Automate Your Budget for Financial Freedom: How to Put Your Finances on Autopilot

  We’re going to talk today about the power of automation with your budget. You know, why. Because what if your budget was on autopilot? I mean, when you think about automating parts of your life, this is definitely one of the areas that you want it automated because we don’t have the time. Like literally think about how busy you are.

Most of our clients miss for Alyssa’s. This is our entrepreneur. So let’s think about, or nurses. Or there are wives of entrepreneurs, right? You think about all of that you think about your kids, that schedule, you think about your schedule, you think about your, your church life, your community life, like your friends, like everything that you have going on.

And we don’t have time to really think about our finances. We want it automated as much as possible. So that’s what we’re here to talk about today. Yeah. And I think a lot of people don’t think about automating. You know, Automating possibility. Life in general, but like how, what is possible to automate with your budget, your finances, so that it’s all easier.

Right. And so that’s what we’re going to talk about today. Yeah.

Okay. So why, what is. Why do you want your, your finances automated? What is, what is the point behind all of it? And so here’s the deal, guys. So the first reason why is because it reduces decision fatigue. Well, like Vanessa said, you, we were just talking today. We’re going to be a bunch of se real people. We wake up at 5:00 AM. And we sprint until the time. Your bed. And like, you have so many decisions all day.

You have, so, and you have so many things to do. You don’t need to be deciding whether you can pay this or do this, or how much you have for that or whatever. You don’t have any more mental energy for that. It just needs to. You don’t have any, you have decision fatigue and. And if you have decision fatigue, it means if you do have to make a decision with your money. It’s going to be the wrong one. Well, and it’s nice to know, like Shannon said, it’s one less thing off your plate. You not only have the decisions that you already know you’re going to have to make during the day.

It’s the ones that pop up when your kids call. Call you in the moment or your husband calls you in something new, something emergency or whatever comes up, and then you have to make new decisions on top of the decisions you already knew you had to make. So if we can just reduce that, if we can just reduce the fact that the finances are not even part of that, like, oh, that’d be so good. Well, and that makes me think about how you can, you’re freeing up time too, because like, we were just talking to somebody who they have an account for their kid.

And when you’re talking about your kids are calling you, when they call you and say, can we do this or that you could, you know, they have an account or they have a certain amount of money and like the answers right there. Yes or no. Right, right. And also, and it frees up your decision. It frees up time, like going back and forth, whether you can do something or not.

So and then also it frees up time. Just one more time in case you didn’t get that. Well, so you know what we have. So what, the way that we really start you off is we do want you to get those accounts separated. And then you might, you’re probably going to start with some manual transfers. Right.

But once you get everything figured out, then when you go to put it on automation, Like you had that client that used to spend all Saturday morning trying to figure out like what’s ha where, how much untangling that, that mess. But even if you’re trying to do our system, but you’re doing manual transfers, like by the time you get to automat automating all of this, like you’re, you’re just gonna free up so much time and mental stress.

Yeah. Well, we have a lot of people that start off, like Shannon said with the manual, but that’s okay. Like you can start there. If you can get the two separate accounts set up, which is minimally your bills account and your spending account, and just know that you’re manually going in because you don’t trust the process yet because you haven’t built that trust yet with your bank account or your money.

That’s okay. But if you’re just making manual transfers at the beginning, That’s fine, but then guys, then once you trust it, then, like Shannon said, you’re going to set up the automatic transfers to go into the different accounts. That is going to be great. Yeah. And we’re, so we’re still, we’re still trying to get to you to tell you why.

Right? So we have all the, how we’re about to tell you that, which we tell you all the time, but we’re going to break it down a little bit specifically about automation here. But the other, why is consistency? So you want, we like the idea of your money looking the same every month.

Like it’s not this rollercoaster of emotions, this feast or famine, it’s just consistent. Right. And if you automate your finances, it can be consistent, which by the way, if you’re being consistent, then all of your savings buckets are being done consistently, automatically growing.

And so all of this can be happening without, and you’re like basically winning at finances without even thinking about it. Well, and it’s not just, we want it to be consistent every month. We want it to be consistent. Every paycheck. Yeah. Right. So this idea of will this paycheck this month, I only pay mortgage cause that’s the only thing I can afford it.

And we have to live off of the freezer and what’s in the pantry for the next two weeks. And then when I get paid, then we can actually go grocery shopping. That, that mentality, that habit now. Right. Like, we’re done with that. And we want you to be done with that because that’s not the life that we want you to have.

