South African’s are highly indebted. According to a recent news article South African’s owe R1.14 trillion rand in debt. Every month between 7500 and 9000 people apply for debt review under that National Credit Act. What’s worse is that people are turning to short-term credit to cover their deficit, compounding their debt situation.
Credit Ombudsman, Manie Van Schalkwyk, said there were 18 million who owe money, of which 47 percent had black marks on their credit profiles or were three months in arrears in their payments and would struggle to obtain credit.
Why Financial Freedom
Our vision is to help people understand their financial situation and manage their finances more carefully so as to avoid debt. The aim is to allow people to achieve financial freedom - to be free of credit obligations and therefore to be fully in control of their own money.
Taking control of your own life
As children we have grown up in a world where we have been taught science, biology, mathematics, business economic and all manner of subjects at school, but we haven’t been taught personal financial management. So we finish school and start work, earning money, and spending money, with no real idea of how much we are spending and how much we can afford to spend.
As a society, we place high value on material possessions, which means that we spend more to raise our status in society in an attempt to keep up with and outdo the Jones’s. Invariably, we end up buying on credit, so we can a that fancy car / TV / holiday now rather than later.
As we earn more, we get offered more credit, and we take it, leading to the continual middle-class debt trap. At no point do we realise exactly how much money we are spending on debt, nor do we understand why we are spending that money.
Financial Freedom teaches people how to manage their money. It teaches them how to calculate their household income and expenses, to work out how much they are able to save at the end of each month. We look at ways of decreasing costs, and using the increased savings to pay off debt.
Most importantly, we teach that it is your life. You are not obliged to keep up with the Jones’s. It doesn’t matter what anyone thinks of you - you can be in control of your own finances, while those around you are living in debt. Ultimately, you can achieve your own financial freedom.