Words on wealth: achievable financial resolutions for 2026

Apart from the obvious ones, such as saving more, updating your will, and ensuring your loved ones are protected if you were to die suddenly, here are seven practical ways to improve your financial (and overall) wellbeing and reduce money worries in the year ahead.

​1. Know where your money is going

It takes considerable effort to stick faithfully to a monthly budget and track expenditure down to the nearest cent. I think more people profess to do this than are actually doing it. If you’re not that disciplined with your money, there’s a base level of control you need to achieve: know to a fair degree of certainty what you’re spending in the broad expense categories – for example, groceries, accommodation, transportation, insurance, services, entertainment, and savings. It’s also important to closely monitor your bank statements for unauthorised debits – these amounts, which may be small enough to escape your attention, tend to sneak in and take up permanent residence in your finances.

​2. Reduce your debt pile

Total up your liabilities – what you owe on everything from your car to your home to your credit cards. Make a note of that figure and resolve to bring it down by the end of the year. You will do it naturally if you carry on making your repayments and avoid taking on more debt, but you can speed up the process by ploughing more into repayments. On your total debt pile, you may be paying an average interest of 15% or more per year, so think of reducing it as a form of tax-free saving at a great interest rate.

​3. Know the replacement value of your possessions

Now look at what you own. Have you recently made an inventory of your home contents? Your possessions are probably worth more than you realise, and replacing them should your home burn to the ground could cost a fortune. This is what your insurance needs to cover, so make sure that the total sum insured, which should reflect the replacement value of your used possessions with new ones, is accurate. Remember that if you are under-insured, the average rule applies, which means that even on small claims, the payout will be proportionately reduced. Insurers aren’t keen to do it, but you can specify items that would be impractical and too costly to replace, such as a book collection, to fall outside your cover.

​4. Declutter

In making your inventory, you are likely to come across many things that you no longer use or need. Clothes, books, kitchenware, electronic gadgets, and accessories lying dormant in a drawer … I could go on. Getting rid of them not only ensures that your insurance policy covers only the items you need covered, but also enables someone else to get some use out of them. And instead of trying to flog them online or offload them at an auction house, why not be a good citizen and donate them to a charity?

​5. Forget about the Joneses

Envy is a wasted emotion that drains our sense of well-being. One of the surest ways to reduce financial stress is to stop comparing what you have with what others have. Don’t make the apparent wealth of others a yardstick for your own achievements – their financial position may be a lot worse than you think. The guy in the Ferrari on the road in front of you  – would you like to be him? Apart from the car, you don’t know anything about him. His company may be in liquidation, his wife may have deserted him, and his eye-catching means of transport may be about to be impounded by the taxman.

​

6. Don’t underestimate non-material wealth

Financial wealth is one component of wellbeing – don’t neglect the others. In his bestselling book "The 5 Types of Wealth: A Transformative Guide to Design Your Dream Life,” American writer Sahil Bloom reminds us where our priorities should lie. Apart from our financial assets, we have:

• Time wealth: “Achieve control over your time – how you spend it, where you spend it, and whom you spend it with.”

• Social wealth: “Proximity to people you love is worth more than any job will ever pay you.”  

• Mental wealth: Remain curious, for it is “through curiosity that you … unlock new insights and achieve lifelong growth”.

• Physical wealth: Invest in your body through “regular movement, proper nutrition, and thoughtful recovery”.

​

7. Be wary of doomsayers

Prophets of doom are invading the internet. Question everything. The historian and author Yuval Noah Harari, in his book “21 Lessons for the 21st Century”, says it’s better to admit being bewildered than yielding to panic. “Switch from panic mode to bewilderment. Panic is a form of hubris. It comes from the smug feeling that I know exactly where the world is heading – down. Bewilderment is more humble, and therefore more clear-sighted. If you feel like running down the street crying, ‘The apocalypse is upon us!’, try telling yourself, ‘No, it’s not that. Truth is, I just don’t understand what’s going on in the world.’”

* Hesse is the former editor of Personal Finance.

PERSONAL FINANCE