DOING NOTHING IS DOING SOMETHING

There is arguably no better time than right now to do nothing. When things get a little crazy in the world, it plays on our emotions, and our emotions seem to tell us we need to do something. If that sounds like you, we are here to remind you that doing nothing is doing something. And right now, doing nothing is very likely the right something to be doing.

Remember that we are all on our own unique money learning journey. Learning to be good with your money is without doubt one of the smartest, most life-changing moves anyone can make. We are absolutely sold on the notion that having a proper foundation of financial knowledge can improve your life in immeasurable ways. And rest assured, there’s a lot of data that backs up our thinking here…

Setting up a conscious spending plan and building a rainy-day fund can help you live day to day without money stress. Learning the best ways to save and invest for the long term can mean having more money for your retirement or even being able to stop work much sooner than you had ever imagined. And it goes without saying that being able to pay off your home loan quicker and easier is the icing on the financial cake.

Now enter those emotions we touched on. We are all humans and with being a human comes emotion. Sometimes our emotions can end up smack bang in the middle of even the best financial plans and threaten to derail them. Being aware of how our emotions can work against our finances is somewhat critical to the successful implementation and sustainability of our financial plan.

We raise this now as there has been a lot of uncertainty gripping the world. Inflation is still front and centre, and along with global conflict its causing volatility in financial markets, the raising of interest rates and last but not least, higher living costs. More often than not, our human reaction in times of uncertainty is the strong urge to do something. Whenever the media start beating their drums the loudest, we feel compelled to take action. When we don't act, we often feel like we are losing or missing out. When emotion takes over what quickly gets forgotten is that financial markets go backwards on average once every five years, we forget that interest rates have risen from historically low levels. What we are seeing is actually quite normal and a knee-jerk reaction isn’t likely part of your financial plan.

Our job is to help you act in your best interests. Therefore, we need to remind you that trying to time investment markets or quickly locking in fixed rates on your mortgage might actually be poor financial decisions, driven by understandable emotion. Our job is to remind you to stick to your financial game plan. One small step at a time is needed.

Not to confuse matters, but we are still big advocates of taking action. You just need to know when action is needed and when it isn’t. We want you to take action on the big ticket items, we want you to implement good financial habits, as doing such allows you to do nothing most of the rest of the time. This is the key, the better you get yourself set up financially and instil good financial habits, the less you need to do as you progress. It’s similar in many ways to becoming and staying physically fit. With money and finance, time becomes your best friend and does most the hard work for you, whilst you keep focus on what your objectives are, and why you do what you do with your money.

If you are in need of support or have questions we can help with, please shoot us an email at [email protected]

Cheers,

Dan and Dave