We all know it is easier to spend money than to save them. Spending money often gives us emotional comfort and became a habit. But changing your spending habits and finding new ways to save money can be a great thing for your financial life.
Learning how to save money can help you to reach your financial goals:
- to buy a house
- to pay off debt
- to save for a vacation
- put more money in your emergency fund
- to save for retirement
- to save for kid’s education
No matter what your financial goals are, this post has money-saving ideas for everyone. Start with a few of these suggestions and see if they work for you.
Here are 20 of my favorite ways to save money every day:
How to Save Money Through Money Management:
1). Pay your bills online.
There are many benefits of paying your bills online. I personally do not remember the last time I mailed off a check to pay our bills. By going online, you will not be using envelopes, stamps, and checks as much as it was popular in the past. Automation helps to save money and time and reduce the stress of money management.
We pay all our bills automatically. Our online payment is set up with a local bank and bills are paid out of our checking account. I just have to make sure I added money to that account before the bills are due. Even though I keep an eye on all our transactions, but I never have to worry about being late on bill payments.
Related Post: 9 Ways to Organize and Simplify Your Finances
2). Consolidate your credit cards debt.
Debt can be a very terrifying issue. When you face thousands of dollars in credit cards debt you do not have enough money to save for retirement or to pay off your mortgage more quickly.
You can save a lot of money and reduce your monthly payments by consolidating your credit cards debt. If you own several credit cards try to consolidate your debt into a single credit card with a lower percentage rate. It will help to reduce interest costs and make your monthly payments more manageable.
One of the best ways to consolidate your debt:
- Refinance with a balance transfer credit card
- Consolidate it with a personal loan
3). Get cash back when you shop online.
For many of us, it has become so convenient to shop online regularly. That is why we need to turn it to our advantage and learn how to get paid while shopping online. You can sign up for websites like Ebates, Ibotta, Rakuten, and Swagbucks to take advantage of cash-back rewards. All these websites are free to join and easy to use.
If you want to learn how to earn cash back, save money on groceries and travel, I recommend reading the article by Michelle from Making Sense of Cents:
Best Rewards Credit Cards for 2021 – What You Need to Know
4). Negotiate credit card rates.
If you are losing money by paying a lot of interest on your credit cards you should negotiate your current interest rate with your credit card company. It is important to remember that you have some power to negotiate your current interest rate as long as you have been making payments regularly. Call your credit card company and ask for an interest rate reduction.
5). Transfer your credit card balance.
If you cannot reduce your credit card interest rate, try to transfer your credit card balances to 0 percent APR card. Transferring your balances will help you save hundreds of dollars in interest over time.
The Best Zero Percent Interest Credit Cards
6). Move your money into a high-yield savings account.
Most people have their savings stashed in a local bank with a very low-interest rate. The primary reason for that is because it is convenient and close to their homes. Unfortunately, your money will not grow fast over time with low-interest rates.
You can do a lot better by moving your money into a high-yield savings account. Find online banks that are paying interest rates higher than your bank and keep your savings there.
Check out the Best High-Yield Savings Accounts and start earning higher interest right now.
7). Refinance your mortgage
You can save a lot of money by refinancing your mortgage to a lower interest rate. With a lower interest rate, you can get lower monthly payments. And once you reach 20 percent equity you can eliminate PMI – private mortgage insurance.
Refinance rates from Wells Fargo
How to Save Money Shopping:
The next time you are going shopping make sure to apply these money-saving ideas:
8). Stick to your shopping list.
One of the easiest ways to save money is to stick to your shopping list. Do not go shopping if you do not have a shopping list. Creating a list is a great way to make sure you will purchase only what you need. Otherwise, you might go on impulse shopping and spend more money than you have planned.
Stay away from email marketing and do not subscribe to emails from your favorite retail stores. Avoid the chances of spending more money on things you do not need.
9). Stop going to the Mall.
Retail marketing is all around us and it is hard to fight the temptation to shop for new clothes. That is why if you want to save money you should stop going clothes shopping so often. As I said before you should have a plan and shop only for what you need. And stick to your shopping list!
10). Do holiday shopping right after the holidays.
One of the best ways to save money on shopping is to do your holiday shopping after the holidays. After the holidays, the prices go down drastically, sometimes up to 75 percent lower. I often buy party supplies, decorations, wrapping paper, and even gifts a few days after the holiday passes.
