Daily habits that we can change to save money

Many of us desire to save money. I think most people would agree that saving money is something “easier said than done”. Personally, I believe it’s a mind-set that needs to be developed by creating good money-saving habits and today I will give you a few tips on the number of things that we can do to cut our costs. In the past articles, I have stated that to succeed in managing your finances, you have to live within your means, spend less than you make. It’s simple as that. Your income doesn’t determine how rich you are; but it's your net worth(what you keep) that ultimately will work to your favour in whatever lifestyle you choose to live as we continue the journey of our lives. Below are areas that I find we can save money on; Buying Lunch at Work; I have always argued that it’s okay to treat yourself once in a while for lunch, but generally I would say make and bring your own lunch to work. For example, if you spend $ 10.00 for lunch each day, five times a week, in a year you will spend $2600.00. Even if you were to reduce that to three times a week, that is still about $1560.00. As you can see, making your own lunch and bringing it to work, will work in your favour as you can have some of that cost invested in other ways that would give you a return. Use the Public Library to get DVD’s, Magazines/Books: The public library has lots of movies that are free. A lot of popular magazines such as the Economist, Business weekly, Consumer report are all available for free. Why should you go rent a movie for about $7.00 a night when you can get the same movie for free at the public library for seven days? Why would you buy a magazine when you can go into the library and read the magazine for free? You can even place a hold online. If you have too much pride to use free stuff at the library, why not try Netflix which only costs you $7.99 a month. Coffee: For those who are coffee lovers like I do. Invest in a coffee mug. It won’t cost you much but it will save you a lot in purchase of coffee. For example if you bought a coffee for $2.95 three times a day that would amount to about $1076 in a year. If you bought your own mug, spent $20.00 for it, and made your own coffee and carried it, or even use the mug to make coffee at work. That would mean a massive savings from the amount spent on daily coffee. Stick to your budget; I know a lot of us plan budgets, but we fail to follow through because of the occasional disruptions here and there. Stay within the boundaries of your budget. If you realize that you overspending in one area of your budget, cut the expense from another area so that you ensure you are living within your means. It is always good to have goals written down so that you can see them every day and don’t lose focus on your ultimate objectives, be it short term or long term. Other things we can do are, cooking more at home. For those that frequent restaurants, you will quickly realize that an evening out easily runs in the $80-120 a meal and drinks. Suppose you ate out twice a week, which easily translates to $8320-12,480 per year, if you reduced that to once a week then its half of that. Now, supposing you chose to cook most of your meals and decided to treat yourself once a month, that would mean you only spend $960.00 per year, meaning the difference can be used for investments purposes to build on your future. If you have read my past articles, I have been a great advocate of paying your full balance on your credit card. If you cannot afford to pay it in full, then I suggest you stack them away and never use them. You are never going to get ahead financially if you are paying 19.99-30% in interest rates. You are basically giving away free money, when you pay interest on those credit cards. Lastly, do not forget to pay yourself, set up an automatic withdrawal of funds from you chequing account into savings. Again, I argue if you do not carry any credit card balance. There is no point putting money in a savings account getting 1.25% at the very highest, while you are paying credit card companies twenty times or more. They are basically borrowing your funds at that rate and lending it back to you twenty times. In the end, saving money requires a lot of your patience and hard work. As long as you stay focused, you will have yourself to thank when you are no longer able to bring in any income as you let your money work for you while you enjoy your life relaxing and reminiscing the years gone by.