While in school we actually practiced writing goals over and over. Every case study we wrote up we had to have functional goals. They did this because if you had vague goals with no proof that these goals had been met then you didn't get paid. Now, it seems simple to write a functional goal, but it is actually hard when you start. I'll give an example.
Patient A will have no back pain after leaving therapy is a nice vague goal. Yet, how do you know when you've reached it? A better goal is: Patient A will rate her back pain from an 8/10 to a 2/10, after standing for over 4 hours at her job, in 4 weeks. Now all you have to do is document how she feels over 4 weeks and you can see if the goal is being met.
This week I read Simple Mom and Dave Ramsey and each discussed financial goals. Since the husband and I were about to have our beginning of the year budget summit I thought I'd blog about our goals both financial and some personal ones for me. I'm trying to use my more detailed goal writing for this year.
Past Goals for Year 2009:
1. Maintain a healthy pregnancy and have a baby
2. Begin saving each month for a car. (We are following this plan)
3. Pay off as much extra as we can on the mortgage.
Goal Status to Date:
1. I have a beautiful 7 month old who is finally starting to sleep more.
2. We have consistently been saving for a car since May.
3. We have been paying above the mortgage each month. As a bonus Christmas present the husband presented me with a detailed plan on re-financing our house. We got a great rate, had an appraisal, and for $20 more a month the house will be paid off before our oldest son turns 16. As a bonus we got rid of the pesky mortgage insurance. Merry Christmas to me.
Goals for 2010:
1. Lose the last 10 pounds of pesky baby weight and tone up my core area.
2. Buy a car by April and keep saving for a turn over car. (You can even watch the plan on YouTube here. Kinda hokey, but it gets the idea across.)
3. Make Educational IRAs for the boys. Put what we get as a tax deduction for the boys into their funds by May.
4. Put in a certain (I have a specific percentage, but we are still working on logistics) percentage in our Roth IRAs by December.
5. Set up a new budget after April evaluations to see what extra money we can put toward the mortgage payment.
6. Set up a trust and have a notarized will by the end of January.
How about you guys? Any goals or plans or am I a little too goal oriented?
6 comments:
Goals. Well, survive Jeff's first "real" year at MW. Keep saving massive quantities for a house, and pay off our car by June (one year from purchase date). About baby weight, well I don't even like to think about it. I've got about 20 lbs to go. (Aurelia + Ellie. I got pregnant again before I could get rid of all of it the first time). We did wills/trusts a while ago (helps when your father-in-law does this kind of law) and set up 529s for the girls for Christmas (and requested relatives to direct gift-giving there...didn't work incidentally). Now, I'm about sapped of goals. Yours sound good though!
I hear you about surviving the billable hours! It can be a killer.
It is handy to have people at the husband's office that can look at our will/trust and witness us signing. One of the perks I guess. That, and as the husband points out, free coke with the "good" ice.
Oh and I'm quite envious of your stamp situation. To never have to go to the post office again....
No. We all have these super boring, super labor intensive adult goals and while I have started many, I need to finish them right away. Have the will started but want to change it and finally get it finalized, have the supplemental insurance for both of us, need to decide whether to do IRA or 529 for Gus ASAP - have the gift moneys from relatives in savings acct but need to switch over - any ideas on why to do one over the other? Have started the conversation with and found the recommended financial planner but got stuck on the verbage of the required info and put it away - need to finish. Happy to report that we met our financial goal for 2009 to have two years worth of mortgage payments saved up. Ridiculous for sure but I am thinking of making a career change in the next few years and will need to have a safety net. Every time I put money back in that account I fee liberated! Its boring and overwhelming at times to do all of these things but doesn't it feel good to have it all taken care of? Kudos for being responsible parents!
Stac-
Here us a good article on ESA vs the 529 plan. The major difference, as far as I can tell, is that the 529 is for higher education only ans the ESA can be used for K-12 as well. There are a few other differences but the article eplains it well. We are meeting with a financial advisor oon to discuss. I'll let you know what we decide:)
It does feel good to get some of theses things done. It makes me feel better knowing that if anything happens to us our kids will be taken care of!
Sorry, the article is here: http://www.goodfinancialcents.com/529-questions-college-savings-plans/
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