So the idea here is not just to automate the monthly budget, but every single paycheck that you get paid. So that way you’re doing the same thing all the time. Like that is where the true relief comes in. Yeah. Okay. And then other reasons to automate, well, how about just reducing your stress load?

Because like we talked about, you have so much going on, you don’t need to be thinking about, did I pay that bill? Or do we, how much money do I have for groceries this week? Let me do all of this math in my head based on what’s, whatever. Going through the 50,000 transactions in my account? No, no. We don’t have time for that.

And you don’t have this, you, you need to just know that it’s running on autopilot and you can just do all the things that you need to do and your money’s taken care of. Yeah, for sure. And another thing is that you can build wealth on autopilot. And have you ever thought about that? What if you were literally investing, they, maybe you don’t have a debt problem.

That’s totally fine. We have a lot of people that come in like, Hey, debt, isn’t an issue for me, but this is where I want to be financially. Like. That’s how I want to build wealth and grow that way. Great. Let’s do that on. Have you ever thought about how you can invest monthly or invest every paycheck or build your savings buckets automatically?

So that way you can see that money consistently going into that account. Yeah. Consistency. Remember. Every single paycheck it’s like, that is so great. Okay. So let’s talk about what to automate then. So we’ve hopefully convinced you that it’s cool. You should do it. You should join the cool kids club and automate, but what do we do?

Yeah. So the first thing we want you to automate is your bills. So your monthly bills that are coming in, these are things that you are getting charged for on a reoccurring basis. So think of your utilities, your rent, your mortgage insurance, your subscriptions, and all of your debt payments. Yeah.

And so we teach you to have a separate bills account. Okay. So whatever you’ve got going on now, which if you’re like most of our listeners, you have one bill, one checking account, and one savings account, that’s fine. We’re going to open up a separate savings account or a checking account, and that’s going to be where we’re spending us, but we’re going to set this bills account up and only bills are happening out of it.

What happens? Your paychecks? Checks get deposited in there automatically. Right. Direct deposit for most of you is pretty, pretty normal. Okay. And then your bills, you set every single bill up to come out. Automatically. Yes. We said it it’s automatic. And so you can set those up to come out, whatever day they’re due.

You don’t even have to stress about that. And it’s, they’re going to come out, but bills are all going to pull out automatically and it’s going to be a complete, separate account, so nothing can get wrong here because there’s always enough money in here to pay your bills. You’re not spending from it.

And all of your spending and savings are elsewhere. So it’s this amazing bills account I can hear. And I’m envisioning our listeners going. Like you said automatically like, oh, I don’t, I don’t know if I can do that. I’m not really sure because is there enough money in there? Yeah, I don’t, yeah. I’ve never been able to do that before we get it, but we want to tell you that if you just try our system. It’s going to help.

That’s why we want to separate the accounts. So you know, it, it will work and you’ve got to start like the biggest thing here is you just have to start. Yeah. And if you could do that, then you’re going to be able to see the money build in that account. So that way there’s always money coming in and always money going out of that account that you’re not spending out of.

Remember, this is an account that’s only paying bills, so you don’t have a debit card attached to it and you’re not going to use it for anything else. And so how you do that is you take your income minus your debts and your bills, right? And, and then everything else you can take and put somewhere else into spending and saving, we can get specific in that, but you just want to keep that amount of money in that account.

And then like Vanessa said, it could just come out and you don’t have to worry about it. I I’ll never forget. One of our clients said I went on vacation. I didn’t have to worry about paying bills. That was so weird. And I’m like, yeah, that’s what the bill system, it’s automatic. Your income goes in the bills, come out, you don’t have to touch anything.

This is where I feel like, you know, sadly I’ve. Taken this for granted because I’ve been doing this system for so long. I don’t even know what that life would feel like. Yeah. Like being in that position where you w. You had to like, worry about stuff like that while you’re on vacation. Like we don’t want, again, that’s not something we want for you.

And, and I feel like sadly, I do take it for granted because I’ve been doing this for so long. So y’all, I’m telling you the other side, come to the other side, you’re going to love it. Let’s do that. Please do that. Okay, so what else can you automate? Well, believe it or not, you can automate your spending what brain brain. Mind blown. Mic drop.

So when we talk about your spending, this is your gas or groceries, your pocket money, your eating out money. This is money for kids that you spend on them throughout the month. Haircuts, things like that, where you can actually automate all of that. So that way the money is being transferred from your main bills account into those other spending accounts, or you’re taking the money out at the ATM for cash, every single paycheck.

