Every week, I spend about 3 hours a week going through my budget, checking my expenses, my balances, my transactions and thinking about the next steps for my money.
(That doesn’t include taxes, by the way. That’s a whole other set of time, set aside, and usually takes the weekend to start and finish, because I want to be sure I didn’t make any mistakes.)
That adds up to about 12 hours a month or 144 hours a year, which might seem like a LOT of freaking time to be thinking about your money, but to me, it’s a small percentage in the grand scheme of things.
I don’t feel like it’s a burden or a chore, and I’d rather spend time checking my money than wasting it on Facebook (yeah.. it’s not really a big thing for me), or even worse, worrying about my money because I am so out of touch with it, and in the dark!
Just a girl trying to find a balance between being a Shopaholic and a Saver.
I cleared $60,000 in 18 months earning $65,000 gross/year.
Now I am self-employed, and you can read more about 
My finances are never far from my mind, truly. As a brand-new divorcee who never had a handle on her spending, I have learned many hard financial lessons. I now have a spreadsheet set up every month to track my expenses, and I spend about 10 minutes daily going over my spending.
WOW, this is a very honest and helpful article. Keep it up!
-Jay http://www.legalcompass.org
My finances are on my mind quite often. I almost have my student debt paid off and I’m just counting the months till I am debt free. I plan to be finished by next October “fingers crossed”
I do it once a month, and I am sad to say “it shows”. I get all excited, about budgeting but where the rubber meets the road I fail. I want to get better and make smart money decisions, it appears I just dont want it enough. I am not making excuses, far from it, its almost like I want a public flogging!
But once a month for me is a small step forward. So I will go from there. This is the year!
Sara in Sydney
Can I add, I find it hard with a mortgage, 2 kids and a husband. I know that lots of families keep track, but should I do this weekly? Daily? We have a credit card which we put everything on, and then pay it off at the end of the interest free period which give us FF points. I have read Your Money or Your Life, which suggests writing down every expense. Is this the way to go, it just seems so detailed and time consuming. Like you say, its hours isn’t it. Any suggestions would be welcome but please gentle….
I spend 5-10 minutes a few times everyday to check bank account balance, bills, net worth, stock, etc… It probably add up to almost 2 hours each week.
I more check in once in a while. I use Mint.com to track all of my spending, so I log on every day or every other day, tag new transactions, check where I am in my budget thermometers and that’s it. I’d be surprised if this amounts to more than a half hour a week.
About 5 minutes every few days on the balances and about 3 hours a month on investments. I should spend more time than that on the investing side, but that doesn’t count reading industry publications and talking to friends about stocks. Some I get through osmosis since the finance channel is playing constantly where I work P/T.
I’m like Daisy and spend about an hour and a half dealing with the finances. When I was in deep debt I spent so much more time just thinking about it!
I’m pretty much a walking budget. I’m constantly aware of how much money is in each of our accounts and where everything’s going. I sit down and do the numbers about every other day to keep a running tally. I have no idea how much time that adds up to, but suffice to say it’s on my mind a lot. :3
A lot of day to be honest. Struggling to find full time work, so with a limited (and varied) income I’m cautious of spending any more than necessary. But I want to enjoy myself at the same time so I’m gradually saving up little by little for a holiday with my boyfriend. Will take a while but it’s a nice thing to work towards.
Hopefully I’ll have some joy in my job search before too long then money won’t be on my mind every single waking minute of the day. 0_o
Lately, less than 1.5! But that needs to change Asap
I’m not sure how many hours I spend each week but 4 or 5 would be a good guess. If that sounds a lot, that’s because I like to (double) check things A LOT. I check my accounts every single day and I reconcile all my datas at least once a week. On top of that, I manage my daughters accounts (6 in total – accounts not daughters).
I’m also quite impartial to banks/building societies and switch accounts as and when required (eg when they introduce new charges / change their fees etc).
I always look for new/better ways to make my money work and that involve quite a bit of reading so I can easily spend 2 to 4 hours researching the latest pension deal before deciding whether it’s for me or not.
I don’t see any of the above as a burden, it’s something I enjoy doing actually.