There are numerous reasons to save money. Whether scary life scenarios or luxury vacations come to your mind, you’ll need more than just motivation and drive to reach your savings goals. Indeed, you’ll need to use proven tactics.
That said, here are six must-know strategies for saving more money in 2020.
1. Track Your Budget and Plan Every Expense
If you didn’t track your income and expenses each month in 2019, start making it a habit by doing so in January 2020. This is the only way to take full ownership of your financial health. After all, you can’t determine what may be wrong with your spending and saving habits until you know whether you’re overspending in certain areas of your life. Use a tool like Mint or Wally to track your income and expenses and monitor your budget month to month.
2. Use Comparison Tools to Find the Best Insurance Rates
Comparing the most up-to-date insurance rates has been made possible by recent technology. Rather than checking the rates at each company, you can type into any search engine, “How much does car insurance cost in Toronto?” and find a platform that lets you filter your search so you can more easily compare rates.
3. Decide What You’re Saving For
Everyone should have an emergency fund. If you lose your job or fall sick, will you have the money to support yourself without a salary? Besides an emergency fund, there are also other types of savings, such as your retirement fund, vacation savings, gift-giving fund for birthdays and holidays, savings for starting a family or savings for buying a home. When you can put more meaning to your savings beyond numbers in your bank account, you’ll remember why you’re saving and how it can help you stay on track.
4. Opt for Used Items Over New
Whether you need textbooks, warm clothes or better electronic gadgets, try to spend less by inheriting or buying what’s already been used. Sometimes tech stores sell you “open box” items at a discount, but these have typically only been used for less than a few days and then returned.
5. Use a Tool that Automates Saving
Try an app like Chime, which automatically saves any of the digital “change” from every purchase in your savings account. For example, if you buy a coffee that costs $2.65, you’ll pay the amount and an additional 65 cents will be deposited into your savings. This not only helps you save money, but also makes you think more carefully about each purchase you make, since the cost is always rounded up.
6. Take Care of Your Health
The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention says that not exercising costs the U.S. roughly $117 billion annually in health bills. Taking care of your health saves you money by keeping you productive and reducing your medical expenses. While your health isn’t always in your control, spending on preventative healthcare can pay off as an investment by preventing bigger health problems in the future.
Get Started Improving Your Financial Health
With so many tools and savings strategies out there, getting started with a savings plan may seem overwhelming. Sticking with one goal and seeing it through, however, is all you need to save more money in 2020 than you did in previous years.
