How To Be Financially Savvy

I read a newspaper article in The Sun regarding the lack of financial literacy among the Malaysians. The survey done by MoneyTree (M) Sdn Bhd shows that many Malaysians are not financially savvy and have no retirement plan or know how to manage their finances.

This does not come in surprise to me as I have come across some people who has no knowledge on this subject. However, financial literacy is an important aspect of life and with the knowledge on how to manage the personal finance properly, one can actually plans out his or her own retirement plan.


To gain more knowledge in financial, one need not have to be a Degree holder or a financial analysts - as a matter of fact, reading materials on financial management can educate one in this aspect. Magazines like Personal Money or even Reader's Digest will have more than sufficient information on the basic financial knowledge that one will ever needs.

Let us not talk about investment first, as to be financially savvy not necessary means that you can invest or knowing the investment terms like stocks and commodities.

One of the most important terms in order to be financially savvy is budget. Budget literally means the plan on how to spend your income - sounds simple, but having the discipline to follow the budget is another matter.

Many of us actually failed to plan a proper budget due to a number of reasons. One of it is because there are ups and downs in our monthly expenses and lack of the information on what is our expected income in like maybe next year due to increment. Besides that, many people are actually put off by the fact that there are some unexpected expenses like medication, friend's wedding, accident and stuff like that. Sometimes or shall I say most of the time, it is due to impulsive shopping nature of one that he or she ended up buying stuff that is not needed.

Budget is important as the budget will be direction on where the money should be going and to be financially savvy, one should really takes some time and plan a proper budget and execute accordingly. A budget without proper execution means nothing as we can all be sitting down writing what we are suppose to spend and then throw the piece of paper into a rubbish bin. Knowing the term without execution is also the same as not a financially savvy person.

Guess I'll stop here right now to watch Stephen Chow's Fight Back to School. Will continue to post in this matter in near future.