Having a job is nice and makes you proud. You can now stand on your own feet. But, don't let all your salary be spent straight away. What should you do when you receive your salary?
What Are the Important Things to Do With Your First Salary and Next Paycheck?
1. Buy what you have dreamed of or wanted all this time
Is there something you've been dreaming of all this time but haven't been able to buy? You might not feel comfortable asking your parents for money. Now, you have received your first salary and you can use it as you wish. Likewise with the salaries for the following months.
But remember, you still have to use your salary wisely and responsibly. For example, the budget for buying what you like should not be more than 30% of your salary.
2. Start managing finances with budgeting
So how do you ensure that your spending on wants fits your budget? Of course, by doing budgeting to manage finances.
Budgeting can help ensure that money doesn't run out in the middle of the month. With budgeting, you can also know exactly what your monthly salary will be spent on.
Maybe you are wondering, what how to budget your monthly salary ideally? Is there only a maximum of 30% for wants as stated in the first point? The percentage is just an example. In fact, the percentage is determined based on your needs.
For example, if your regular expenses such as electricity bills and boarding house rental costs only require 40% of your salary, you can take a larger portion so that the budget for wants becomes 40% and your savings remain at 20% or increase your savings to 30% and the budget for wants remains at 30%.
Also read: 4 Reasons Budgeting Can Reduce Financial Anxiety
It's best to separate each need so that funds don't get mixed up and it's easier for you to monitor your expenses. You can experience easy and practical budgeting when using the Pocket feature in the Jago application.

To buy what you want, for monthly shopping, bill payments, daily meals and various other expenses, you can use the Spending Pocket.
There are many Spending Pockets that you can create, all tailored to your needs. Meanwhile, for savings, you can create a number of Saving Pockets. For emergency savings and retirement savings, for example, you can separate them by creating 2 Saving Pockets.
Especially for emergency fund, if you have save a minimum of Rp1,000,000, you can transfer the money to the Jago Deposit to protect your savings from being spent on other needs. Apart from that, the main benefit of saving emergency funds in the Jago Deposit is that there are no penalties when withdrawn early or whenever needed. Therefore, the Jago Deposit is a savings instrument that is suitable for emergency funds.
3. Save for financial goals (Moneyfesting)
Apart from the many things you want to buy, of course you also have financial goals (dreams) that you want to achieve in the future. For example, you want to be able to travel the world, perform Umrah for Muslims, want to start saving for retirement or have your own house and car.
For whatever your financial goals are, you can start setting aside a portion of your salary for savings. Saving doesn't need to be in large amounts straight away. For example, you could allocate 20% of your salary to savings every month.
However, there is 1 important thing that needs to be done first. Certified financial planner Edo Velandika CFP®, who is familiarly called Dika, emphasized the importance of having emergency fund savings before starting to save to make Moneyfesting a reality.
"Ideally, for first jobbers, emergency funds are prepared for unexpected events that could occur at any time. The minimum amount is 3x the monthly expenses."
4. Consider investing in yourself
Investasi terhadap diri sendiri maksudnya seperti apa? Kamu bisa belajar skill baru, yang selama kuliah mungkin nggak kamu dapatkan. Kamu juga bisa sembari bekerja sembari mengeyam pendidikan lebih tinggi.
"Before financial investment, the focus and priority for first jobbers should be to invest in yourself by learning new things, improving skills, and expanding networking, which are needed in the early days of a career," Dika said.
What About Parents, How Much Money Should You Give Them?
The amount of money that must be given to parents can vary between people because there are many influencing factors. The bigger your salary, the bigger the percentage you can allocate.
Other factors such as whether responsibilities are shared with siblings and parents' needs also play a role. There are also parents who don't want their children to give them money because they are still working or have enough savings, and so on.
If you are part of the sandwich generation who has to meet many needs, you can read how to be jago at managing finances for the sandwich generation here.
Starting from your first salary, you can manage your finances the way you want with Jago.