I know it's a real challenge for many people today to earn a decent income, find affordable housing, build up savings and accumulate financial wealth. But just because it's a challenge doesn't mean it's impossible.

The single most expensive financial need we all have is building up sufficient money to avoid having to work until we die. Back in the day, this used to be called retirement and typically was something done about ten years before death.

Less than three weeks after the UK budget announced some tax cheer for home buyers and further COVID-related financial support, the UK government has published over 30 tax updates, consultations and documents. To save you the effort, I've had a trawl through all the documents to see what's relevant from a personal finance perspective.

Two years ago, I had the crazy idea of building a beautiful barn-style house in an unloved and unused part of my garden. Today it is a reality. After nine long months, the project is nearing completion. 

I've been involved in several property-related projects over the years, including refurbishments and remodeling, but building an entire house is another ballgame entirely. I had to research, plan, negotiate and oversee to ensure the project went smoothly and stayed on time and within budget. 

This year, as I have done for several years now, I was one of the Financial Times’ (FT) budget day commentators. Despite trawling through the enormous number of budget documents, we struggled to find many significant personal financial planning changes.

This week, the UK government set out tentative plans to relax coronavirus restrictions and reopen the economy, bringing much-needed optimism and hope to a weary population. I thought it might be useful to reflect on what the pandemic has taught us all about money.

Conventional wisdom is that buying a home beats renting. But conventional wisdom might be wrong. In my latest Real Money Stories podcast - “David Blatt Invests His Way To Wealth” - my guest explains how he has built a multi-million dollar property fund over the past 13 years. He also points out that he rents his home in downtown Manhatten in New York because this frees up his capital for wealth creation and gives him the maximum flexibility to move home in the future.

If you see other people making a lot of easy money in a short space of time, they are likely to be criminals, very lucky, or super smart. Sometimes they can be all three! Recently, a minority of people have made a lot of money from a surge in the price of the nascent Bitcoin cryptocurrency, shares in loss-making video games retailer GameStop, and the spot price of silver bullion. What all these things have in common is they don't produce anything of value or positive cashflow. They derive their value from the demand of existing and new investors. 

Charlie Munger is 97 years old and has been Warren Buffett's business partner for five decades. Despite giving away vast amounts of his wealth, he is still worth nearly $2 billion. 

One of the traits that has helped Munger become wealthy is his ability to learn from his mistakes, and also those made by others. Munger advises "I like people admitting they were complete stupid horses' asses. I know I'll perform better if I rub my nose in my mistakes. This is a wonderful trick to learn." 

2020 is the year that most people would rather forget. The global pandemic has affected every aspect of life for most of the world's population, including their finances. How has your financial situation changed over 2020? Has it got better, worse, or stayed the same? 

In a modern aeroplane, the onboard flight computer monitors the operation of the aircraft and alerts the pilot to any relevant issues. While there are a lot of instrument displays, switches and audio alerts, the pilot tends to focus on just a handful of metrics like altitude, wind speed, fuel consumption and oncoming weather.  

By focusing on those factors which are likely to have the most significant impact on flight safety and speed, the pilot minimises mental fatigue, plots the most efficient course and remains better prepared to deal with any potential emergency.

In Time is a 2011 science fiction film featuring Justin Timberlake and Amanda Seyfried. In a dystopian future about 50 years from now, people are genetically engineered to stop ageing at 25. Also at this point, a 12-month countdown clock starts on their arm. Once the clock reaches zero, the person dies. People can increase their clock time - and as a result their lifetime - by transferring time from other people or by downloading time held in special Time Capsules. Time is, therefore, the universal currency.

For most people, building wealth is an essential element of their financial wellbeing. The three factors which have the most significant impact on how much wealth you accumulate are:

The amount you save; how long your money is invested; the returns you achieve each year (net of costs and taxes).

As a general rule, the higher the expected or potential return, the higher the level of risk. Risk means the possibility of a total loss of capital, fluctuations in the daily value of your investment or the potential for future returns to be lower (or non-existent) than anticipated (based on historical performance).  

I recently established a presence on Instagram so that I can share my money insights with a broader audience. This week I will be holding my first Instagram Live, which will also let me to answer viewers' money-related questions. 

I've been concerned to see some personal finance information on Instagram which is very poor or just plain wrong. While I'm sure most of the people posting this content have good intentions, following their 'advice' could be very detrimental to your financial wellbeing.

One definition of insanity is doing the same thing over and over again and expecting different results. If you want to improve your financial wellbeing, you might need to change your approach. You might need a better plan. Your plan can be elaborate and complex, or it can be focused and straightforward.

Many people don't realise what they have until they lose it, which might explain why plastic surgery is a multi-billion pound business. Plastic surgery is the vernacular for cosmetic surgery. And to make it even more confusing, procedures can be surgical (e.g. breast augmentation) or non-surgical (e.g. Botox). The minority of procedures are health-related, but the vast majority are elective, in the sense that they are purely for aesthetic reasons.

There are many definitions of what it means to live a good life. Having enough money to avoid the misery of poverty is a key priority. But so is being able to choose how you spend your time and afford things that make more varied and exciting. While the news is full of tales of woe about how hard it is for people to get ahead financially, it rarely discusses how to build wealth.

I am naturally an impulsive and spontaneous person, and I love socialising and doing fun things. But when I was younger, those aspects of my personality got me into real bother financially, and I ended up with over £30K of expensive consumer debt. I felt stressed, bad about myself, and ashamed that I was in such a hole.

In desperation, I researched how I might be better with money. I came across US money guru Dave Ramsey and his Baby Steps programme and learnt how other people had got on top of their money.  

At age 18, Abigail Sweeney was passionate about computer science and the potential for more women to have a role in the male-dominated technology sector. A teacher questioning why she would want to do a “boy's subject” only strengthened her resolve and she managed to secure an offer from Royal Holloway University in London to study computer science.  

The controversy about A-Level grades and the impact on students' ability to get into their chosen university has brought back into focus the question of whether it makes sense to go to university.

The past six months have been a rollercoaster ride for anyone who has capital invested in the stock and bond markets. And given that most people have some form of pension savings, that means almost everyone is affected.  Shortly after COVID-19 raised its ugly head, global investment markets fell about 30% during March and April, as investors took fright and headed for the perceived safety of gold, government bonds and cash. 

Over the past few weeks, I've been reading and hearing a lot of the same question: “Is now a good time to buy a home?” In this slightly longer than normal blog, I set out some thoughts to help you form your own answer to that question.