Starting 2016 with clearly defined goals will give you greater impetus and focus to achieve them.
But, if like me, you find it difficult to keep New Year resolutions, let alone a longer plan, it’s important to develop a strategy that will keep your goals on track.
While everyone has different plans, budgets and life situations, a strong strategy will help you move towards your property goal, whether it be to save for your first home, buy an investment property, sell a property, do a renovation or something completely different.
Here is my step-by-step process for setting my property goals for 2016 and beyond. If you’re also looking at property goals this year, you may find this process I went through to help me determine my property goals helpful.
GOAL SETTING
Step 1: Define your short, medium and long term goals
Before you begin the journey, you need to have a clear idea of what you hope to achieve. Set aside time to write down your short-term (3 month), medium-term (1 year) and long-term (5 year) property goals.
Don’t limit yourself, put down everything you aspire to achieve under all three categories like the following example:
| What do I want to achieve in the short term (3-6 months) | What do I want to achieve in the medium term (1-2 years) | What do I want to achieve in the longer term (5+ years) |
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If, like me you end up with multiple goals it can be difficult to know where to focus. So the next thing would be to look at your list and in each column put a star next to one item. Ask yourself, in each time frame, what goal is most important to me?
Step 3: Write them out as SMART goals
Look at your three prioritized goals and rewrite them so they are specific, measurable, actionable, relevant and time-based? If your short term goal was to pay off your credit card you could rewrite it as:
Pay off the $1500 owing on my credit card by 30 June 2016.
Step 4: Determine the smaller actions
Once you have your three SMART goals, list out all the smaller actions you need to take to achieve that goal within the time frame you’ve set.
Using the credit card debt option, some of the smaller actions could include the following:
- Set up a regular payment plan to deposit $60 per week into my credit card account.
- Cut up my credit card so I stop using it
- Apply for a debit card so I only spend money I have in my account
- Take my lunch to work 3 times a week (put money saved towards my credit card debt)
- Learn to use the coffee machine at work so I don’t buy two coffees a day (put money saved towards credit card debt)
DEVELOPMENT PLAN
Step 5: Do a personal stock take
Take a look at your current position. How do you sit in terms of knowledge when it comes to tackling your property goals? What do you need to address? It’s prudent to get a clear idea of what it is you need. If you find this task overwhelming, you might like to try this: Draw up a table with three columns. List obstacles in the left column, possible solutions in the middle and an expected timeline in the right. You may discover that you have more options than you first thought.
For instance:
| Obstacles | Solutions | Timeframe |
| Lack of real estate knowledge | Read industry articlesSeek advice from professionalsPost questions on forum Read property news |
From your personal stock take, write down a list of actions points. What can you do now? What can you do this month or this year? It’s a good idea to create a to-do list of all the actions you can take.
For example:
This week: Set budget.
This month: Meet with a mortgage broker to get a clear understanding of investment options.
This year. Start a property investing meetup group for first time investors and hold my first event.
Think of these action points as the smaller steps that will take you from your short term to mid term to long-term goals.
TRACKING PROGRESS
Step 5: Establish system to track progress
Once you have fine-tuned your goals and created your list of action points, it is important to monitor your progress and make sure you stay on track. How are you going to measure your progress? And don’t forget to celebrate your successes along the way too.
To track progress you could set email or phone reminders and schedule monthly check-ins with yourself to review progress to date and make adjustments as needed.
Or you could make use of an app. Strides or Goalscoring provide charts that visually show your progress, Level Money helps with budgeting and Nobe assists with task management. There are many more apps out there to help.
I’d be keen to hear how you set your goals and whether you did a goal setting exercise using my pointers – to set your goals today just download our Property Goal Setting Action Plan Worksheet now!
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