My name is Sarah and you probably know me as the founder of Momentum Financial Planning LLC. But I am not your traditional financial planner. Learn more about my journey.

Taxes are a fact of life. We notice them from our very first paychecks to our very last and beyond. Let’s walk through specifically how income taxes work and how to file taxes and what it all means.

Let’s focus on more of the numbers perspective. Buying a house generally comes with a whole host of other expenses that you are adding on that you may not think about, and they don’t all go away even when the mortgage is paid off!

What questions should you be asking yourself to make sure you really want it and are really ready? If you have a partner, are there more questions you should be thinking about too? (Spoiler: the answer is yes.)

These are some initial questions to get the money conversation started.

The emergency fund concept is all about having cash on hand and available to you so that if something happens in your life where you need more money to cover it than your general income/spending might allow, you have it. Learn all about how much to have on hand, where to keep it, and what it means to you.

So many people come talk to me and tell me that they have Stash, Acorns, Robinhood, or a whole host of other personal finance apps and are using them to try to ‘get ahead’ or to ‘save a little bit’, but yet they don’t yet have an emergency fund and aren’t taking other more solid steps to move financially forward.

What your credit score is, how it does and does not affect you, and what you can do about it

You have just gotten your first job out of college and all of a sudden you’re finding yourself with what feels like one hundred new and different accounts.

There is a surprising number of numbers involved in getting paid. While you only see the very last one - the net pay that actually hits your bank account - they all mean something useful! Here’s an example of a full paystub, or “Earnings Statement”, below. Let’s break it down.

Pay yourself first. It’s the motto that first got me interested in personal finance and made the lightbulb turn on in my head.

Learn why I love working with clients and what you can expect when you reach out to me for financial planning and coaching.

Spend less than you earn. Learn why it’s so important and how you can take the next steps to make sure you’re doing so!

If spending less than you earn is the fundamental tenet of personal finance, then tracking your spending is the fundamental way to actually make that happen. Learn all the various options you have at your disposal to make that happen and build the confidence to actually do it!

Let's start from the beginning. Stocks, bonds, and baskets of all of them. How you can (and probably already are!) investing for your financial future. No fancy words, I promise.

401(k), 403(b), 457(b), Roth. How to decipher all those letters and numbers to start saving for your financial future!

It’s your first job out of college and you’re really excited - you did it! You’re an Adult. You’re about to get your first paycheck and to feel like you’ve made it.

Using credit cards in this way make it *very* difficult (if not downright impossible) to get ahead financially and *very* easy to go into credit card debt without realizing it; this spending is straight up the wrong way to use them.

One hesitation I hear often in financial coaching is “Sometimes I’m afraid to look at my balance…” The first thing I want you to know about that is this: you are more than your bank account balance or your credit card bill.