I have always been a money-saver. When shopping for my wants and needs, I always look for a sale. This does not make me cheap; this makes me frugal. I don’t mind spending money- I just love a good deal. I’m also really good at saving money. When I am saving for something- be it a piece of clothing, a vacation, a special treat, or an emergency fund- I use several methods.
#1 Saving Five-Dollar Bills
I began doing this many years ago after reading about it in a magazine (remember magazines?). This method is so simple, and the amount of money you will save is very surprising. You simply save every five-dollar bill you receive. It becomes a competition if you get your family involved. We saved for our annual beach vacations using this method when my kids were younger. We had a big jar in the kitchen where everyone would put their five-dollar bills. Every once in while one of us would pay for something with a twenty-dollar bill and get three fives back. You would have thought that person had won the lottery! Before leaving on our vacation, we would convert the five-dollar bills into larger bills. Those saved five-dollar bills turned into hundreds of dollars.
#2 Saving Change
This is an obvious one; just about everyone saves change. I read somewhere that if you fill a 2-liter pop bottle with dimes you end up with some amount like $500. Well, if a 2-liter full of dimes converts to that kind of money, a 2-liter of nickels, dimes, and quarters would total even more! So that’s what we did. We put all our loose silver change in a 2-liter bottle that we decorated with pictures of the sun and beach and added “Fun in the Sun Funds”. If I remember correctly, we ended up having to use a second 2-liter bottle since we saved so many coins. I can’t remember what our grand total was, but it was a sizable amount.
#3 Saving a Set Amount Each Payday
Another method for saving I have used is saving a set amount each payday- kind of “paying yourself” like it’s a bi-weekly bill. Adding a twenty-dollar bill to a jar every payday adds up. It won’t seem like much while you are doing it, but at the end of the year that’s $520. If you and a partner are doing this, that would be a painless way to save $1040 a year. Of course, you could increase the amount saved each payday; putting in $100 each payday would give you $2600 or $5200.
#4 Left-Over Payday Cash
This is a new method for me. For the past two months I have been taking $100 in twenty-dollar bills out at the ATM every payday. I put that cash minus a twenty-dollar bill in a tarnished metal “teapot” that my parents kept money in when we were kids. Amazingly their teapot was always full of twenty-dollar bills; however, for some reason the teapot doesn’t miraculously grow money at my house! I only dip into the teapot money if I need some cash. I add whatever cash I have leftover in the teapot on the next payday to my “Palm Trees and Sunsets” stash. For example, yesterday was my payday. I took out $100, and I added my cash leftover from last payday (which was $80!) to my stash. Some paydays I have only $20 or $40 left from the previous payday; it just all depends on how much cash I needed during the previous two weeks. So far, this method seems very promising.
Give one of these methods a try. After a few months, it will be a habit and you won’t even have to think about it- it will just be something you do.
