More Money Monday

As we typically take stock of where our lives are going around the New Year period, so did yours truly. This year, my thoughts focused primarily on my running goals and how I was going to achieve them. I made some sacrifices, such as letting go of my golf game even further. Prior to my running comeback, I had a burning desire to be a single figure handicapper and practiced incessantly. After the running bug bit me, I scaled back the golf to once or twice monthly social club games with occasional practice. After nine months of not touching a club, there was the temptation to get back into it, but I reminded myself of how I played far too many different sports in my twenties to be truly top level at any one of them. Running is #1 and I'm not letting anything get in the way this time around - so I'm at peace with letting my golf game go rusty!

On the contrary, I realised that my committment to personal finance and wealth creation had slipped over the past year as my committment to running increased. Previously, I was quite regular and perusing and analysing my personal finance and my investment portfolio - that hasn't been the case in the past year. In fact, my personal finance has become quite sloppy and I'm frequently forgetting to pay my mobile phone bill or electricity bill on time. This is not a good thing because even though I've never missed a home loan repayment, those failures to pay small bills could come back to haunt me. Australia is only one of three countries in the world to have a negative credit reporting system - when trying to obtain credit, lenders won't be able to see that John Citizen paid a home loan in full over 15 years without missing a payment - they'll only see that he was a week late paying his mobile bill on eight occasions last year!! Ridiculous, isn't it!!!

So, I've decided to committ myself to "More Money Monday". This involves spending no less than one hour each Monday attending to my personal finances and wealth creation. You know, well creation is a lot like running isn't it? You continually add money to your portfolio(training), spend time reviewing it and making sure it is healthy(eat vitamins) and then enjoy the satisfaction of an investment hitting paydirt(a race PB!) So, at least one hour on More Money Monday will know look like this for Matty:

- attend to personal finances - bills/bank a/c's etc
- review progress of share portfolio/read annual reports
- study other ASX companies with a view to future accumulation of their shares or play around with puts and options
- peruse opportunities in property - residential/commercial or industrial
- examine business opportunities
- meet with business partners or potential business partners
- if nothing else to do, then read BRW or Fin Review.

I was going to suggest that we start up a Runner's Investment Club, but do you really think a group of runners in one room could focus on the topic at hand?