Okay, so I wouldn't say I'm good at saving money. In fact I am terrible at it! But this year I decided to make a conscious effort to save more! So I wrote a list of five ways we can all save a little extra. Whether your goal is as small as that perfume you want, or as big as a deposit for a mortgage (I'm no where near that by the way).
1. Make a list of savings goals - think small.
Many people do this at the beginning of each year, I know I do. But the biggest mistake we all make is to focus on all the big things we want straight away. Focusing on the big stuff when you are trying to save can be overwhelming, smaller goals are easier to manage. Make a list, but think only of small goals to start with, maybe you need to save up to get your mom's birthday present in a few months time. Once you have achieved a small goal, tick it off your list, success, will give you the confidence to work to even bigger goals. You could even split big goal into smaller goals, for example, you need £1000 for your summer holiday, this would scare the life out of me but if you say you want to save £100 a month for 10 Months then it seems much more manageable!
2. Saving with your bank
Many people have a savings account with their banks. But, unless you set up a direct debit/standing order with them to deposit regular amounts into your savings account, many go unused. I bank with TSB, previously Lloyds TSB, they have a savings scheme called Save the Change. The concept is that as long as your account is in credit, when you buy something they automatically put any change to the nearest £1 into your savings account. I love this idea because although you're not saving heaps and heaps of money, the pennies do actually add up over time! You could also do this yourself, at the end of each day, put any spare change you have in a jar. .
3. Take part in a savings club.
A work, we have a number of different savings clubs going on throughout the year. I'm part of a weekly and a monthly one. For the weekly one you give in £2 a week for a £104 pay out at the end of the year, whereas within the monthly one you give in £10 a month. The monthly one is a little different, they split your money into two so that you receive £50 for your birthday no matter what time of the year it is and £60 at Christmas (you don't pay in December). Both are really effective, especially because someone else has your savings so you can't dip into it. If you don't have anything like this where you work, maybe you could create one!
4. Make it fun
Lewis and I have made saving money into a competition. I saw the 52-week money challenge on Pinterest at the beginning of the year and thought it was a really good idea. Basically you start by saving £1 on week one and it increases by a £1 saved each week so the second week you would save £2 and so on. We changed it a little by saying you just have to pick a number between 1-52 to save each week. By doing this, for the weeks when you may not have much money you can choose the smaller amounts. The competition is that the person who has saved the most so far is the winner. There are loads of links to this challenge on Pinterest.
5. Make money doing surveys.
I would say this is the most effective way I have found to save money. Well, for me anyway, I use a website called Valued Opinions. I have been using this site for well over two years, but I have tried many different survey sites before. This one is the most reliable, I get at least a couple of surveys a day sent through to my email, and they credit your account straight away. Once you have accumulated £10 on your account, you can then redeem a voucher for the amount. The choice of vouchers vary from Amazon, to M&S to Sainsbury's. Last year I saved up all the credit on my account until Christmas, I saved £80 all together in one year. It helped so much when Christmas came around so I've decided to do it again this year. So far I have £48!! The surveys are great to do while you are watching TV or in your lunch break and they only take around 15 minutes.
You could also try:
- Leaving your credit/debit card at home.
- Unsubscribing to promotional/sales emails to prevent online shopping.
- Use the Sleep On It concept (if you think you want something sleep on it before you buy it, if you still want it the next day after thinking about it then get it).
Saving money is so difficult for so many people, me included. But, I have managed to do better this year by making some of these small changes. If you decide to try any of them be sure to let me know how you get on!