Today begins a new VLOG Series!  Monday Money Minute!!!

I am so excited to share with you in this series a piece of information and tips on how to create financial wellness, delivered to you in one minute or less.  You can catch the videos each week LIVE on Facebook.  If you are not able to catch this live, you can watch the replay later on Facebook or catch it on the YouTube for Misty W Gilbert.  And of course, if your week runs away from you, you will get the video sent to you here if you are a subscriber of the blog as it will come directly to your inbox!

Monday Money Minute – Episode 1:   We discuss why you need to have a Master Password & Account Log

One of the main reasons people are disorganized in their finances is because they do not have a log of all their user names and passwords in one location to all financial sites.

I recommend a spreadsheet to track this information that you password protect.

The spreadsheet will have the name of the company, the web address, your user name, your password, the security questions and answers associated with that log in, your credit card numbers, your security codes to that credit card, the expiration date of the credit card, along with any other applicable information that you would need to access.  This could be an specific account number or contact information to a banker or anything else that you need at your fingertips.  The more information you keep in one spot, the easier it will be if you ever need it, whether because of a financial emergency or to report your wallet or purse that was stolen.  Having this information all in one place creates less stress and helps you to stay organized if you need to do a stop payment on something or simply contact your financial institutions.

Your Master Password & Account Log should at minimum include:

• Credit Card Accounts
• Bank Accounts
• Utility Companies
• Loans
• Investment Accounts
• Mortgage Company

I actually use my Password & Account Log as master spreadsheet for ALL my logins, even those that are not financial related.  You can purchase a template here to get yourself organized immediately!

I strongly recommend backing this document in an online cloud based program such as Google Drive, Dropbox or Carbonite and to also store another copy of this document on a jump drive (video says Dropbox twice – my apologies).  I am aware that there are apps like LastPass that allow you to store login information in, however, there are a lot of security risks with these and most of them do not allow you to track the information to this level.  You also can only use LastPass on one computer, so if your laptop is lost or stolen, you are going to have a challenge getting this information reset.

Getting organized doesn’t have to be difficult!  Join us each week as we will teach you how to create simple processes, maintain accurate records, and stay focused on creating financial wellness.

Cheers to taking the first step to create organization in your finances with a Password & Account Log!

Misty