Submitted by Hildy910 on 01/11/2008.
Hi everybody,
I need some advice about financial organization. Both my husband and I have been diagnosed with ADHD, which means that we both procrastinate mightily when it comes to paying bills and doing other financial stuff. It's incredibly frustrating to make the same mistake over and over and over, not to mention expensive as I have to pay late fees that I wouldn't have to if I'd paid the darn bill on time.
Of the two of us, I'm less inclined to chaos, so I do most of this household organizational stuff. Some works well, as stuff around kids, cooking and scheduling is in an area of hyperfocus. But the finances are just awful.
I need some sort of advice, or financial advisor who knows how to work with ADHD people, to give me an simple way to organize and deal with things. We are also trying to figure out very basic things such as how much we spend in certain areas, so that we can create a budget. But that, too, fizzles out.
Any ideas?
How I take care of my finance
Submitted by ccs on
Financial Organization
Submitted by MelissaOrlov on
You don't say whether or not you have the financial wherewithal to hire someone to help you on a very part-time basis. But if you have time to hire a personal organizer for the really critical areas, that might make both of your lives easier. Perhaps a retired person who lives in your area and is looking for some very part-time way to make a bit of extra money a few hours a week? If you have a senior center nearby, perhaps you could talk with them about posting this job. Sounds as if you need someone for financial organization mostly - paying bills and organizing your financial files.
I also like the idea of the banking person who helps out, though that person can't physically pay the bills for you.
You can also set up many of your bills to be on "autopay" at their websites. This means the money is automatically deducted from your account each month. This solves the problem of late payment fees, but you would still want to put aside time to review the bills to make sure that they were okay. (And you have to have enough in your account to pay for the bills that come in...)
I set aside a specific day each month to pay bills and deal with whatever comes in that month. To do this, cross that day off your calendar and mark it as bill day, then get your bill due dates aligned by calling your credit card companies (and any other one that might charge a due date). Set the payment due date for 7-9 days after your scheduled payment day to give the payment time to get there. (I also deal with school requests, registrations and all sorts of other stuff that comes into the house on that day). The other benefit of this is that if I finish early I can do something fun as a reward for my hard work!
Melissa Orlov
Financial Organization
Submitted by Hildy910 on
Checkfree & auto pay
Submitted by Comissar on
Some financial organization ideas that worked for us
Submitted by Comissar on
Financial organization
Submitted by Andrea Grenadier (not verified) on
Credit rating
Submitted by Comissar on
It does depend however.
Submitted by Tohanry on
What works for us
Submitted by Frazzledmom on
Keeping organized financially has been a huge challenge for us. What has finally worked for us is using a combination of tracking and organzing tools. We both attended Dave Ramsey's Financial Peace University a few years ago so we do have tools and knowledge.....using them consistently is the key. We use the allocated spending sheet from Dave Ramsay (we actaully made our own using a google doc) combined with a homemade spreadsheet that lays everything out-what's due when. Then we use Mvelopes from Crown Fianancial Concepts to track everything online. We try to enter all transactions within 24 hours. Debit cards are still devious, sneaky and dangerous if we forget to enter transactions. If you are living paycheck to paycheck and money is so tight you can't afford missing a transaction I would highly reccomend using cash only for food, gas/car expenses, clothing, and recreation/ misceallaneous.
Best Wishes and Blessings to you
Frazzledmom in WA
How to get my husband to keep records?
Submitted by Sueann on
My husband and I functioned fairly well for a while with a joint checking account. I checked our account balances online. At least I knew how much we had.
But we have had to separate our finances to avoid someone I owe money to. (I was unable to keep the original payment arrangement because he stopped working.) He has his own account with the bulk of our money. He uses a debit card for everything. It would not be safe for him to carry large amounts of cash, and he needs to buy gas several times a week. He, of course, has no idea what he's spent. I can't get him to go to the bank or call them (he hates the phone) to get the pin for online banking. I can't get him to use the check register. He now finds himself 30 miles from home with no gas and a whole workday ahead of him. How can I get him to do what he needs to do even though it's not stimulating? Just spending until the card is declined is not the way to go.
Hello, I wanted to share
Submitted by hollyamy27 on
Hello, I wanted to share what worked for me in helping my fiance grow more organized in the financial aspect, it took a little over a year before he was comfortable enough to go at it on his own w/o me hand holding as much but it worked. I reminded him twice a week to start what bills were due and he made an agreement to come home with the cash if I could organize the payments and companies & etc...after a while of doing this so I could figure out his financial state w/o him int he picture then I brought him into once I had it all organized. I used a spreadsheet to list company names, total owed amount to ech one and called each company to get the information on a monthly payment plan and the due date payments needed to be made by.
Once I had all this on a sheet as a 'visual' I showed it to him a few weeks after he came home consistently with money to pay all of his bills and not miss anything. After 2 or 3 months of just making sure he was coming home with the cash consistently, then I showed him the sheet and it was sort of shocking for him and he got upset when he realized how much money he owed to so many companies combined. However, I told him the reason this happened was because he ran away and ignored it for so long and did not seek help in how to organize it to begin with - he agreed then he asked me what to do about it and how.
Because I had already started off organizing everything into a sheet and had him making regular payments he was already knocking down the amounts though he did not see the effect it was having. I showed him the sheet when we began and then showed him the one where we were at current day and his response was "I never knew it could be this easy" He came to an understanding that it can be easy it just takes some consistency and little effort and of course his own 'will" to want to do better...
Once I had the comment from him in his 'own' time that he felt things had become a little easier which gave him a new perspective, I told him he will take this sheet post it somewhere he can see it every day and bring home the money he needs each week (which was printed on the sheet in weekly amounts, including his weekly budget for what he wants or needs aside from paying bills) so essentially he saw 4 weeks pre-listed with his personal budget and the amount he would need for that weeks bills separated on two lines. This left him less likely to go over each amount as he knew his targets.
He did wonderful with this and he has kept up with it on his own for the most part. He said having the information on paper was the thing that saved him.. He told me he just never knew where to start taking the info out of his head to get it organized in the right way that made sense so he could see it on paper - which made sense as it was something he struggle with naturally which I knew which is why I stepped in to help him...he now updates his own budget sheets and forecasts hi own spending and has not missed any bills in about a year. AMAZING improvement and all from a spread sheet that took me little time in comparison to put together so eventually he could help himself and realize he is capable of a lot more than he might have thought.
Hope this helps someone out there, if anyone has questions on how to set up an 'easy visual' spreadsheet I can share some helpful tips.
~Best~