We all wish that we had a little more money in our bank accounts sometimes. After all, it's not getting any easier to live a frugal lifestyle. Even if you have a relatively good income, there's a good chance that you're constantly pinching every penny to make sure that you can afford to buy not just the things that you need, but the items that you want in the future too.
The good news is that saving more cash doesn't have to be as exhausting as it seems. Anyone can use the following money saving hacks to transform their relationship with money and start taking savings to the next level.
1. Use The Envelope System
All you need for this is a pile of envelopes - the old ones that you have lying around from birthday and Christmas cards will work fine. To use the cash envelope system, create a budget listing everything you need to pay for in the month - including any loans you’ve taken out, house and rent costs, groceries, utilities, car maintenance and so on. A lot of the things that you'll need to pay for each month will be available to pay digitally, so you can forget about them.
Once you've paid for everything that you "have to have", pull the remaining cash you have from your income out of your bank and divide it into envelopes for things like food, entertainment and extras. Once you run out of cash in your envelope, you stop spending on that category - it's that simple.
2. Track Your Expenses
One of the things that people look forward to the least when it comes to making a budget, is tracking every penny that they need to spend. However, keeping a journal of your expenses can also help you to figure out where you're more likely to go over your limits. For instance, if you notice that you're most likely to overspend on food that you get for lunch when you go to work, or takeaways because you're too tired too cook, try meal prepping.
Creating the meals that you want to make in advance and putting them into the fridge or freezer so you can use them later means that you'll be a lot less likely to turn to someone else to make your food for you when you're exhausted.
3. Keep The Change
Stop taking wayward dollars and extra pennies for granted. If you have a lot of spare change around the house, start gathering it together into a savings jar. Every time you buy something with cash, put the left over money that you have in your pockets in the jar and allow the money to build up over a few months. About halfway through the year, you can cash in your savings jar and use it to add some extra money to your emergency expenses or savings account.
There are even apps out there that can help you to take this strategy to the next level by investing the left over change from your purchases. For instance, if you spend $8.88 on an item, your app would ask of you wanted to invest the extra $1.12.
4. Stick To Your Grocery List
If there's one thing that US households are notorious for wasting money on - it's food. When you go out shopping without a list, you are more likely to blow your spending through the roof, because you're guessing at what you need for the days ahead. On the other hand, if you create a list in advance based on the meals that you know you are going to make and the items that you already have, then you will be less likely to spend excessively.
You can also reduce your risk of overspending by taking the exact amount of cash that you need out with you to the store. That way, if you are tempted to buy anything extra, you will need to go back home for extra money, or you'll have to figure out how to save some cash on another purchase.
5. Know When To Stockpile
Finally, whenever you see kitchen towels, toilet paper and other important purchases available for a low price - take the opportunity to stockpile. Buying certain items in bulk when they are on sale is a great way to save some money in the long term. Just make sure you know you are going to need them before you go over the top.
It is also worth looking for coupons and voucher codes before you decide to splash out on the items you are going to stockpile, just in case you can get a bigger discount.
