Your first financial plan

This is the project the whole subject builds toward. You will take one realistic scenario, either your own next year or one we provide, and build a complete financial plan for it: earning, spending, saving, tax, insurance and a first step into investing, all with real numbers and honest reasoning.

Choose a scenario

• Your real next year: your actual job, study plans and living situation.
• First year of uni: living in a share house, part time work at $26.55 an hour, 15 hours a week.
• First full time job: an apprentice or trainee on $48,000 a year, living at home and saving to move out.

What your plan must cover

Work through each part of the subject in order. Your income section applies the tax topic: gross pay, tax withheld, super and what actually lands. Your budget applies needs and wants honestly, with every number justified. Your savings section names an emergency fund target and one real goal with a number and a date. Your protection section picks one thing worth insuring and prices it from a real insurer. Your growth section explains, in one page, where your first invested dollars would go and why, without recommending any specific product.

Good plans are not the ones with the biggest savings number. They are the ones where every number could survive a question that starts with why.