Looking for money saving tips to increase savings right away? Here are 9 money saving tips that will help you stay on track with your financial goals.
We all love instant gratification. These money saving tips will allow you to decrease your spending and help to increase your savings immediately!
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9 Money Saving Tips for Instant Gratification
1. Set Up Text Message Notifications on Bank Accounts/Credit Cards
This is one of my favorite money-saving tips! Set up text notifications on all of your bank accounts, credit cards, and debt cards. I have all of mine set up so that I am notified of any activity. If a purchase is made on my credit/debt cards, I am texted immediately.
This helps solve several problems:
- For purchases I make, it confirms that the amount I agreed to is the amount I was charged.
- If a purchase comes across that I did not make, I'm able to immediately call the company to inform them of the fraudulent charge so that they don't let it go through.
- This has saved me many, many times from fraudulent activity. One day, I was enjoying a day at the beach and got a text message saying I just spent $400 at Staples. LOL I called up my credit card company immediately and they were able to stop the charge before the products were shipped to the fraudster AND before the charge went through.
- Hint: If a charge isn't stopped right away and it goes through, when you report it days later, it goes through a longer investigation since the retail company has already shipped product. Therefore, you want to see and report the charges right away so you can get your money back and get a new credit card number to move on with your life.
- I don't have to reconcile my summaries each month since I see them in real time. Ever go back after a month and think, “Did I spent $50 at Target? Maybe, but I can't remember.” No more of that. You'll know in real time if you did or not.
Tip: Often, credit card hackers charge small things like $50 at Target because they are hoping you won't notice these small charges. If you reconcile only once a month, you probably wouldn't notice and would think you did make that charge.
However, if you are texted with every purchase, you'll know right after if you hadn't just spent $50 at Target.
2. Negotiate All of your Bills
We have bills for everything these days! Cable, internet, medical, etc. The list goes on and on.
Did you know you can negotiate your bills? Yes. Every single one.
Call them up and ask for a discount. If they deny you (most likely), tell them you want to cancel your service. They'll send you to the cancellation department, who is then likely to offer you a discount if you stay.
Better yet, there's a company that will actually negotiate your bills for you! It's called Trim!
You know how your internet bill goes up after the “promotional deal” is over?
Trim will take care of that negotiation for you!
Trim is a bill negotiating company that works to lower your bills for you! In fact, they successfully negotiate off $645 per year on average for people!
Trim will look at your subscriptions and if they are able to negotiate a savings for you, they'll take a percentage of that savings. Otherwise, the service is free! So you basically only pay a small fee IF they are successful at negotiating your bills down for you. Win-win, right?
3. Eliminate Grey Charges AKA Unneeded Subscriptions
Are you familiar with grey charges?
These are essentially forgotten subscriptions. Remember the free trial for the workout app you signed up for and forgot about? Now it's charging you $39 a month! It's time to clean that up and get rid of it!
You're not alone!
In fact, it's estimated that people have $200-$300 a month in grey charges they don't know about [source].
The Trim App will help you figure out which subscriptions you aren't using, and cancel them so that you don't continue to experience charges for things you don't use!
4. Share Subscriptions with Family
If you must have subscriptions to things, consider sharing them with family!
For example, an Amazon prime account allows you to name household members on the account. They will have full access to Amazon prime benefits including shipping, movies, books, etc.
The same thing goes for Netflix and Apple Music! Save money by combining accounts and profiles!
5. Leverage a High Yield Savings Account
A high yield savings account gives 10-16x more interest than a regular checking/savings account. If you keep your money in a savings account, you might as well make the most interest you can.
HYSAs are online banks that are able to leverage a better interest rate due to the fact that you can only withdrawal 6 times per month. Due to this, a high yield savings account is recommended for emergency funds and 5+ year money, but not to pay bills and write checks.
Related: 5 Things to Look for In a High Yield Savings Account
Recommendation for a High Yield Savings Account can be found here.
Feel free to download my free emergency fund spreadsheet to determine the exact amount you need in your emergency fund!
6. Use a Credit Card (Instead of a Debit Card)
I use a credit card for all purchases. Yes, you read that right.
However, I make sure to pay off the full amount each month so that I don't incur any fees/interest.
This way, I accomplish two things:
- I collect points that I can later redeem for cash and travel rewards, like Amazon cards!
- I build my credit and prove myself as a trusted credit holder by paying off my balance every month.
I love redeeming my credit card points for purchases! It's free money and such a no brainer!
7. Automate Your Savings
Set up your bank account or paycheck to automatically distribute into a savings account every month.
This way, you can automatically save each month without even thinking about it!
Determine the emergency fund needed, and then automate additional savings to help set yourself up well financially!
Recommended: Best Type of Account for Saving
8. Enable Autopay
Ever get a late fee for not paying a bill on time? Whoops! We've all been there!
There's sometimes just too much to think about between life, jobs, bills, kids, etc. I hear ya!
That's why I automate all of my bills and put them on autopay. This helps me avoid any late fees since all bills are always paid on time.
Worried you'll pay for something you didn't actually purchase (a fraudulent charge)? Easy solution! Just add a text message notification to your accounts from tip #1 so that you're notified in real time on every purchase made.
This way, you already know exactly what is being charged when the bill comes.
9. Create a Budget and Stick to It
Creating a budget for yourself will help you stay on track and stay focused on your goals.
They key here is to not spend more than you make.
Use a monthly budget tracker to keep yourself accountable, like my free 11 page budget binder here.
Plan out a budget for yourself and STICK TO IT. You'll see your savings start adding up in no time!
A full tutorial on how to use the budget binder and expense trackers can be found here.
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