Our early adult years are an exciting time for so many reasons, one of them being the thrill of receiving your first real paycheck and dreaming of what you’ll buy with it. Unfortunately, too few of us spend as much time dreaming about saving some of that money. In fact, a recent study from the American Institute of CPAs (AICPA) and the Ad Council found that while one in three Millennials rank savings as their number one goal, 55% say they’re impulse buyers, 44% don’t pay off their credit card balances in full every month, and 41% have less than $100 in their checking account.

Building a solid financial foundation is critically important, and one of the best ways to make that happen (some might say the only way) is to create a budget and a disciplined savings strategy and stick to them. Here are a few resources to get you on the right path.

Feed the Pig

One of the cornerstones of any budgeting and savings plan is to take a set percentage from every check you receive and put it into a savings account. But, knowing what you should do and actually doing it are two very different things. Feed the Pig has a variety of tools and resources that can help you create a budget, control your spending, manage your credit, and set up savings plans. Thinking about the future will help you pay more attention to how you’re spending your money today. Having long-term goals makes it a lot easier to say No to those impulse purchases. Saving and investing could mean the difference between being able to buy a home in your 20’s and renting until you’re in your 40’s, and between being able to travel the world while you’re still young enough to enjoy it and being confined to your cubicle until you retire. http://www.feedthepig.org/


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