I’m not big fan of TV. The only TV program I watch is News and it doesn’t happen too often neither, just in a case I eat alone (usually I eat with my family at the table). Couple days ago my wife was out with the kids so I came back from work and seat to eat, while watching some news.
I didn’t catch the name of the program but basically they had a specialist in financial area and the host asked a question and gave 5~10 minutes to respond to the question.  And they had around 5~6 people to answer questions.
And you know what stroke me?! All speakers on the show were people directly or indirectly involved in financial industry. Do you know what does it mean?

All of them are interested in some way to sell their financial products, in other words that we will spend money on their product and services! To me it doesn’t make much sense!
One of the guys was from TransUnion, guess what his cure to all problems was… Pull your credit report every month – pay for this service every month! That is outrages! Instead of helping people to save the money they are agitating to spend even more!
I wouldn’t take an advice from interested party, never! The conflict of interests is obvious! I understand Global TV guys had good intensions, but it is in fact was missing the point show.

Borrowers – Credit Companies relationship
Let’s take a closer look on this. I personally firmly believe I have direct responsibility to keep in check my debt but Credit Companies are not so innocent. The greed and wish to make an extra million that’s what these companies are driven by.
People’s lack of financial literacy widely used by financial institutions to hand out loans and credits on really bad conditions.
 And it seems that that government is not in a rush to help us to win this battle. So the only choice we have left is to help to our self. So be aware of consequences each time when you borrow money from the bank or credit company, be smart, do your homework before your acquire any financial product.

This post is a long time overdue. So how much do you worth and how much you should be. Here is the formula from”The Millionaire Next Door” book of Thomas Stanley and William Danko. I will publish a review on the book separately but to me it’s a must read book if you are planning to become financially independent some day. Also I will explain how they came up with this formula.

Age – A
Gross annual household income – I
A x I /10 = your net worth should be

So let’s plug in some numbers:
Age – 30
Gross annual household income – $90,000
30 x $90,000 / 10 = $270,000

Your net worth should be $270,000 if you are age of 30 and your gross annual household income is $90,000.

So what do you say? How are you doing? You don’t know what is your net worth? It’s a time to take a closer look at your financial situation. Here is I putted together something for you. This is free Excel (2007 version) file you can use it with no limitations and fear - Household Budget v1.00, tools for budget

I have to share with you that I don’t worth as much as I should be, but I’m doing something about it and I’m determined to become financially independent. I developed an exercise, when I’m tired and feeling like my life is passing by, to motivate myself I take our gross household income and multiply by 5. Try to do the same. Did you get the number? Quite sobering isn’t it? Where all this money gone? I know there are 1001 excuses why we are not wealthy. But the bottom line is the financial rescue of your family and yourself in your hands. So suck it up we have mission to accomplish! 

Are you close to the net worth you should be?