An Irish Dave Ramsey?

Diceicle

I've been watching some Dave Ramsey on Youtube and was wondering if there is someone dispensing similar advice for the Irish context?
From the 'recommend a book on family finance' thread, I understand Eoin McGee is sort of in that space but would like to see if there is anyone I'm missing.

Savings-wise we're not too bad but we've 2 young kids and would probably just like to see if we can be a bit cleverer or more deliberate with our savings and where we put our money. Do we have sufficient safety-nets in place and all that.....

Thanks for any helpful suggestions.

Static M.e.

No, I don't think. I listened to Dave for a long time and found his methods very helpful and motivating when I started fixing my debt problems. There comes a point though (Step 4) where it stops working from an Irish perspective and then you need to take a different approach. It's at this point that I think you need to get more information on how to apply it to Ireland - tax and pensions in particular. These are the Irish people that I read \ listen to regularly.

http://informeddecisions.ie/
Blog and Podcast. Paddy focuses a lot on retirement or on the last 10 years towards retirement but he also does some great general information posts. I've listened to all of the Podcasts at this stage.

https://mrsmoneyhacker.com/
Mrs Money Hacker has a great blog and she has recently started a YouTube channel. She focuses on the FIRE movement but she has done a lot of good analysis on different options available and I always learn something from them.

https://anirishinvestorsguide.com/
I really like this Blogger who has posted some great information of EFTs.

The Ask about Money / Money Makeover forum is great for getting a steer too

There is another Podcast from a women in Cork I believe, which I heard was great but I haven't listened to it yet.

Diceicle

Thanks for those links. I'll definitely take a look over them.

Static M.e.

Hi Diceicle,

Something else for you to consider is using an App or Spreadsheet to manage your family budget. I used an excel sheet for a long time, which kinda worked for me but this year I have started using YNAB after reading about here on Boards. I still have to get use to budgeting the YNAB way...but I think it holds a lot of potential for me so I can track and manage what I am spending on. The app \ website itself is quite slick and they have a lot of YouTube videos which are easy to watch. There is also a separate service that you can use "Sync for YNAB" which costs extra, different company, which allows you to automatically import and link your bank accounts with YNAB. I'm still learning but I like the direction it's going\bringing me so I wanted to share in case it was of use to you.

Diceicle

Thanks for that.
Budget-wise and spending-control we're not bad / pretty good ( I'm fairly sure anyway)
We have a budget in excel to cover most things - have a savings plan etc etc but the steps Ramsey (for example) talks about - €1000 emergency fund, 3-6 months expenses in an account somewhere. We technically have that but its just in a 'savings' account. So I'd like to be a little more strategic with how we use our money.
Much appreciated.

Static M.e.

It is interesting that in the YNAB way they say you are better off having single account with all of your savings \ Bills \ Emergency fund and then you use YNAB to decide what job that money has. I understand the logic of it as it really shouldn't matter where your money is but I find it difficult in practice. What has worked for me is to have an emergency fund in an account which is hard for me to get at. It takes me a lot of effort to access that fund so by the time I get access, I'll have spent a couple of days thinking about if that spend is an emergency or not. Somewhat childish but it works for me and that's all that matters for the moment

autumnbelle

You can just add your emergency fund account as a seperate bank ac and give the money a category I find ynab brilliant.

Jim2007

Static M.e. wrote: »

It is interesting that in the YNAB way they say you are better off having single account with all of your savings \ Bills \ Emergency fund and then you use YNAB to decide what job that money has. I understand the logic of it as it really shouldn't matter where your money is but I find it difficult in practice. What has worked for me is to have an emergency fund in an account which is hard for me to get at. It takes me a lot of effort to access that fund so by the time I get access, I'll have spent a couple of days thinking about if that spend is an emergency or not. Somewhat childish but it works for me and that's all that matters for the moment

It's actually not childish at all. From my point of view there is far to little time given to taking Financial Behaviour into account.



I while back there, I was reading a research paper from a guy at the St. Gallen Business School examining why Swiss pensioners retire with very substantially higher saving that US pensioners. It was not that they were more prudent that US pensioners, It's that they did not have access to their savings before retirement.



It's seems there is a quirk in the IRA/Roth system, which result in occasions where safer are paid out cash, with the expectation that they will transfer it to their next savings account and in just does not happen.


Most people had very good logic for not doing so, things like:
- Buying something now at a discount
- Home improvements

- Education

- And so on
Always with the intention making it up later, but it just never happens.


Far better that you recognize your behavioral tendencies and take steps to counter act it, than to have it mess up your finances.

Zizigirl

Would love an Irish Dave Ramsey too. Closest to it that I have found in an Irish context is AskPaul on Instagram. On par with Eoin McGee but lots more content for free.