5 Painless Ways to Increase Your Savings

My savings account is my security blanket.   If we need new tires- having that account lets me feel secure that we will get new tires without racking up that debt again!

Here are 5 Painless Ways to Increase Your Savings Account:

1.Put extra money in savings.

I know- who has extra money right?   If you budget $100 for your electricity bill each month and one month it’s only $88- then put that $12 difference in savings.  That may not seem like much but over the year it can really add up.

2. Reduce your bills, put the excess in savings. 

Many times “add ons” get added onto your bills for services such as internet service, telephone, cable, etc.  I recently found that I had a new charge for $10.99 on my last two bills for my internet. Some how I’d signed up for “Turbo Boost” or actually neglected to decline the service.  We had made changes to our service so the extra fee wasn’t noticed the first month.  I had upped our budgeted amount to the new amount and by removing it I was able to put $10.99 a month back into our savings account.

Check your cable, internet, telephone bills.  Really analyze them.  Are you paying for service you don’t use?  Remove those services and transfer that money to savings.

3. Do something you are paying someone else to do. 

We’ve talked about the cost of buying coffee out each day– instead of paying someone to brew the coffee for you make it at home.  Instead of buying a pre-made salad at the grocery store or restaurant – make it yourself.  There are lots of services we pay for others to do for us that are costly.  Doing it ourselves can save a pretty penny.  Then move that money into a savings account.  Watching it grow will make those few extra minutes a day seem so worthwhile.

4. Shop around.

I was amazed that one of my family’s prescriptions cost our entire $12 co-pay at most pharmacies but at our local grocery store?  Just $3.   That’s $9 a month saved.  Now I can put that extra $9 into our savings account!  With those items we buy every month, or week, we get into a routine of getting it at one location but by looking around we might find that someone else offers it much cheaper.

5. Move it before you see it.

Our Credit Union allows us to move money automatically. So I set up that when my husband’s paycheck is put into the bank, a portion is automatically moved over into our savings account.  It’s called a recurring transfer.  I never actually see that money in our checking account so I pretend his paycheck is that slightly reduced amount.  By never seeing it, it’s painless to save!  As time goes on, try increasing that amount moved over ever so slighly every month.  By the end of the year you might just find you are putting an extra $100 a month away and never even felt it!