Money Saving Tips
With gas and food prices on the rise and the economy the way it is, saving money is more important than ever. No matter how far in debt you may be, it’s important to set aside some money, even if it’s a small amount. Here are a few suggestions:
Limit grocery shopping
It’s tempting to make a few extra trips to the store during the week. Don’t do this unless it’s to buy something that you absolutely need. If you have to do this, only buy the thing you came there to purchase.
Toss your spare change into a jar
Every time you buy something, keep the change. Once a week, collect you change and drop it in a jar. When the jar is full, put the money into your bank account.
Sell items around the house that you don’t use anymore
You can have a garage sell or sell your items on ebay. This is a great way to bring in some extra cash to either help you get out of debt or put in the bank.
Use coupons
This can dramatically reduce your grocery store. Also, watch for sales. Buy generic instead of name brands.
Saving Money: Try Used Instead of New
We all like the idea of purchasing something new at least once in a while. But, when trying to save money we should look at every way to do just that. It’s very possible to get needed items in very good condition, although used.
Suggestions for buying used:
Furniture - look in classified ads or advertise for what you need. Yard sales, estate sales and flea markets are also a good place to look. Ask around. A friend or family member may have just what you need, but don’t want the item any longer. This helps both of you.
Clothing - thrift shops are becoming more popular and often have nearly new clothing that is inexpensive. Sometimes you can find clothing that still has the tags on them. You can also find good clothing at yard sales and sometimes flea markets. Buying nearly new and inexpensive clothing can save bundles, especially when buying for children.
Children’s outdoor toys - children outgrow toys just as they do clothing. Ask friends who have children if they have toys their children have outgrown that you can buy. Yard sales are also a good place to find good used toys. Outdoor toys are usually very durable and can last through several children. You can buy them used for half and sometimes much less than the original cost.
Freecycle groups - in my area there is a freecycle group where members can post what they have to give away and what they are in need of. No money is exchanged. Those that want to get rid of something, gets it hauled away free. Those that are in need usually get what they need.
There are many other items you can buy used. Some specific items you may not want to buy used, but in general, you can save a lot of money by looking around to see what’s available before buying new. Browse around before spending more than you need!
Giving Up My Meals for Gas Prices
Did you know, that you can now buy a happy meal for the same price as one gallon of gas? That makes me extremely pleased with the world. It’s so great to know that so many of us are literally spending all of our savings on burning fuel.
Actually, when the gas prices got up to $3, the transportation on my end said… good-bye…not worth it. So, if you are sick of supporting a literal burning of money, you have options. Yes, you do. And a lot of them.
1. Buses, trains, subways and the good old transportation. One round trip of any of these types of transportation is about 1/2 a gallon of gas, depending on where you are and what the city determines. Heck, if you work for the right place or have some hook-ups you can either get in for free or get a discount beyond that. I know that you are spending more than a gallon of gas to get to work everyday.
2. Motor scooters. I am obsessed with this form of transportation. Did you know that they make scooters that can travel long distance? Yep. You can have all the conveniences of a car, without the high prices. Sounds like a deal to me! And, if you are just going around town, you can get a motor scooter that does the same. Very little gas, very little care AND the smaller ones don’t require insurance, tags or any of the expenses that come with cars.
Oh, right. One motor scooter that just goes around town… exactly 100 gallons of gas for the complete purchase (at the lower end). That’s exactly 2 1/2 months worth of gas if you go through a small tank a week… yep. And then the purchase is already completely paid for.
3. Get your exercise. If you are living close to an area that you need to be, why aren’t you using a bike? For exactly 10 gallons of gas, which would probably fill up your tank once, you can buy a good bike…. that will last you forever.
Okay, just for comparison… 4 gallons of gas will get you 2 complete meals at the Olive Garden, 2 large pizzas, 2 Chinese food plates.
How about this. If you are shopping for 4, one week of groceries is about the same as filling up your tank twice. If you have a small tank. If you have an SUV or a truck, why are you driving?
Oh, if you absolutely need a car, here you go. Renting a car for two days is equivalent to 8 gallons of gas. In other words, if you have to fill up your tank more than twice a week, it would be cheaper for you to rent a car.
