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Well ladies, we’ve come in 2nd, again. Multiple studies show that women have worse credit scores than men. How is that possible?  We are the ones proven to be more rational in our financial decision making compared to men. Cognitive neuroscience has proven that we ladies are a great deal more rational in financial decision making than are men!   So what gives? What is keeping our scores down?   Studies conclude that due to the gender pay gap women have suffered from for so long, our decreased income leads to higher debt to credit ratio than that of men. Due to a lower income level, women as a group overall are granted a lower credit limit than men. This leads to women using more of their credit, and getting closer to their given limit; resulting in a higher credit to debt ratio, which takes points off credit scores.   So, there you have it ladies, once again we are fighting more to stay alive in this financial world. The good news? The gender pay gap is continuing to be a topic of discussion – which is a substantial win in itself compared to previous years. In the meantime, we will need to find other methods to continue to take control and excel with our finances. Stay tuned, Sisterhood ……   “Second place is not a defeat. It is a stimulation to get better. It makes you even more determined.” -Carlos Lopes

Have you ever left the office (maybe to return home to kids doing homework) and think to yourself, if only I could go back to a level of high-school-difficulty-life. Sometimes I think about how easy it was at times; How we would love to exchange our adult responsibilities and problems with those of our 16- year-old self.   Imagine that for 1 day, you can go back to high school. However, in that 1 day you must pass a financial literacy test. Do you think you could do it??   A New Bill?   In March 2019, State Senator Rick Horner (North Carolina) co-sponsored a new bill that would require high school students to pass a financial literacy course in order to graduate. Currently only 17 states require high school students to take Personal Finance Course.1   According to an article, the financial course would cover “the true cost of credit; choosing and managing a credit card; borrowing money for an automobile or other large purchase; home mortgages, credit scoring and credit reports planning and paying for post-secondary education; and other relevant financial literacy issues” among other topics.   What are your thoughts? Do you think this requirement is a good idea?   Would you be better off today if you had learned about the basics of finance when you were younger?   Do you think it’s important to support the idea that women and men should be armed with knowledge that directly affects their lives and future? Rather than keeping them in the dark thus making them susceptible to others taking advantage of them and their finances, or leaving them behind?     If you want to check on the status of the Bill…here is the link to the Government’s Bill Lookup Tool: https://www.ncleg.gov/BillLookUp/2019/s134   If the bill is approved, it would cost taxpayers $2 million dollars to fund training for educators and would be added to the 2020-2021 school year curriculum.   Let us know what you think about instituting a Financial Literacy requirement in schools. Comment below, send us an email, drop us a line on our social media platforms. We’d love to hear what you think! 1 Winston-Salem Chronicle- Winston-Salem, NC

Financial planning is much more than just buying life insurance, or an annuity and calling it a day. Many people have a false perception of what financial planning really entails accompanied by a false sense of fear. Financial planning is not just a singular action, the concept is a process to follow, much like a diet plan. If you wanted to lose weight, or live a more active lifestyle, would you just start by making random purchases of products you think can help? Most likely, you would not. One of the best examples I can think of to help explain the reality of financial planning is a weight management program, such as Weight Watchers or Jenny Craig. If you have ever been a part of these programs, then you know that they are more involved but generally lead to great results. When you join a program like these, you simply do not just try to eat better, workout more, and hope for the best. When you are creating a financial plan, you follow a similar format to that of a weight management program, acknowledging that both plans are to make your life better from now on so you can live longer and enjoy life!   Financial Planning Weight Management Step 1: Find your starting point Where do you currently stand financially? What assets and investments do you have? What are your measurements: weight, diet habits, exercise frequency, etc. TO CONTINUE READING & FOR STEPS 2-7, CLICK HERE

