Eri112âs money saving tips.
So, did you reblog this money saving challenge last January?
I remember thinking that it would never work. I remember thinking it would be too hard. I remember thinking HOW CAN I HAVE CASH IN MY ROOM AND NOT SPEND IT??
I just counted and it turns out I saved more than this person calculated.
I saved $1500 in cash. In one year. In a Mason jar.
If you had told me last year that I could do this, I never would have believed you. I have never been a financially secure person. This activity taught me so much about myself as a spender.Â
For those who have never seen this, the basic concept is that you print out this (or google 52 week money challengeâŚYou can find many variations on this)âŚSo the first week, you put in $1, second week is $2, third week is $3, etc. The final week of the year, youâll put in $52. There are 52 weeks in a year. See how that works?
As I said, though. I somehow ended up with more. Iâm not sure how that happened. Let me tell you how I managed to save money period.
PLEASE KEEP IN MIND, I AM NOT A FINANCIAL PROFESSIONAL. FOLLOW THESE TIPS WITH CAUTION. I CANNOT GUARANTEE THEY WILL WORK FOR EVERYONE.
1. Create your own payday. I have 2 jobs. One is my full time job that pays every two weeks on Thursday. The other is a part time job that pays every week on Wednesday. So, usually by Thursday, I have all the money Iâm going to make that week. So, I made Thursday my pay day. Every Thursday, I made sure to put in the amount I was supposed to for that week.
2. Use small bills. This was CRITICAL to saving money for me. If I didnât have the cash I needed, I would swing through the ATM and then ask a family member to trade a $20 bill for $1 bills. I put in the required money and then hid all of the other ones under the jar. That way, in future weeks I would have the ones I needed to make a payment.
3.  Hide the jar in plain sight. I kept the jar in my room, but it was hidden. This way, I wasnât tempted to spend it. I have 3 jars in my room. One is my âhappy memoriesâ jar where I right down all the good things that happen to me. Then I have my savings jar. I also have a jar for paying myself to work out. (Any time I work out, I pay myself a dollar. I use this money for fun stuff like going to the movies) In order to remember my savings jar and hide it at the same time, I put it directly behind my happy memories jar. That way, I could see the jars, but I couldnât see the money inside.
4. Pack the money tight! It took my father a good five minutes to help me figure out how to get all of those bills out of that jar. This was quite fun to watch (âHEY DAD! Iâm giving you $1400 in a jar! Help me get it out!â) and quite difficult to do. This is because I packed every inch of that jar. Having the money packed in tightly made it really difficult to take money out. The harder it was to take money out, the less I wanted to. Iâm quite lazy.
5. Donât be afraid to borrow, but write it down and pay yourself back in two days. Iâll admit, there were a few occasions where I needed to borrow some money from the jar. I never took more than $20. I also forced myself to pay it back in two days. Now that I think about it, I remember there was one time I borrowed and charged myself interest because I didnât follow this ruleâŚ
Now, as I mentioned, my father is the recipient of this large stack of cash. He was incredibly proud of me, but this lead to a conversation of how I could put away money that could earn some money. He also suggested ways to get out of debt. So here is what he suggested.
1. Open a mutual fund with a high/mildly aggressive interest rate.  A mutual fund is an account that you deposit a set amount every month. Iâll be opening one later this week. We found one that earns 13% interest. We agreed that I will put away $50 a month for 5 years. Please note that these accounts will charge a fee if you withdrawal from them. We did the math. If I put away $50 a month for 5 years, I will have deposited $3000. With a 13% interest rate, I will have $4394 by the end of those 5 years. Thatâs correct. The bank will pay me $1394 just for using their mutual fund.
2. Snowball your debt. I also have acquired a lot of debt over the years. I wonât lie. I love to shop. I have credit cards for every store, including amazon and LLBean (in NH, thatâs a big deal). When I receive my bills this month, he and I are going to sit down and compare them all. Weâll be looking at total amounts due as well as the interest rate. Then, I will pay in full anything that I can. That way, I wonât continue to be charged interest on small amounts. Then figure out how much money I can send to the bigger bills. Once you know who has the highest interest rate, you can figure out how to divide that money. You pay the most money to the highest interest rate. On the others, you pay the minimum balance. This way, you can put more money towards the bill that you lose the most money on.
Some advice from my rich sister:
Find a way to earn money when you shop or waste time online.
My sister and I use many different apps for saving money on groceries or shopping. Message me if youâre interested and I can send you my sign up links.
I also use many different websites for earning money online. Check them out:
Bing: Without using it for every search I do, Iâve managed to earn $10 in Starbucks gifts card through Bing. Iâm 54% away from my $5 gift card. All you have to do is search for 30 things through Bing. It can be random (Iâve searched my name a hundred times) and they suggest different stories for you to search. You donât have to click on any of the search results. Just search. There are other ways to earn with Bing, but searching is the easiest. Check it out at Bing Rewards and start earning your gift cards now.
Treasure Trooper: Iâve also been on Treasure Trooper which I originally discovered through another Tumblr user (Thanks Diana!.) Iâve been using it for a little under a year and have already earned $30. You can answer surveys, listen to music, complete tasksâŚItâs pretty easy. You should check it out.
Inbox Dollars might just be my favorite, though. Iâve been signed up for a little over 5 months and have already earned $46.77. They also have surveys and videos to watch. They also send you e-mails and every time you click âview e-mailâ you get 0.02. That adds up.
Swagbucks is an awesome website where you can watch videos (in the background while you sit on Tumblr) and answer surveys, etc. to earn points. Then you redeem those points for gift cards. I have earned $45 Amazon gift cards. Itâs so easy. I love it.
So, this is all I have to give for money advice. I can certainly answer questions. Donât hesitate to message me. Hereâs to having a little more cash to play with!
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