So the how really quickly, and again, you can go to pass episodes and you can get more in depth in this, but the, how is doing 90 day review, right? A 90 day audit where you print out 90 days worth of bank credit card statements, whatever you use for your spending. And you’re going to go through those and highlight what you’re spending. Pending.

Right. So you’re going to know how likeness that, how much we’re spending on groceries, give or take how much you’re spending on eating out gas, how much you’re spending on your kids. Love them so much. Like what are we spending money? And then I can do that on purpose. So now I’m going to take. When I get paid that amount.

So I’m going to say, okay, here’s what I was spending. What do I want to spend set a budget line item for each one of the spending account or categories. And then you transfer that money to an account that is labeled with that category. So if it’s your kids, it’s your kids name. If it’s gas and groceries, it’s called gas and groceries.

And then all you have to do. It’s transferred automatically every payday so that you always are getting funded. You’re getting refunded, you’re getting refunded with this cash in your account, and then you can spend, and you don’t have to transfer anything. You don’t have to think how much. Do I have, you don’t have to think.

Okay. When can I get money? What’s leftover all happening automatically. And it’s separate. So I don’t know if you guys understood that part. It’s in a completely separate account. Then the account that’s paying your bills. And so that way it’s very clear. How much you have in there to spend, and that way you can’t ever go over.

And I always tell my clients like, take off this overdraft protection. Okay. So that way your card can’t go through. Yeah. If you are. I so like for instance, I had a client, her. For some reason of her husband’s spinning account was attached to the bills account for overdraft protection. And so if he swiped her and there wasn’t enough money, it would just pull from bills automatically.

And I was like, oh no, you need to shut that down. Because it not just for him, but for her, like anyone, if you’re, if you don’t have the money in that account to spend, then you’re not going to spend it. Like you’re done spending, that’s your cue. We’re not going to just pull from another account to be able to do that.

Right, right. Okay

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So other things that you can automate your savings buckets, right? Any sort of savings that you want to do, you can automate it the same system. Right? So whatever. Thanks for trying to save for maybe it’s vacation. Maybe it’s Christmas, maybe it’s a new car. Maybe it’s a new roof for your house, whatever, whatever you need to save for that can be automatically done.

Okay. And many of you have tried this, but we’re going to do it on purpose because the point is once we have the bills automated and the spending automated. When we automate the savings, you might actually stick to it. Usually people might, if they do have a transfer at savings, right, Vanessa, and then, but then they end up spending it throughout the month because they don’t have an actual budget they’re seeking to.

But if you do this whole system, In whole, this will be easy. And it’s the same thing. The money, all your income gets deposited. You’ve done the math. You’ve done your budget, which says income minus debts, minus bills. My spending look, this is how much I have leftover for saving. I’m going to. Divide that by the number of paychecks and that automatic transfer is going into each individual savings bucket account for the things I want to say for, yeah.

And this is such a great way to build the amount of money that you have in your state. Like. In your bank. So think about people are talking about building wealth, which is through usually investments into your savings accounts, but think about all the things that are coming up, that you’ve never budgeted for until the moment that you need to pay for it.

So if, for instance, Christmas people sometimes forget, and they’re budgeting for that. Like November, December. Where you could actually be saving for that months in advance and go, okay. I’m putting. $2,000, $3,000 cap on Christmas. This is how much I need, and this is the amount of time that I have to save for it.

I’m going to divvy that up, this certain amount of money that I need, and every single paycheck I’m putting, I’m taking money out of my bills account and transferring into my Christmas account. So I have the money they’re available on purpose. Yes. You know, So out of your bills account, not an accident, but on purpose so that it’s all adding up or actually subtracting the equals zero on purpose.

And one thing I want to add is people like to do direct deposits from their paycheck, like from payroll, like they have to contact their HR department or whatever, and do these, we don’t want you to do that. We want you to set up all of these automatic transfers from your bank. Okay. Not from any other third party, because we want you to be able to have. And have access to that.

Yeah. And this is the whole point of what we do is you taking ownership of your finances, you being the CFO of your household budget. And so that is what you’re not, you’re not asking permission. Right? You’re going to say. It’s it’s you, you’re doing it on purpose. So obviously another one that you can do And this will actually come out of your Bill’s account as investments, right?

So let’s say you get to the point, or you’re already to the point where, you know, you’re, you’re putting 500 bucks or whatever, whatever toward him investments every month. That can be automated too. It’s just automatically coming out because you have a bills account. You’ve done the budget to know how much I need to leave in the bills account so that this can come out automatically every month. Yeah.