11). Clean your closets.
If you have an urge to buy new clothes often, I recommend going through all your closets and see what you might find. Make an inventory of your clothes. Have a yard sale or use craigslist to sell clothes buried in your closet for years.
Another useful trick is to take the clothes from the back of your closet and bring them to the front. After cleaning your closets, you might find your wardrobe looks completely different and you do not need to spend money on clothes right now.
How to Save Money on Food:
Learning how to save money on food and groceries does not have to be complicated.
12). You can save money on food by:
- Prepare some meals at home
- Cook from scratch
- Get a crockpot
- Brown bag your lunch
- Invite friends over instead of going out
- Share meals when eating out
13). You can save more money on groceries if you choose to:
- Skip the bottled water and soda
- Buy in-season groceries
- Plan your meals around your grocery store’s sale
- Start a vegetable garden
How to Save Money on Entertainment and Vacations:
If you are planning a road trip or vacation, there are lots of money-saving ideas. Here are a few of my favorite ones:
14). Check out free events in town.
Our town has several wonderful parks, lakes, trails, free tennis courts, and more. Everyone can have fun playing outdoors, hiking on trails, walking around the lakes, or trying any sports activities. And it is all there for free.
Most towns schedule many free events. You can save a lot of money if you want to get free entertainment and free food. What you need to do is just look at your community calendar. Stop by the local town hall or library and ask how to get a list of upcoming community events. I always check out our town’s website to keep in touch with what is going on around us.
You also can save money by replacing cable TV bills with low-cost video streaming.
Absolute Best Cable Alternatives to Watch TV, Sports, Movies and More
15). Pack food for road trips.
If you want to get out of town, take some time to pack meals and snacks for your road trip. Thus, instead of stopping in the middle of the trip and driving around looking for a place to eat, you can just eat on a road. Even better if you can stop at a nice park and have a picnic there. This way you will have fun and save money. Travel service plazas and fast-food chains are conveniently located right off the highways and always expensive, so you better off avoiding them if possible.
16). Use Airbnb when traveling.
For the past decade, Airbnb became hugely popular among travelers as a cheaper alternative to hotels. Vacations are always expensive. The next time you plan on taking a trip, check out to see and compare prices for Airbnb vs hotels. You can save a lot of money by renting an entire house to yourself for a fraction of the hotel cost.
17). Use Booking.com for travel deals.
Booking.com is one of the best websites in the online booking world.
We like to travel and use this website all the time for booking our hotels because you can find some incredible deals. If we stay at the hotel, we always try to find one with breakfast included in the price. I love hotel breakfast especially when they offer regional specialties. With breakfast included we do not need to start our day trying to find a place to eat and we can take a bagel or pastry and some fruit for our lunch later.
Use Booking.com for last-minute deals
18). Use your AAA discount.
If you are an AAA member you can save a lot of money by using your AAA discounts. AAA travel agency has money-saving offers from cruise vacation packages and hotel discounts to car rental deals. To save more money use your membership card to get a discount anywhere you can.
How to Save Money at Home and on Services:
There are many ways to save money at home and on services. These tips will help you minimize your household expenses significantly.
19). You can save money at home if you want to:
- Try to fix things yourself. You can learn anything you want from YouTube.
- Turn off the lights every time you leave the house or the room.
- Install energy-efficient light bulbs. Swapping just your 4 or 5 most used light bulbs for LEDs can save you $50 or more a year.
- Rent out unused space in your home.
- Cut your lawn.
- Look for a cheaper place to live.
20) You can save money on services if you choose to:
- Get rid of some of your subscription services (meal deliveries, streaming services, etc.)
- Cancel unused gym memberships.
- Cancel the cable or satellite channels you do not watch. Switch to low-cost cable alternatives such as Netflix, Amazon Prime Video, or Hulu.
- Get rid of your home phone and switch to cell phone plans.
Great Article by Internet Advisor: 14 Ways to Save Money When Working At Home
Final Words
We all know that trying to find easy ways to save money can be tough. We have been there before. There are times you feel that you are not making much progress even you have tried everything. However, if you are prepared to sacrifice now and learn about the best ways to save money every day you can reach your financial goals a lot faster.
What are your favorite ways to save money? Share your thoughts and ideas with us in the comments below.
Remember to share this post if it helped you!
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