Five Ways to Improve Your Finances in Five Minutes (or Less!)

Got five minutes? That’s all you need to improve your financial life. Yep—we said it!

We often talk about setting long-term goals and creating a plan full of lots of baby steps. At Mountain America, we recommend revisiting your financial plan at least annually. Small tweaks along the way can help you become more intentional about how your dollars work and provide you with better direction to achieve your financial goals.

1. Step up your emergency fund contributions. When you first built your financial plan, maybe you went a little light on this line item because you weren’t sure how much you could afford. Now, after a year or two (or more!), you don’t even miss that money. It may be a great time to increase your contribution. Take five minutes, log in to your online banking site or mobile app and adjust your automatic transfer. Shoot for at least six months’ worth of expenses in your emergency fund.

1. Determine if your retirement savings is on track. No matter your age, it’s difficult to work toward a goal if you don’t know where you stand. Since retirement is a long-term strategy, it pays to take a moment to check in on your savings. Set aside a few minutes to enter your info into this retirement calculator. Find out how much you’ll need to hit your target retirement age and how that breaks down into your savings strategy per year.

1. Provide for the ones you love. Maybe it’s been awhile since you really looked at your life insurance. Got five minutes? Give your life insurance a quick check-up. Have you experienced life changes that require a policy update? Are you in need of additional coverage? Have you updated your beneficiaries recently?

1. Get the “big picture view” of your debt. You may have been making payments on your debt for months (or even years) but do you know how much you’re paying in interest? Have you looked at your current payment schedule to track when everything should be paid off? Take five minutes to check using this payoff calculator. If you’re interested in paying off your debt more quickly—and paying less in interest—increase your monthly payment. Use this calculator to get a debt-free strategy in place!

1. Free up some cash. You don’t always have to cut something completely from your budget to save money. Sometimes it’s about renegotiating or reducing your spend. Find a more efficient way to use the money you have and you will spend more of your money the way you want. Need a few ideas? Check these out!

BONUS: Educate yourself. The best way to streamline your finances, and make them work harder for you, is to understand them. Utilize resources online to learn something new about eliminating debt, retirement planning or smart spending. Read an article, listen to a podcast or watch a TV show or video.

Ready to put these ideas into action? Commit to completing one five-minute task per week (more, if you’re feeling particularly ambitious). Eventually, you’ll get in the habit of regular check-ups to stay on top of your financial world.