THE 15 RULES OF MONEY TO HAVE THE LIFE YOU WANT IN THE PHILIPPINES !!!

• 15 rules to make money and get a life in the Philippines.
• Spend less than you earn.
• Create and stick to a budget.
• Protect your assets with insurance.
• Plan for your future and retirement.
• Think about generational wealth.

15 rules to make money and get a life in the Philippines

Number one: Spend less than you earn. So while you're in the west, you want to be looking at spending as little as possible, and spending a little as possible on expenses, and then the remainder saving and investing away, so you can accumulate as much money as possible before you move to the Philippines.

Two: Save and invest. So all the extra surplus cash from your work, look at saving some of that in a high-interest savings account which has less risk, and then the remaining you want to look at investing, which has a bit more risk to it but the money's likely to grow more.

Number three: Don't rely on credit. Credit comes with a cost, and it's basically you can have good credit and bad credit. Good credit would be when you're using debt to make money, whereas bad debt is when you're buying goods or materialistic things that will soon break or you won't want anymore, and it's just thrown-away money. If you got large purchases, then what you want to do is save up for it.

Number four: Create and make a budget. So you want to have a look at your expenditure, and then create a budget, and then maybe try and cut out as much spending that you don't require, and then look at sticking to it.

Five: Insurance. Protect your assets and ensure you have the right cover. So you want to have insurance for things like your house and your life, and then you'll look at what kind of insurance or how you're going to insure yourself medically in the Philippines. As the Philippines does have PhilHealth and that, but generally, you want to be looking at either private insurance or look at self-insuring, where you save up money so you've got a pot of money that you can access for medical bills when you do become sick or have an accident.

Number six: Emergency fund. Look at having 3 to 6 months of living expenses saved away. That's your emergency fund should you become ill or there be some kind of emergency or issue you got to deal with.

Seven: Avoid debt if possible. Good debt only; bad debt takes money out of your pocket while good debt puts money into your pocket.

Eight: Diversify your investments. Don't put all your money in one investment. Look at spreading it around, diversifying it from different types of investment to different industrial sectors, just various types of investments. So if one of your investments fails or doesn't perform, then at least you don’t lose all your money.

Nine: Financial literacy. Learn about financial and personal finance. There's loads of information on the internet now. There is YouTube, there are books. Books are quite good because when you get a book, then you're reading and focusing on it.

Ten: Seek financial advice. This could either be your network of friends or different internet groups. Be careful with financial advisors; some people say that they're worth their weight in gold, whereas others can cost you a lot of money and don't really produce any more outstanding increases in your wealth than what you could have done yourself.

Number eleven: Set financial goals. So as part of your budget, figure out how much you're going to spend. From there, you can then look at what your income is and then start setting financial goals like how much money you need to move to the Philippines. Look at saving or having an investment plan to hit that goal.

Twelve: Money management. Look at managing your money effectively and not wasting it. That's where budgets come in, looking at your income, looking at your outgoings, and trying to reduce wastage down to the minimum.

Thirteen: Be aware of fees and costs of financial products. There are some financial products that would cost a lot of money in monthly fees or setup fees. Do your own research and due diligence on any financial product or investment you’re looking at.

Fourteen: Be careful with credit. If you got something like a credit card, a lot of people now live their life on plastic and don't carry much cash around. But if you do use a credit card, make sure you pay it off fully each month so you don’t have any interest costs accruing, because paying interest is just throwing money down the drain.

Fifteen: Plan for the future. Plan for your retirement. It's difficult when you're younger to think about your retirement, but it does creep up really fast. By the time you hit 45 or 50, you could be looking at wanting to retire or have a change of pace in your life.

Look at making your money work for you while you sleep. This is where your money's in investments, and those investments should increase in value while you sleep at night. Look at trying to make as much of your income passive as possible.

Finally, maybe look beyond your retirement and consider generational wealth. Some foreigners can be quite shortsighted and only look after their Filipino partners while they're around, but don't necessarily think about what happens once they've passed away.

Thanks for watching! Let us know in the comments below your own experiences with this and how you would go about it. Ensure that you've got your life in the Philippines. Thanks for watching!