And so when we talk about setting up all these automations, like China alluded to it before you are going to do the budget for the entire month to see where your money is going. And then you’re going to say, okay, how many paychecks do I get this month to fund this budget? Sometimes people get paid once a month and that’s easy.

So you just have one transfer a month. Sometimes people get paid twice a month. So that means you’re going to break down your transfers by paycheck. Right? So you’re going to say, I get paid twice a month. If I’m going to put $500 in my spinning account a month, that means two 50 is going per paycheck.

Right?, and then maybe you get paid once a week and that, so my husband gets paid weekly, so we break everything down to what is happening. What’s getting transferred every single week. So, and I love that for me. It’s like, I know what my grocery budget is.

Our. For seven days. For me. That’s good. So that is where you’re going to take this amount of money that you’re going to transfer. You’re going to break it down by paychecks, and you’re going to set that up automatically to go into those accounts every single time you get paid, which means that your paychecks are automated.

Right? So I, you know, sometimes people in their head, Vanessa, they’re thinking of, Hey, this paycheck pays. This bill and this, and then, or I see them write it out. Like this paycheck has a lot going on now. Every paycheck is the same and every, and when your paycheck drops, it automatically does its work.

It starts going to work in some, like Vanessa said, some of it stays for bill. Some of it goes to spending. Some of it goes to the savings it’s done. It’s automated. You just woke up like this, right. You woke up with your, with your money all over where it needs to be exactly doing the job. And that’s how this whole thing put together automates for budget.

Right? So as we teach your budget, is your income. It is your debts. It is your bills. It is your spending and use your savings. So once you’ve put all of those on auto transfer and auto deposit and auto. Withdrawal. Then your whole budget guys is automated based and it’s based on your paycheck.

So it’s based on how many paychecks you get for the month. But remember, we’re not saying this paycheck pays this bills and this paycheck does this. Everything is doing the exact same thing all the time. It’s just divided by how many paychecks you have. Right. And so, but my point is the entire budget is automated.

Right? So. When we’re. You know, you’re learning how to budget and how to do this. Your budget can be completely automatic once you get that one monthly. Viewpoint figured out your whole budget. Everything that you’re doing can be on autopilot. And I think that’s really exciting because you want to be a good steward of your money.

You want to be doing things on purpose with your money. The best way to do that is that you don’t have to do anything. Let’s be really honest, you getting in it with your hands is what slows things down or messes them up. If you can put the, if you can, your best self puts a vision, puts a budget together, and then you put that all on autopilot.

It’s much more likely to actually happen. Well, and we just had two calls with clients, previous clients that had graduated and they talked about like, I think I check in a couple of times a month, maybe. To look at it and see how it’s going, because it’s all automated because I have everything done for them.

And all they really have to do is make the upcoming budget that’s coming out. But it’s and, and really at that point, once it’s automated, you’re just adding in like the one-off things that happened throughout the month. Other than that you’re spending, like Shannon said, your savings, your bills, all that is automated. So literally becomes easy peasy, lemon, squeezy.

Yeah. And I it’s, just to your point, like, it’s so exciting because you just they don’t have to do anything. And just like she said, I just pulled my food at money, my food card out, and I pay it because I know I haven’t been up in there because it gets refunded every two weeks, you know? And it’s the same with the savings.

I, I know like I’m over here at, you know, baseball practice or at school or whatever I’m doing. And my, my vacation budget is just growing every week, you know? So that’s the power of this is very exciting. It can take your stress load down. It can take the time that you have to spend on this down and it can make you this automatic awesome budgeting in charge of, or. Finances kind of person. It can make it automatic.

Yeah. Again, so we challenge you guys to set this up, try to do an automatic budget and automatic, like automated for everything, your, your paychecks, your budget, everything. Try it. If you have any questions about setting it up, email us@helloatbudgetbesties.com. If you want to hear from you, and also after you’ve implemented it. Let us know.

I want to hear your success stories and also share this episode. If somebody, if you think somebody, if you guys are talking about how I, on the time to pay my bills or whatever, send this to them, share it with them. And then you guys can come on and also a free call because some of this you might be like, but wait. I have questions. I have questions.

My budget does this or that, or I’m weird because of this weird thing that happens with my money. That’s fine. Come to budget besties. Dot com forward slash live call. Come on a call with us. We don’t have to give any real information around where you can ask your questions. We can coach you and it will help.

Not only you, but anyone else who’s listening. So we have a lot of offers for you, but. But the point is do the things that we’re saying, and we love you. Yeah, I think so. Right. Okay.