With the institution of malls, affordability of technology, and rising cost of health care, loans, and rising inflation, it has become very difficult for one to spend less and save money for future use.
Current statistics show that banks are showing a considerable decline on each bank account holder’s savings and have shown an increased in the number of withdrawals per month leaving people little money to spend before the next salary strikes their account.
Along this fact shows a relative increase in the amount of spending made in private institutions marketing different products.
While these facts and a host of temptations are a commonplace scenario in the real world, there are many ways by which you can keep yourself from getting into the hype and aid you in creating and developing your personal and unique habit of saving a few dollars from your basic salary.
Ø Compulsive Buying – Given enough money, 7 out of 10 people lure into the idea of buying a personal item they like in a store at a first glance.
In a simulated sociological study, people who originally planned on window-shopping ended up buying personal stuff if they are taking their personal bankcards with them.
If you are doing window-shopping, limit your spending to a few bucks and try making your list the next time you plan on buying such items. Buy only the store items you need and abandon those that do not satisfy an immediate need.
Ø Budgeting – Along with your pursuit to saving money, it is also important to keep an organized and effective, yet reasonable budgeting technique. Budgeting eliminates buying temptations that would tend to build up during malling and help you save money along the process due to preformed lists of items you need to buy.
Ø Performing Price Comparison – The World Wide Web provides a great avenue on providing a checklist of prices on specific items that you plan on buying.
This is great for you if you are into bulk buying and plan on conducting your malling activity in one place. This will give you a good idea if the usual store from where you usually get all your everyday household needs provides you a reasonable price for specific products.
Ø Take All the Convenience At Home – Lunch, snacks, and major meals are something which you can prepare at home. If you are serious on saving money, you can prepare all this from home and get away with some amenities of the gut by replacing soda with water. This is not only beneficial to your pocket but does a great deal for your health as well.
Modern Ways of Saving Money: 4 Tricks that Can Make You Rich
Saving has always been a way of life for people who believed on its power. These people know that they have to save more money in order to create a more established future.
However, as time goes by, more and more people find it hard to save money. They contend that saving is no longer a way of life but a resolution that they have to strictly adhere to just to salt away some amount of money.
Some people even insist that it is no longer possible for a person to save more money because most of them are already living paycheck to paycheck. With all the high-prices of commodities these days, saving more money is no longer workable.
But the point is that people can indeed save more.
How? Here is a list of some modern ways that will let you save more money:
1. Save some percentage from your salary
Most money-savers automatically take at least 30% from their salary and save them into their savings account. The basic concept here is that most of us spend whatever amount we have on our paycheck, and maybe even more. If you are able to limit that amount, your expenses will unexplainably get smaller.
2. Pay everything in cash
Credit cards had always been a way of life for most consumers. The problem is that they become so comfortable with it that they tend to spend everything on credit. In fact, statistics show that the average family has an average outstanding balance on their credit cards amounting to $7,000. And they even pay almost $1,000 in each year just on the interest charges alone.
Hence, because of this comfortable shopping, they forget to keep track of their expenses and accumulate more payables than what they can afford to pay.
3. Set goals
Create goals that you really want and not be fickle-minded about it. If there’s a certain amount involved, be specific with the amount, like saying “I will save $5,000 in a year and not around $5,000.”
Try to set your goals based on your priorities. Have a period for every goal.
4. Check your company’s retirement plan
With your employer plan such as the 401(k) or the 403(b), you can definitely save more money for the future. Here, your company will deduct a percentage of your salary from each paycheck and invest the amount in your choice of instruments—mainly mutual funds.
The bottom line is that saving is not just a way of life or a resolution. It’s the ultimate gratification that you get as a fruit of your labor.
The Advantages of Using Money Budgeting Software
The problem with most people these days is that they get so comfortable with their expenses through the aid of credit cards. They become so indulged with cashless shopping that more and more people are spending more than what they can afford.
For this reason, experts contend that budgeting can definitely alleviate the consumers from “financial strain” by managing their expenses and income instead of falling into the pit of liabilities.
However, some people just contend that they cannot simply do budgeting alone. They insist that they need some help in order to come up with a reliable and workable budget.
That’s why some financial experts have created some money budgeting software that will facilitate the creation of a good budget in order to promote wise money-saving strategies.
Basically, money budgeting software assists an individual in his or her expenditures and uses the money sensibly. These new technologies will help distribute the money into various aspects and areas and will also help add to savings.
So, if you still don’t know what the money budgeting software can do for you, here is a list of its advantages:
1. It helps you keep track of your expenses
Money budgeting software can definitely allow you to keep track of your expenses. With this kind of technology, you get to understand your cash flow and allow you to be aware of how much money you spend and earn.
2. It helps you to create some probable projections of the future
While some people are comfortable with the usual type of budgeting on paper, utilizing a money budgeting software can give you more than what you expect. You can even make some possible projections using your integrated money budgeting software. And if you are really into hard copies, you can even print them out for record keeping.
3. It gives you control
The problem with most people who do not have a budget to guide them is that they tend to overspend with what they have.
With this kind of help, you can gain control of your expenditures. You will be able to know when you are already overspending or not. Plus, you become attentive of the blow of every money decision that you make.
The bottom line is that money budgeting software can definitely give you the kind of assurance and control that you need to keep track of your expenses. In this way, you can be surer that all of your spending activities are based on reason and plan and not just sheer indulgences.
The Benefits of Using Money Saving Coupons
One great irony of life is that people find it so easy to spend money and yet, they find it doubly hard to save money.
