The first step on the path to financial freedom is to get a handle on exactly where you are now. Awareness helps to draw a line in the sand and to be clear on where your starting point is- once you are financially aware you can begin defining your goals where you want to get to and start planning the journey of how to get there.

So in our Wealth Wednesday workbook Stage one is the Awareness stage and the ticks/todo’s look like this:

1. Get your full current credit file and credit score. We use www.checkmyfile.com to see exactly what information all the different credit agencies have on you.  Its quite spooky to what they know sometimes but it’s a great resource to see all of your credit  details in one easy to see interface. Also you can spot if there are any mistakes and/or if anyone is using your identity fraudulently that may be negatively effecting your credit rating. Its also got some good sensible advice pages on debt management.[about 10-15 minutes]
2. Work out your Net Worth.  Ok so this is basically like your personal Balance sheet. You add up all your Assets– the things you own ( eg house,car,savings,investments) and take away all your Liabilities– what you owe ( eg mortgage,personal or car loans, overdrafts, creditcard balances)- and the difference Assets- Laibilities is your Net Worth. Using your credit report from above which will have nearly all the details of your liabilities you can do this in about 10-15 minutes on a spreadsheet -However  instead of using a spreadsheet we use www.xero.com  which is a great online business accounting package but also has a personal finances account for you to manage all your money. There’s a free trial and its got a really easy to use tool to add up and keep track of your Net Worth.

Ok so thats it- once you have (1) your credit report and (2) have worked out your net worth you have your starting point  all written down and can move onto Stage 2 planning.

For reference our Workbook tasks  to complete stage1: awareness looks like this

• Register/subscribe to www.wealthwednesday.com blog
• Review the Wealth Wednesday Financial Intelligence Stages: try and define where you are and where you want to be.
• Read: the richest man in Babylon-  and post your  key learning’s onto WW blog.
• Get your check my file report and check for errors/ credit agency inconsistencies
• Set up your my Xero account and using your check my file report fill in your net worth statement
• Fill in debt chart and order in APR priority
• Complete: “Why bother with a pension- Pros/Cons? or how to make 30-40% return overnight” induction
• Complete: “ Why we like peer2peer lending”- understanding how personal loans/banks work -induction