1. Credit Cards: Credit cards are a easy way to get into trouble financially. When my mother was young she was told to create “credit” by getting credit cards and paying them off slowly every month. She got in trouble right away. She received a credit card to a clothing store called Benetton and JCPenney. She was 18 years old and it was like somebody had handed her $1000. She maxed both cards within two months and it took her almost 3 years to pay off. By the time she paid off the thousand dollars she actually paid almost $3000 for clothes that she didn’t even wear anymore. It was a good life lesson she pays off credit cards every single month now since.

2. Having more than one checking account: my dad said if you have more than one checking account you can use one for bills and the others for things that you are striving to buy. He had a checking account for a boat, mortgage and a new car. All of his disposable income at the end of every month went into these three accounts and although it took many years he could afford to buy a new car with cash and mom never let him buy another boat and they use that money to go on vacation.


 

3. Matching retirement funds at work: if you ever have a job that matches the money put into your retirement account maxed it out every single opportunity you get. You'll never get another bike account that pays you as much.

4. Jobs: even if you hate your job do not leave it until you have another. Even if you get a job as a pizza delivery man after being the vice president of Google. Your self worth is incredibly attached to not being a bum. No employer in the world will pick up somebody who’s been unemployed for a long time because there is always job out there you just have to be able to swallow your pride and take it and if your new employee has so much pride they would rather be a drain on the family then bring in income of any kind I would not want to work with them anyway so I wouldn’t hire them.

5. Don’t drink and drive or smoke pot and drive. An average DWI cost over $10,000 A friend of my dad’s got three beers on a ferry after a baseball game in the 1 mile drive home he managed to get stopped for drunk driving and those three 8 dollar beers on the ferry cost him almost $16,000 in cash. Being stupid is very expensive, as it should be.