Almost 80% of the consumers, according to some surveys, tend to spend their money easily and find it hard to save even just 10% of their income or any amount of their earnings. They always insist that they have more expenses than they can handle; that is why it is so hard for them to really create a hefty amount for savings.
What people do not know is that they can easily save more money even on their daily expenses if they just know how to do it.
The point is that if they were really wise consumers, they would definitely take advantage of freebies and discount items that can absolutely cut their expenses almost in half.
One of the best examples is the utilization of money saving coupons.
The problem is that many people are still not aware of the benefits that money saving coupons can give. They contend that these freebies just offer such a little amount of money and that they can be better off without it.
Therefore, for those who are not yet fully aware of the benefits they can derive from these money saving coupons and what they can do in order to save more money, here is a list of some of tips on how to use these coupons for a cause:
1. Look for the right places
If you are not yet aware of the right places where you can get excellent money saving coupons, try to look in your local newspaper, especially the Sunday editions. It’s one of the best places where you can get discount coupons.
Usually, different establishments provide discount coupons to entice consumers to buy their products. That’s why they use the paper to distribute their freebies.
2. Shop online
Online businesses also provide money saving coupons. What people do not know is that online discount coupons provide more money saving percentage than what the newspapers can give.
Best of all, it is so easy to accumulate discount coupons. All you have to do is to sign up for the online business and you can easily get some of their freebies.
3. Coupons are great money savers
The very advantage of money saving coupons is that they can cut your bill to almost 50%.
Indeed, using money saving coupons can definitely save you more money than what you have expected. So, for those who do not know this yet, try to cut more coupons and start saving.
Five Great Ideas to Save Money
Want to save money but don’t know how? Feel like depriving yourself when it comes to saving money? Don’t be disheartened. Try these five money saving ideas, without breaking up a sweat!
Reduce or eliminate magazines. If you are a typical American family, your mailbox gets its regular fill of magazines: business, sports, home and garden magazines. Can you imagine how much each of these subscriptions cost? Annually, it is an average of about $20 per magazine. If your family is subscribed to 5 different magazines, that’s already $100 savings per year! If you still need the information from such mags, try to check out their websites and you’ll be surprised at how much free information is available!
Buy in bulk. How can warehouse and discount clubs drastically lower their prices? Because they buy and sell in bulk. And so should you! Consumables that are non-perishable can be purchased 10-15% cheaper when bought in bulk. Be sure to stock up only on fast-moving items such as kitchen towels, cleaners, canned goods, etc., to avoid wasting money on rancid food.
Eat at home. Eating out has become an American lifestyle. What used to be an activity to celebrate special occasions has become part of the daily, fast-paced life. But did you know that eating out could chomp as much as 40% of your budget for food? That’s as much as $40 weekly, saved just by eating in!
Plan your meals. Eating out 4X a week need not be your solution to a dynamic lifestyle. Menu planning is! Take time on weekends to plan for the following week’s meals. Every night, before you hit the sack, take out the ingredients for the meals of the next day from the freezer, and store them in the refrigerator. By the time you get home from work, everything is thawed and ready to be cooked. And because eating out is part of the American way of life, you would have saved enough money to spend for dining out on special occasions!
Homemade skin care. Is your dermatologist eating up your budget? Don’t you wish you can be beautiful and save money at the same time? The answer is yes, you can! By using ingredients from your pantry, you can take care of your skin and still save a fortune. Try the following:
– Honey and oatmeal can exfoliate dry skin.
– Ginger seeped in a bath softens your skin.
– Cucumber and milk softens tired skin.
Without drastically changing your lifestyle, you have started your path on saving money. Secure your future by using these money saving ideas, today!
Money Savings on Food
Thinking of cutting down your expenses on food? Then you should read the following tips. They will surely help you on reducing your food expenses. They are by no means comprehensive but they will be very useful.
For coffee drinkers
It is a good idea to re-use the grounded coffee once. Using coffee grounds two times or more will not greatly affect the taste of the coffee. It is highly encouraged to do this using a filter that is permanent and avoid the paper variety. Keep the grounds refrigerated until using it the following day.
For bread lovers
Grocery stores sell bread that was made the day before at a much lower price. There is nothing wrong with eating bread that was made the day before since it still is good to eat. If you have a lot of space in your refrigerator, store a lot for bigger savings. If you will eat the bread, you can defrost it using your microwave oven. Re-heat it every 30 seconds to prevent the edges of the bread from getting too hard.
When buying from the grocery
Before going to the grocery, you should have already made a list of all the things that you really need. Prioritize basic goods and avoid buying things that you do not really need. Observe the prices indicated on the displays. Remember, branded products cost considerably more than store brands. It is also a good idea to keep the receipt of your previous trip to the grocery and make it as a basis for your purchases on your next trip. To have higher savings, buy more of the product. You can always store it in your refrigerator or in the house to minimize your trips to the grocery store.
When eating outside
If you are going to eat in a pricey restaurant, the best time for you to go there would be during lunch. Food during lunch usually costs less and this will be to your advantage. When staying at the hotel on your trips, it is a good idea to check if they also include breakfast in your total room charge. You should also find out where the locals eat. Chances are, they will eat where the food is great and the price is even better. When going around, carry with you some snacks. A chocolate bar, chips, and cookies will go a long way while strolling around.
Eating cheaply does not necessarily mean eating bad food. Look around and you will be suprised at the options you can choose from. Take time and consider your choices so that you will not only eat a lot but save some money also.