Freelance Finance

Saving money as a freelancer, independent contractor or whatever you choose to call yourself if you don’t happen to have a full-time job with bennies, is tricky. We’ve discussed this before: Saving regularly is more challenging when your income is constantly changing. This is why Muck and I stick with percentages, which has worked like […]

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The phrase “keep your nose to the grindstone” took on new meaning for me Friday, when Mire and I attended a woodworking class given by master craftsman, author, and self-employed worker Andy Rae. Though the class was about sharpening woodworking tools, I couldn’t help finding a double meaning in much of what Rae said.
I […]

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Another remarkable freelance friend—a brilliant writer and researcher—has, just yesterday, taken a full-time job. This comes after years of very successful, but tiring, work on her own. She will be performing the exact same kind of duties, except she will be performing them for a law firm. I am happy for her. Why? Because she […]

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Are you outraged about the price of mobile phones? You should be. If you go over your allotted minutes, your carrier hits you with fees. If you stay substantially under your allotment, you’re wasting money. Yes, yes, I know some carriers offer carryover. But if you haven’t used those extra minutes this month, what makes […]

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Last week we did some traveling, sharing the Freelance Finance System with some new friends and acquaintances. One question that came up often: Will people really be disciplined enough to save money this way? The question is rooted in the notion that people are by nature bad savers, that they will routinely spend their cash […]

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Mire and I used to sweat out the tax season, living in fear that our accountant’s verdict would throw us in debt for years to come. But we don’t fear tax season anymore. Why? Because we’ve starting doing something many freelancers don’t, namely, save to pay our taxes. While not as glamorous as saving for […]

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Deciding how long you should keep your old tax documents and financial records is hard enough without getting bogged down in busy work. It’s entirely possible these days to scan and create a digital record of every single piece of paper you accumulate. But you’ll never find me doing it. That may sound weird after […]

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I have been reviewing how I organize and store financial records I accumulate in my twin roles as human being and freelancer. Both David Bach, author of the Finish Rich series and David Allen, author of Getting Things Done, promote systems for filing away paper in such a way that you can actually find it […]

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Personal finance for freelancers is a tricky topic for many reasons, perhaps the most obvious of which is that our work lives—and the erratic payments that often go along with it—look a lot different than most people’s. Saving for retirement is a must for anyone who doesn’t want to spend their golden years panicked about […]

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Paying yourself first is the cardinal rule of all income-earners, whether you are a self-employed freelancer or not. As you may have noticed, Mire and I like to call this feeding the monkey. Suppose you decide to save 15 percent of your income. Save it as follows: 10 percent to a retirement account, and 5 […]

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