How does your mind react to those words? What emotions are sparked by those words? Do you immediately sigh and say, “whew I am not gonna panic because my ESF (Emergency Spending Fund) will take care of me.” Or, do you feel like so many people we heard from during the recent Gov’t Shutdown – “oh, no … I live paycheck to paycheck… this is an emergency spending problem.”   Like all unintended consequences, the government shutdown has highlighted a guiding principle here at Financial Sisterhood. We repeatedly emphasize the theory of having money in reserve … call it an emergency fund, call it rainy day money, call it contingency funds, or any one of other terms … you MUST have a stash of cash that has no other purpose other than to fix entirely unexpected, unforeseen, serious, threats to your financial structure.   The 2019 shutdown has shined a light on issues of personal financial security, national security and fiscal health and preparedness. In the 2018-2019 Government shutdown, employees were not being paid for the duration of the shutdown, with far too many employees having a hard time making ends meet. Does that inconvenient word “unprepared” come to mind?   This circumstance just highlights a problem that thousands of other non-governmental, private sector employees have every month with any number of unexpected issues that challenge their financial foundation. We should all use this revealing example to gain greater financial literacy and fix our own future emergency days. Ladies, let’s not be naïve … it is when, not if!   This is a lesson to learn from and to secure your own financial future.  It’s not just in the USA either … countless international examples show this necessity of action for women around the world.   Women are, arguably, the glue that holds families together. To keep your own family strong it is imperative that you have an emergency spending plan. Having exposure to such a risk without a thoughtful and disciplined solution is irresponsible in the adult world; it leaves you vulnerable, manipulated and open to poor or desperate choices. Often from those poor or desperate choices come outcomes that truly have even more devastating consequences. Think of an example of those consequences being things like a lower credit rating, higher future interest rates on borrowing occasions, lost personal and business opportunities that could make a career or personal life.   Rarely can one define an emergency in advance, and often things don’t really seem like an emergency until … suddenly … there is a problem.  Try as we all might, it is fantasy and not reasonable to assume that we can consistently live a life that is never interrupted and always goes as we wish.  Or, worse yet, that someone else is going to bail us out of our problem.   But let us all take heart and see the silver lining in an ugly situation … we can increase our financial learning and we can define an ESF (Emergency Spending Fund) for our own use.   How do we start? Using the government shutdown as an example would be that those employees who receive their back-pay apply a portion to strengthening, or as it sounds many should start, an emergency fund.   What makes an emergency spending fund? Most times an ESF (Emergency Spending Fund) is considered to be readily available money to cover 3 months to a 1-year timeframe of necessary expenses for a household. Certainly at a minimum it would mean having enough funds to carry a 14 day or 30-day paycheck, unlike what has been demonstrated in the government shutdown.   ** Woman-to-woman TIP: Have tires, food, gas, hospital bills, water heaters, refrigerators, roofs, gone down in price in the last 3, 5 or 10 years? Certainly not. Be sure to have your ESF keep pace with inflation and your spending plan; which means once in a while you will have to increase your contribution to your ESF (Emergency Spending Fund) and not just sit without attention.   And, please, don’t get enamored with trying to figure out if your money sitting in a cash account is not earning enough interest, or isn’t getting you “points” etc.  Put it aside for its’ intended purpose … be disciplined and only use it for emergency; the slight trade-off in interest will be returned many fold when you actually need, and can immediately, access your ESF. How much should you have in your ESF? Use our free worksheet to find out Free ESF Worksheet

It’s all fun and games until you can’t even keep up with yourself let alone, work, family, friends, school, and now you’re being asked to stay organized on top of it!   We want to share some tips we thought were extremely helpful in getting a system in place that you can actually benefit from.   Keeping a central spot for all organization related materials is key. And having a plan for the influx of incoming documents is so important. Use this article to help plan out what your ongoing plan will be to keep you on top of everything like the super-human you are.

We learned the method of organizing based on categories of length of time we will need certain documents. Now, what are those documents that go into each category? How do we know to keep something for 1 year versus 7 years?   Why do I have to keep this? You may ask yourself, why would I have to keep something for 7 years? Or longer? This article not only explains what to keep and for how long but also explains ‘The Why’ of keeping some documents for an extended period of time. Yes, 7 years is a long time, but its necessary for some items in this list! I printed this list and paper clipped it to my accordion file to remind myself. This is one of those things that in time, will come naturally to you. You will know when a certain document comes across your desk that you will need to file it away for long term, or if you can shred it relatively quickly. Practice makes perfect!   Personal Tip: The psychological principle of the Familiarity Effect states that humans will become more familiar with and have a preference towards something due to exposure to it. If you can increase your exposure to staying organized and the process, you will have a better familiarity with it and can generate a preference to staying organized. (Bonus tip: this works with dating and relationships too – if you want someone to like you…make sure you’re around a lot for them to be familiar with you! We’re not saying be creepy but you get the idea!)