Okay, Americans. What I’m saying is… it’s time to cut down. And, it’s time to stop burning fuel and burning money. From my experience, it is so not worth it anymore.
Know your financial position…
Sometimes you think saving money is difficult. Ultimately, you give up saving money anymore. In fact, you have been giving priority to spend carelessly. That is why this habit let you down towards saving money. Most people save money naturally. But they have been doing this from their young age.
Here, you should keep in mind whatever you read on saving money, it will motivate you to save money until you are prepared to do internally. You should have commitment. If you are saving, you should have commitment as well as flexibility. Saving does not mean that you should not use your saved money. When unforeseen things happen, you will need money. Here saving will you instead borrowing from others.
For saving money, you can do daily reporting of your spending. You will find that you are spending needlessly. Note down these unnecessary spent items and avoid it next time though you wish.
The best way to saving money is to control our desire. We buy more things, though we are not able to maintain it. Know your financial position and you can find how much you can spend on unnecessary things
Resort to get an extra cash
Payday loans are also popular with other names. These are cash advance, check advance loans, short term loans, pay day advances, cash loans, fast cash, etc. Payday loans are especially a kind of instant short term loans. Whenever you run short of money, you feel an instant requirement of extra cash. At that time you will feel yourself under sudden expenses stress, especially when you are challenging unforeseen expenses. Payday loans are a real way to get cash within few minutes to face your emergency cash needs.
Payday loan is a most useful when you get a high bill to pay it. That time, you may not have enough money and payday loan can be your resort to save yourself from further confusion.
No matter if you have bad or poor credit history. Nowadays most of the Payday Loan companies do not consider credit histories. Instead, payday loans are an unsecured loan, you need not to provide any security to gain a loan amount. All you required is to fill in and complete an online application form. Go to at Google and type payday loans, you will find many payday loans providers.
Guide to investing
There are three rules to follow before you take your first step towards investing.
Make a plan
Consider your strengths and weaknesses
Review the plan often and change it as your needs and financial circumstances change
Follow these rules, and you can be able to decide your financial requirements. If you don’t know what you want your money to do, then whatever you read on investing will have no meaning. All of us wish to be rich. Use the right way, investing in shares can create wealth for you in a big way.
Here are some suggestions you can take into account before investing.
Outline your personal financial goals.
Know your strengths.
Know where you stand financially.
Reduce debt.
Invest small, steady amounts regularly.
Don’t put all your eggs in one basket.
Do your research and ask questions.
Plan for long term.
Better thinking produce better results
Avoid unessential spending
Realize true value of money. Money doesn’t come easily. You have to invest your efforts for earning. When we are young, we spend money with careless attitude. May be, we do not know importance of saving money. If you want to save money, you should give up habit of spending money unnecessarily. Try to keep daily report of your spending’s to know how you spend. This habit will gradually aid you for spending money carefully.
Saving money is of the highest importance. In our life, times come when feel instant need of money. We try to collect money with available resources. We borrow from someone with or without interest. But, we don’t think about repaying it. When repayment time comes, we feel ourselves under pressure of borrowed money. If you have saved money, you will easily overcome this. If not, then you again try to collect money to repay borrowed money. This cycle continues and traps you in debt.
That is why saving money is vital. Because when you need an instant money, you have it already and don’t go anywhere. Avoid spending money unnecessarily. At the end, know your financial capacity and spend within your financial limits.
Used Car Loans: Resort to Own a Car
Used car loans are specially designed to you who are not capable to buy a brand new car. Buying a brand new car can cost you very much. It does not mean that you should give up thinking to buy a car. Make your dream real of having a car. People, like you, always prefer to buy a used car. Buying a used car fulfills your desire to own a car.
There are two types of used car loans. Those are secured and unsecured car loans. In secured car loans, you need to mortgage your valuable things such as house. While unsecured car loans require you to provide information of your job, income and resident.
Before applying, consider your financial capacity. Because your repayment ability, monthly income and credit status are checked by lender. Think to buy a used car within your repayment ability. You should choose a used car of low cost. It can benefit you in getting a loan amount as well as in repaying it easily.
