Cash Management
Columbus Ohio
Optimize where you allocate your capital
What Is Cash
Management?
Cash management is a strategy used to manage your cashflow by understanding income and expenses. This is completed regularly through accounting for businesses but is also important for individuals. Maintaining financial stability is an important part of understanding a total wealth portfolio.
We look at a client’s cash reserves and determine the best way to allocate their money. First and foremost, we will do an evaluation to determine whether you have a sufficient emergency fund given your income level and expenditures. Once that is satisfied, we will determine based upon your financial goals (including upcoming large purchases such as a home, vehicle or other tangible asset), where your excess reserves would be best allocated and in which order of priority (below are a few possibilities):
Our recommendations are always made with your goals in mind and will not detract from your financial plan.
Benefits of cash flow management
Prepared for Shortfalls
The first and most obvious benefit to managing your cash is knowing if an unforseen event happens, you have enough cash on hand to take care of that situation.
Reduce Stress
Managing cash flow will alleviate a lot of stress as you have a plan in place taking into account both positive and negative outcomes and changes that will occur for each situation.
Know when to Invest
We don’t “time” the market but we allocate money in various assets depending on how the market is performing. Having cash reserves and getting a good value for your money will help you increase your return on your investments.
How to manage your personal cashflow
We always recommend keeping a simple spreadsheet to help you manage your cashflows. Although it’s a manual process, it’s good to do your research, put all of your incomes and expenditures on a simple table, and keep track of how much you are spending and where. This will give you an idea if you are spending too much which does not align with your future goals.
What Our Harding Financial Group
Clients Are Saying
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With Harding Financial
Group
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Get a one-one consultation with our cash management advisors to begin the conversation about your cash management goals, needs, and current financial situation.
See our Frequently Asked Questions below for commonly asked questions about cash management.
Frequently Asked Questions
You should audit your money-spending habits and see where you stand. Create a budget worksheet and itemize your expenditures – use your checking account or credit card transaction history to fact-check yourself. Are you going out to eat too often? Are you spending too much on health insurance when you could use a cheaper plan? Do you overspend on clothing, electronics, or coffee? Do you have five different streaming services instead of one or two? Being aware of your spending habits is the first step to improving your cash flow.
For illustrative purposes, some people use the 50-30-20 rule:
-
- 50% necessities
- 30% wants
- 20% savings/investments
Everyone’s situation is unique and a one-size-fits-all approach is not recommended as the percentages listed above will be different for everyone. Some may require more than 20% savings to stay on track for retirement. Others may have too much in debt payments to budget even 10% for “wants”. The takeaway is that it’s important to work with a financial professional to develop a plan tailored to your situation and to stick to it. The breadth of our services extends well beyond the core areas of financial planning. We also assist our clients with residence and other debt financing, liquidity and cash flow analysis, and targeted event planning.
Set up an automatic monthly deposit from your checking account to your savings or investment account(s). This way, you don’t have to think about setting the money aside. Depending on how you’re accounts’ investments are allocated, your money could have more potential “return on investment” than it would by sitting in a checking account. You can do the same with your retirement account(s) by having funds taken out of every paycheck to be added to your employer 401(k) plan or other retirement account. You don’t “see” it happening but this will help grow an account hands-off with regular monthly contributions.