Have you noticed how financial advice can be an echo chamber?
It probably goes like this: you get inspired to look up some best practices around a certain financial topic, so you take to the internet, and… all of the results are exactly the same, and let’s be honest: they’re all super lame.
Maybe you’ve googled something like “tips to save money on rent” and all you get is five articles telling you to find an apartment in your budget. Like, c’mon internet, is that the best we can do? It’s like all of these articles are written by Captain Obvious himself.
I remember when I was looking for some help padding my savings account and all of the advice I found made me roll my eyes. We can definitely be more creative when it comes to saving our money. Here are five ways to get you started.
1. Shop at companies with lifetime warranties. Einstein said that the definition of insanity is doing the same thing over and over and expecting a different result. My definition of insanity is buying the same products over and over, instead of shopping with a company that will let you replace damaged, or even worn, products. JanSport, Eddie Bauer, L.L. Bean, and Away all have lifetime warranties— and there are plenty of other companies out there that play by the same rules. Remember: purchases feel like expenses, but they can be investments. So choose the product with the best ROI and shop with a company that offers a lifetime warranty.
2. Put birthdays in your calendar. I am going to come clean about one of my biggest financial pet peeves right now: it drives me absolutely nuts when people shop last-minute and then have to pay for expedited shipping. That is truly just flushing money down the drain. If you do this, you basically just added a premium for yourself… and why the heck would you do that?! The secret here is to make sure that you’re staying on top of the time-sensitive shopping that you need to do— so that’s birthday presents, holiday shopping, anniversary gifts, you get the idea. I put all of my friends’ birthdays in my calendar and make sure that if I’m buying a gift, I do it far enough in advance to opt into standard shipping.
3. Use ad blockers. There’s a reason you get so many ads online: they work. And ad targeting is getting so freakishly accurate that the ads you’re seeing online are probably for things that you’d actually want to buy. It’s spooky. And, it’s bad for our spending plans. Ad blockers are basically shields that your computer can put up for you so that you don’t have to see any online ads, and therefore, won’t be tempted to buy something that you don’t actually need. You can set-up ad blockers easily on whichever web browser you use. Just look up the instructions and tada! Your computer is no longer a billboard. You’re welcome.
4. Go cash only. As we all know, credit cards can sometimes feel limitless (even though they aren’t). I’ve found that one really helpful way to keep strict to a spending limit, is to make that limit physical and withdraw exactly the amount of money you can afford to spend, in cash, each week. Then once that cash is spent, you’re done.
… well, within reason— I don’t mean you can’t swipe your card in case of emergency, but for everything else, cut yourself off when the money goes dry.
To do this, go to your spending plan and check out how much you expect to spend weekly— and this should be the total amount you’re expecting to spend on both the essentials like gas, and also extras, like getting coffee with a friend. Then, go to an ATM and take that amount out in cash, and let that be your spending limit.
5. Don’t store your credit card information in your web browser. When you buy something online, the site— or maybe even your web browser itself— will ask you if you want to store your credit card information. Just. Say. No.
I know this is counterintuitive. Saving your credit card information makes it really easy and convenient to buy from the same sites over and over, and we love convenience, right? Well… If spending is too convenient, it leads to overspending. I know that going through the motions of getting out your wallet and typing in your credit card information every time you make a purchase online isn’t that much extra time and work— but you’ll be surprised by how effectively that slight change weeds out the purchases that you don’t actually need to make.
xo,
