Excellent post, music!

Set aside a small amount of time every week to do this stuff, that way it never builds up and becomes overwhelming. I.e., pay all bills every Tuesday night, or spend 15 minutes researching investments every Sunday afternoon, etc.

I have taken this one step further...

I have structured my repetitive bills (utilities, mortgage, insurance, etc.) so that they are either automatically taken out of my checking account every month, or applied against my credit card every month.

I am now in the position of writing ONE CHECK PER YEAR, and that one only because my water company doesn't accept credit cards. (I wait until I owe them a couple hundred dollars, then write them a check for $1000 and that keeps them off my back for another fifteen months or so.)

Once a month I go online to my bank account and compare my end-of-month balance to my 10-year budget projection, and make whatever changes are necessary to the budget (add/subtract a hundred dollars or so to my "unexpected expenses" category).

So, all told, I probably spend about 15 minutes a month managing my finances.

tanstaafl.