We live in a day and age where families spend more than they can save: food, clothing, transportation, housing and taxes – in the latter we actually spend the most on. Any little bit of money, no matter how small, is very important.
It’s difficult to obtain $1,000. It’s also not that easy to save $1,000 over the time span of 365 days. With so many ways to spend more than putting away money for a rain day, what can one do to save $1,000 in a year?
Here are some tips to follow to save $1,000 for the rest of the year.
Debt
Before you begin the task of saving $1,000, be sure to pay off all of your credit card debt. Not only do you have to pay back the money you borrowed, but also the charges and the interest accumulate. Think about how that interest could have gone towards your savings goal.
Eating
Consuming food is one the largest expenditures we have. Whether it is eating out or purchasing a daily coffee, there are remedies to this. Instead of heading out for lunch on payday, bring food with you and then continue to do this throughout your work week. Forget the lattes, opt for a simple coffee and better yet bring your coffee to work.
Transportation
Maintaining a vehicle is quite expensive. If driving to work, to the store or anywhere else you have to go is not essential, leave the car at home and walk, ride your bike or take public transit. A monthly transit pass costs on average $125 – think about how much you spend on gas, insurance, maintenance and all other aspects that come with owning a car.
Research savings accounts
As each day goes by, the money in our wallet and bank account devalues. Besides finding the best investments, playing the stock market and purchasing hedging assets, like bullion, research financial institutions that have the highest interest rates for savings accounts (or even chequing accounts).
Questioning your bills
Do you really need cable? Do you need your mobile phone with all those extra features? Does your home phone need that long distance package? In this day and age, it’s perfectly all right to question some of the bills you pay on a monthly business. One of the first things you should do is axe your cable package. Analyze how much time you watch television, how many commercials you watch and what other things you could be doing in your spare time. You’ll see the dividends immediately.
Sell
Its spring time and what better way to do your spring cleaning than to find stuff you don’t even need? Go through your closet, look at your book/CD/DVD shelf and, if applicable, rummage in your locker or storage and see what other junk you have you can sell. Where to sell? Head on over to Craigslist.org or Kijiji.com.
Part-time job
Yes, we’re overworked. It’s a fact that we spend much of our lives at work, but if you need to save $1,000 in a year, you always have the option of obtaining a part-time job. Of course, try to find a job that isn’t too hard and is flexible, like telephone interviewing, cleaning, retail or work you can do from home.