What’s it about?

Gain the skills to manage your personal finances: managing budgets, debts, investments, property purchase, pensions and insurance.  

With real incomes falling and personal debt at a record high, there has never been a better time to improve your personal financial skills – Managing my money aims to do just that.

You'll start by learning how to compile a budget and use it to make good decisions about your spending. You’ll explore debts and investments, and find out how mortgages are used to finance home ownership. The critical issue of pension planning is explained, with guidance on different pension products. You'll finish by examining different types of insurance and getting practical advice on how to make rational decisions about which insurance products to buy.

Using up-to-the minute data from the UK you develop financial skills and approaches that are relevant globally. 

This course is presented on OpenLearn with the kind support of True Potential LLP . If you want to know more about the work of the True Potential Centre for the Public Understanding of Finance (PUFin) and its mission to improve personal financial capability, check out the centre’s website. The centre, generously funded by True Potential LLP, has a mission to develop teaching and undertake research to help improve public financial capability.

What will I learn?

After completing this course you will be able to:

• understand how to undertake financial planning, including drawing up a budget and a household balance sheet
• apply a systematic approach to making key financial decisions
• understand loans, mortgages and other debt products and their costs
• understand the main categories of personal investments, their characteristics and the returns they provide to investors
• understand pension products and how to undertake pension planning
• understand insurance products and how they are priced.

What’s involved?

Although the course has been designed to be studied over eight weeks, the course is open all year for you to join at anytime and study at your own pace.

Using rich in high-quality text, images, video, audio and interactive elements to support your learning.   You'll start by learning how to compile a budget and use it to make good decisions about your spending. You’ll explore debts and investments, and find out how mortgages are used to finance home ownership. The critical issue of pension planning is explained, with guidance on different pension products. You'll finish by examining different types of insurance and getting practical advice on how to make rational decisions about which insurance products to buy.

Prerequisites?

This course is intended for those with an interest in developing their personal financial skills to make good decisions when managing their finances and buying financial products. The course does not require any previous experience of studying this subject.