Specific. Measurable. Achievable. Relevant. Time-bound. SMART Goals.
So we have all set New Year’s resolutions before and found that they typically don’t work. A lot of times, it’s just not a smart enough goal. This may be something you have heard about before: a SMART Goal is specific, measurable, achievable, relevant, and time-bound. In order to set a SMART Goal, we need to make sure that the goal aligns with all of those five letters.
Financially, we can set goals for the new year. An example of a bad goal would be to say, “I want to try to save money on groceries.” It’s not specific. It’s not specifically measurable. We don’t know exactly how much we are trying to save, and it’s not really time-based.
A good goal would be to say - “I want to spend $100 a month or less on groceries.” - which I know maybe that’s not realistic anymore, but that’s a good specific goal, and “I want to do that for 12 months.” So you set a time frame in which you want to do that.
Another great way to set goals for the new year would be to say, “I’d like to start saving $50 a paycheck into my investment account.” That’s a great way to do that for 12 months, establish a good habit…sometimes out of sight - out of mind...once it’s moved into your investments, you don’t necessarily think about it anymore.
If you’d like help setting up a SMART Goal, please feel free to reach out to a financial advisor with Summit.