Rose Imperial
There are almost 10 million OFWs in the world, they are even called “bagong bayani” because of how much they are helping our economy by their remittances alone.
But do you know that aside from their families in the Philippines, finances are also one of their main concerns?
Sadly there are a lot of OFWs who goes home broke, years after years of working abroad just go to waste and the main culprit is… guess what? They do not know how to protect the money they worked hard for.
Below are just some of the tips I can share with my fellow OFWs all around the world. Just a disclaimer though, I am not a financial expert and I won’t claim to be one, these are just the things I learned from others too and worked really well for us.
Be protected.
Life Insurance – It’s always best to make sure you are covered when something unexpected happens. May it be unemployment, accident, family members getting sick, death, and so on… or unforeseen events such as calamities etc. There are a lot of affordable life insurances in the market now and some of them even have investment plans on it or VULs.
My advice – Do your own research, allot a budget for it, find a trusted insurance company and choose the one that best suits your needs.
Emergency Fund – Another way of making sure you are protected when the unexpected happens is your emergency fund. Financial experts say that we should have at least 3-6 months of your monthly income saved as your emergency fund. We learned the importance of this the hard way when my husband lost his job and was unemployed for a few months here in Dubai where everything is expensive, good thing our son wasn’t born yet at the time.
My advice – set a portion of your savings and start building your emergency fund.
Invest.
When I say invest, it doesn’t just mean money, but most importantly, invest your time on things that can educate you about personal finance. For me, the first step in financial freedom is to be equipped with the knowledge of things that can set you financially free.
My advice – Invest on books on how to handle your finances.Watch tv shows that cater to it (ANC, is my favorite), subscribe to mailing list of financial gurus so that you will be updated once they published a new article, follow them on FB and other social media sites and lastly, attend seminars (free or not) so you can learn a thing or two from the people who have years of experience and know what they are saying.
Invest in another source of income, you can choose from owning a business, real estate, online shops, stock market, mutual funds and a lot more.
My advice – Make sure that you study whichever you choose to invest your money on. Personally, we chose on investing in the stock market and mutual funds since we planned on working abroad for few more years so we can save for a business that we have in mind once we settle in the Philippines for good.
Be Disciplined.
Create your own budget plan and really stick to it! We follow the 10-20-70 rule but yours might be different.
10 % – we bring back to God (who gave us all that we have)
20% – Savings / Investments/ Emergency Fund
70 % – Expenses
We follow it in that order, I know others are used to deducting their expenses first and save what is left but this is where discipline will come into play, by making sure that you only spend 70% of your income for your expenses and nothing more.
Be Wise.
There’s actually a lot of ways to be wise when it comes to spending your hard earned money. Below are just some of the things we do in order for us to save more.
- Plan your meals – Ever wondered why you tend to buy more than you intended to? That’s because if you do not have a list to follow then everything in the grocery seems to be something that you really need to buy. We plan our meals monthly but we do grocery shopping weekly, not just we save money but we also save time since we only need to visit the store 4 times a week instead of everyday.
- Your date night should not be expensive – for married women like me, quality time with the husband is very important but it doesn’t need to cost us too much. Take advantage of those 2 in the price of 1 offers and discounted vouchers. My husband and I both love to watch movies, good thing the mobile service provider here in Dubai offers those 2 in 1 tickets one day in a week. So we didn’t just enjoy our date night we even save money from it.
- Pack your lunch – Instead of buying meals outside, why not prepare it on your own? You’re not just gonna save but you can also make sure that what you’re eating is clean, safe and healthy.
Get rid of that Entitlement Mentality.
This is the most dangerous mentality one can ever have not just when it comes to our finances but also in our everyday lives. I was guilty of it too, back when I was still working in a BPO in the Philippines and was earning more than the minimum I would buy things that I don’t really need and I will justify it by saying I deserve at least this after working so hard. We deserve a lot of things. We deserve to be financially free, we deserve to retire early and enjoy the fruits of our labor and to go to trips with our families with the money that worked for us (aka our passive income).
Those were just some of the things we can do in order for us to take better care of our finances. I hope it would help you as much as it helped us.
