Financial stress is a real thing and it could be affecting your life more than you can know. Today, financial difficulties are common and people are facing one or more types of financial problems. These financial problems can lead to stress, which then can lead to various health problems. It’s important to understand what finance related stress is and how to deal with it.

This article will help you understand what financial stress is, how it affects your life and how to effectively deal with stress.

What is Financial Stress?

Financial stress happens due to financial problems. A person may feel pressure, inadequate, or unhappy due to financial difficulties. These difficulties may arise from huge debt, needing money for important things like medical expenses, low income, no job, fear of bankruptcy and others. These situations can create stress and affect the health of a person.

Financial stress shouldn’t be taken lightly. Not dealing with it right way can lead to serious problems like suicidal thoughts.

How Financial Stress Can Affect your Life

Financial stress can build over a time and become a huge problem for any person. Without you realizing, you could be falling deep into depression. The stress due to financial problems can lead to a wide range of health problems and affect your day to day life.

Some of the symptoms of financial stress may include difficulty sleeping, Feelings of isolation, anxiety, guilt, and denial.

Here are some of the effects of financial stress:

• Negative thoughts can seep into your mind and constantly give you headaches. This can lead to things like self-harming.
• Feeling of regret and failure is the common symptoms of financial stress. You may think that you have let many people down with your disastrous financial decisions.
• Change in your behavior with your family and friends can be apparent. People with difficult financial situations dealing with stress will often avoid social occasions. Slowly the person may be withdrawing into themselves and avoiding talking.
• Building bad habits like drinking excessively could be another bad effect of financial stress.

How to Deal with Financial Stress

Dealing with your financial stress is essential for a healthy life. There are many reasons for financial difficulties. Rising debt is one of the major ones. You need to first know how to deal with financial problems effectively. Once you do that you will see that your finance related stress and anxiety have gone down too.

So, here are some of the best and practical ways to deal with financial stress:

• Identify the Triggers

The first thing you need to know is what is causing you the stress. Is it your debt, loans, credit card bill or low income or low savings? It is essential to identify your triggers. The problem will always weigh in your mind so it isn’t that difficult to indentify it. If you are constantly thinking of debt rather than your low income, then debt is your trigger. Once you have identified the major cause of the stress you can then devise a strategy to overcome it.

• Mange Your Expenses

Now, it’s time to get serious about your expenses. It’s pretty common that you are spending more money than you can afford. Managing your expenses effectively can help you reduce stress and help you come out of the problems real quick. One of the best ways to deal with financial problems is to create a budget and stick to it. It will help you avoid any unnecessary expenses.

• Save as Much as You Can

Saving money is one of the most important steps when it comes to facing the question how to deal with financial stress. Saving money gives you a back-up. Saving for emergency situations can help you in various situations like when you are out of a job or have a medical emergency situation. Saving for retirement is another type of saving that will cover your expenses in your old age. Plan ahead and create a healthy financial situation.

• Get Help from a Professional

If things have come to a bankruptcy-like situation, then it will be the ideal time for you to consider seeking the help of a professional. Financial experts will help you manage your finances and advise you on how to pay off the debt and loans against your car title real quick. You can also seek help of family and friends and ask them for help.

• Seek Medical Help

If the financial stress is taking a toll on your health, then you should be visiting the doctor for help. It’s essential that you manage your stress well before it gets out of hand. Meditating and keeping a positive frame of mind will help you overcome your problems, as will using CBD or delta 8 THC products. You can find some in-depth reviews of these products on the LA Weekly website, should you wish to learn more. Once you have educated yourself on the benefits of CBD, and which products are legal for now, you can start experimenting with products to help you relax.

No matter what your financial situation is, always remember that there is a solution to it. You need to stay focused and try to deal with your financial stress as effectively as you can. These points will help you overcome your financial problems and reduce the stress.

A 5 Step Guide to Managing Finances For New Expats

Any new journey overseas begins with some excitement and nerves. The chance to live in a new place is always exciting, and it’s sure to bring you so many new great experiences and memories. But all the new tasks you need to attend to in a foreign country can feel overwhelming. Especially because unlike when at home, you don’t have a ‘home field advantage’ of being familiar with the environment, and knowing how everything works.

The benefits of good financial management abroad are the same as at home. You can minimise expenses, seek to grow your savings, and make prudent financial decisions that can help you invest long-term. The downsides of poor financial management are bad anytime, but especially overseas, given it’s far easier for hiddens costs and expenses to add up. So let’s help you navigate this area, with our guide to managing finances.

Watch your exchange rate costs

Whether you are planning on living overseas for a short period of time, a couple of years, or permanently, you will likely retain some ongoing financial links with family and friends back home. Even if these links are nothing major like property or car ownership, there’s still likely to be bills, special treats you buy yourself, and gifts for others that will see you purchasing from afar.

Your size of your transaction may vary, but your need to keep an eye on your exchange rates expenses will not. That’s why ensuring you use a exchange rates provider that has reasonable exchange rates is vital.

There’s many offerings out there, but CBA exchange rates are always a really good first port of call, given the Commonwealth Bank’s global reach and reputation as a trusted financial institution.

Setup a local bank account

You can usually maintain your old bank account abroad but in practice it’s best to setup a local one. A local bank account will not only make it seamless to deposit and withdraw cash daily, but also ensure you get access to the network of low fee credit cards, high interest savings accounts, and other benefits you may be unable to get if using your old account overseas.

 Localise all other expenses

Just the same as setting up a local bank account is wise, it’s also ideal to localise all expenses as much as possible. If you moved countries and bank accounts, some subscription services you have you setup in your old country may still be charging you for transactions – but now also charging for currency conversion fees, and this should be cut. The exception to this is if you’re able to keep old subscriptions where they would be cheaper than changing to the local one. If you can do that, do it.

Make use of special taxation offers

Life overseas will always come with some big new expenses. There’s not only the plane ticket and passport fees, but also sorting out all those everyday items like furniture, household goods, and entertainment. Some of these are just unavoidable, but that’s all the more reason why it’s vital to maximise your position on important ones.

Right now Australia has a number of special schemes and agreements in place with friendly nations around the world. Whether it’s our tax treaty with nations like the USA, or the opportunities to work for an Australian company and use an ABN overseas,  there’s numerous ways an expat can earn money and look to reduce their annual tax bill via special arrangements. Considering your career alongside these taxation arrangements can be a great way to save money now, and save thousands in the long run.

 Pay special attention to your disposable income

You’re living in a new place, and it’s exciting, and you want to experience all it has to offer. This is great and there’s nothing wrong with it. What can be challenging about living in a new place is the risk of ‘holiday mode’ becoming permanent. That’s a recipe for disaster as your bank account can quickly take a real hit because you’re still buzzing from the excitement of your new life.

Even people who have been prudent spenders before find they can easily blowout their budget when overseas. That’s why being proactive about managing your expenses is really important. There’s a number of good ways to do this. Some people setup an account that automatically pays a certain amount from their wage into their account each month, and once that is spent they don’t spend anymore. Other’s like a bit more freedom but use an expenses tracking app to help ensure their budget doesn’t get blown out.

Whichever works for you is what is best for you, but just be sure you use something.

Take a deep breath and go step by step [Conclusion]

Like any big decision in life, it’s easy for a move overseas to feel overwhelming. That’s why it’s really important to have a good plan in place for managing finances. At the same time it’s OK if you don’t have absolutely everything set up on the first day!

Good financial management is like building good foundations for a house. Provided you constantly look to keep building and go step by step, you’ll be sure to have a strong and stable base in place soon. Once that’s done, all that remains is to enjoy your time and the adventure of living overseas.