You loan amount decides which types of used car loans you need to choose. You can apply for secured used car loans if your amount is high. It has lower interest as well as monthly repayment. It is a long term type of used car loans. Generally, from five to twenty years.
If you are applying for a small loan amount, then you can go to unsecured car loans. It offers loan with higher interest. It meets need of those people who have not their own property for collateral. Also, bad creditors can get used car loans by this type.
It is recommended that you should check condition of a car before applying to loan. Otherwise, repayment of loan of loan can be troublesome if a car is not in good maintenance.
There are many lenders to give used car loans. You may be confused. To avoid your further confusion use Internet to search for used car loans providers. You should compare their interest rates, repayment periods, etc. It is very easy to apply online. You just need to fill up the form. After few minutes lender will contact you.
Over all, used car loans are good resort to own a car. As prices of a new car increasing, it is not affordable for all people to buy it. That is why most people prefer to buy a used car which involves low complexity than a new car. As mentioned above, bad creditors can also get loan. It gives them a chance to improve their credit score by repaying loan on time.
Therefore, don’t give up your dream of owning a car. It is possible to make it real by the help of used car loans. Only need is to carefully choose a good-condition car and used car loan provider.
Don’t Put Your Money in a Hole
With the economic depression and hard times hitting most of the households (except for the elite, who are taking all the poor man’s money), is the need to re-define how we spend money. Most of us know that there are problems with credit, financing, mortgages, loans and everything else… meaning that most people, with two jobs… simply can’t pay.
What is surprising me, though, is that even though conditions are the way they are, it’s like it hasn’t hit. We go worse into debt, and at the same time, continue to thrive on materialism and wealth in a way that isn’t applicable.
The reason why I’m saying this is because I see the depressed state in the metro area, such as the downtown places, of people who always need money and who can’t find it. They are going through foreclosures, being attacked by creditors and thriving off of a gamble of whether they will be able to eat the next day.
And, when I go to the suburbs and the north side of town… I see developments. Big houses, $1,000,000 places being put up… all in luxury. And, the shopping areas are booming, just the same as they ever are. Well, maybe not as much, but a little bit.
So, if you are starting to hit hard times and trying to save, save by not supporting the developing areas. You will be giving your money back to those who already have the money. One of the best decisions I made was to stop shopping at the big centers, to stop spending money and extra expensive shoes or clothes and live by my means. In the end, it makes no difference.
If materialism continues the way that it does, the up and coming years are going to turn into one of survival and not in the sense of success or failure in career… in the sense of starting over again, learning to grow food and being so damn poor that we can’t figure out how to live anymore.
If we wake up to the imbalance of materialism instead, it can be prevented. So, my advice to everyone who has financial problems… figure out where the holes are and don’t put your money down it.
Cutting Back During the Hard Times
We get so used to having all of the modern conveniences that we start to believe that we need them and can’t possibly live without them. My husband and I ran into some financial difficulties a few years back due to some unexpected and very costly medical bills. Fortunately, we have always had good credit so we were able to bounce back pretty well. But it did take some strategizing and some cutting back in order to pay off the major expense. Here are some things that we cut back on:
Create a Budget
I sat down and figured out every single expense we had, what we were paying and created a limit to what we could spend on each category per month for those items that weren’t fixed amounts. I then created an Excel spreadsheet where I tracked every single receipt and every dollar we spent. I found out we spent a lot less when I was tracking spending.
Eating In Restaurants
I would always cook during the week but we liked to eat out on Friday & Saturday night both. We cut back our restaurant visits to just Saturday nights.
No Extras - At All
We cut out purchasing all extras. We would ask ourselves when we were tempted to purchase an item, “Do I really need this or do I want it?” If we determined that the item was not a necessity, it didn’t go in the cart.
Phones
If you have both a cell phone and a home phone, can you do away with one or the other? Figure out whether it would be cheaper for you to keep your home phone or your cell phone and ditch one whole bill per month.
Bent & Dent
Find a local bent & dent grocery store to purchase some of your groceries. You can save a lot of money through these types of stores. Just make sure you check over dates and don’t purchase any items that are too dented.