Literally Misplacing Money When we were younger, our parents used to do Easter egg hunts with us on Easter morning with plastic eggs. Green eggs were filled with money (ranging from $1-$5- don’t worry no 100s in our eggs) and the other colors were filled with candy. On one particular year, my parents decided to take the fun outdoors to the backyard. They hid 15 green eggs and they were tasked with remembering where they hid each one. Long story short… we found egg #15 four years later by accident in the yard! How it was not taken by the hundreds of animals that may have come in contact with it is beyond me. Anyway, the point of the story is that a lot of times we think we have a good grasp of where we put things. Even if we just put it there 20 minutes ago, as in the case with the hidden eggs. Many of us think the same with our important financial documents, possessions, and heirlooms. We have all put something in a ‘safe spot’ only to pull our hair out trying to remember where we put it!   Is a Safety Deposit Box Right For Me? A safety deposit box has been a popular method to keep important items in a safe place. However, there are some questions that arise such as: What exactly is it? What do I put in it? Why do I need it? We liked this post because it was short and to the point; Telling us exactly what it was, what we should put in it and what we should not put in as well. Extra! Quick Tips: We loved this post about 15 things should know about safety deposit boxes. Sometimes information like this is not generally known and we love when others share for the greater good of the community!  

Tuesday: Where Should Documents Be Kept In that little nook on the counter? The glove compartment in the car, on the desk, with the stack of magazines? In your purse? In the diaper bag? So many places it could be, but only the one bill that you need to pay. New Year’s resolution – get more organized? Getting organized is much harder than keeping up with the organization system that you already have in place. So where do you keep all the important documents so that you can maintain an organized life and be able to find what you are looking for?   I Know What Records to Keep, But Where Do I Keep Them? We love the idea in this article to sort your organization system by how long you will need the documents. It makes total sense to store the documents you will need for a year in a different spot than you would for documents that you are planning on keeping for the long haul. Making it easier to access the records you need sooner and getting everything you don’t need right now out of the way!     Out of Sight Out of Mind Personal Tip: I found that when trying to stay organized, if I kept my immediate filing system out where I was more apt to see it on a day to day basis, I was more likely to keep up with filing than if I tucked it away somewhere.

Many women have so many other things going on life that when a decision comes across them and if it takes more than 30 seconds, they might as well just scrap it. Because in those 30 seconds, the grilled cheese has started to burn, the dog walked in with dirty paws all over your white tile, your daughter bumped her head on the table and is crying now, and your husband is asking you if you remember where he put his sunglasses… last thing you have time for right now is whether to keep that piece of mail or toss it. Trying to stay organized when you only have 5 seconds to really allocate towards organization is a difficult task. We understand where you’re coming from. There are two types of people in this world – those that keep everything, and those that toss everything. We’ve taken it upon ourselves to help shed some clarity on exactly what files you should be creating and what documents to keep in order to be a Minimalist Organized Woman – it’s all the rage these days.  A New Mantra to Live By This article lays out a simple rule of thumb to think about when making a decision like whether to keep or throw, when you only have 5 seconds to make it. “What’s the worst thing that can happen if I throw it out? Can I get another copy?” We love this!  This one little thought makes the process so much easier. A credit card statement lands on the counter; you have online banking and can access that statement anytime you want; TOSS IT! So for some of us, we’ll use this mantra to keep a relatively paper-free organization strategy. But what if we can’t get another copy or an electronic version? How do we know what is important to keep in those instances? Paper Documents You Should Keep When in doubt, if the item in question falls under one of these categories, file it away for safekeeping: Tax Returns Tax- related documents Retirement Plan Statements IRA Contribution confirmations Brokerage Statements Bank Records Bills Pay stubs Credit Card statements Receipts Home improvement costs/documentation House records Legally binding documents   Security Tip: If you receive pre-approval credit card applications, some of these have partial information about you already pre-filled in such as name and address. Shred these pre-approval applications to limit your risk of having your identity stolen. A credit card application with partial information already filled in makes it much easier for a thief to open a credit card in your name. Plus – you’ve already been pre-approved according to the company – one less step the thief needs to take to get your money! Being able to quickly decide if something should be kept or can be shredded can help keep a clean and organized home – especially if you will need to search for something specific one day. Not to mention we don’t have time for lengthy decisions! We’ve got a lot of things on our mind!