I find that most of us want to save money, however, the only problem is learning how to stick to our goals. The problem is most of us like being consumers and trying to keep up with our friends instead of living within our means. I also used to struggle to save daily until I came up with strategies that have helped me in my financial goals, from using AutoInsureSavings.org or other sites to help save money on insurance, to checking my budgets and understanding how much I spend every day.
Here are tips that I have used to save money every day.
1. Checking Accounts Every Day
I advise all of us to track and record our expenses and income every day. We can use an excel sheet to track our expenses or the software of our choice. This is very handy for knowing what insurance payments and other expenses are on the way. I personally love excel. This action may seem time-consuming but it’s the best activity if we want to save money. But 10 minutes every day is not a lot, right?
Some of us prefer to do our accounts monthly and even weekly and that is fine. There is no need of applying pressure on ourselves; the goal is to do what works for us as long we save money. However, the reason why I advise doing it every day is that it takes such a short time and then becomes a good habit.
2. Reducing Impulse Buying
I used to spend an extra $20 on impulse goods during my shopping before I started learning how to save money daily. I know we are all human and we tend to overspend especially when we see Ads for a good product or even new food menus.
I managed to beat impulse buying by buying only the things that I need. I decided to be making a shopping list and sticking to it. A shopping list may look like something simple but it saves us a lot of money. The extra $20 that I was wasting am now saving it.
3. Cooking at Home
Cooking is a skill that we should all aspire to have. I always make meal plans on Sundays and ensure that I have all the groceries in the house. A meal plan helps me avoid eating out. Let’s admit it, eating out is expensive. I know some of us eat out every day.
I used to eat out every day until the day I counted the money that I was using outside. It was a lot. Eating at home not only saves money but also makes us eat healthily.
4. Sticking to the Goals
We know very well that saving regularly is hard. That is why we need a strong laid down action plan that can keep us in check. Our friends can also keep us in check. I find writing an action plan and sticking to a regular place in our house to be an effective method. This is because when we see our goals daily we can stick to them.
5. Living Within Our Means
This is the hardest part. This is because we all want to keep up with our friends who are doing well. This problem leads to us making the wrong money choices and sometimes even taking loans so that we can show our friends that we are in the same league with them.
Avoiding this problem is easy, one way is changing the friends that we feel are pressuring us. The other way is to be true to ourselves.
I know saving money regularly is hard, but our future will thank us. The information in this article is a great way of learning how to save every day.
Veeramachineni Lalitha
I am Finance Content Writer. I write Personal Finance, banking, investment, and insurance related content for top clients including Kotak Mahindra Bank, Edelweiss, ICICI BANK and IDFC FIRST Bank. My experience details : Linkedin