You can save a small fortune by starting really small. Saving money can begin coin by coin. So just pick a particular coin and start saving that coin out of your change on a daily basis. If you’re tight with your finances maybe pennies or nickels could be your savings vehicles. If you have a little more money to spare then dimes and quarters will help you build up your own personal stash of treasure at a much faster rate.
A trip to any store shows just how little a hand full of coins in your pocket will buy. If you can buy a small candy bar with the change you carry around then you should consider yourself lucky. However, just saving on average ten quarters each week out of your change will build up to a whopping $130.00 in just one year. Over a ten year period this can add up a tidy sum of $1,300 which could be a nice little bit of money to help out a struggling college student or to make a mortgage payment should you be caught short some month. Setting a goal for what you want to spend your savings on will help to keep you saving coins religiously out of your change and act as a deterrent should you decide you wanted to run down to the nearest ice cream stand and buy a large ice cream cone double dipped in chocolate.
Now saving $1,300 might seem like just a small stash to save but remember you saved this money out of coins that by themselves would not buy anything in most stores. So, saving that change is a painless way to build up some savings. Saving ten quarters out of your change each week amounts to only $2.50 out of (literally) your pocket. And, since you are saving just a single type of coin out of your change you will still have plenty of other loose coins to give to a clerk so you don’t have to break a bill. Having no change in my pockets would be psychologically devastating for me since I would cringe having to break dollar bills all the time because I saved all my change and brought none with me to the store.
There are a few things you should consider as far as managing your little treasure. First of all you should put them in a clear container. Physically watching your treasure grow over time will inspire you to hunt down every single coin in your home just to get your pile of coins to grow another half an inch. Taking pride in watching your treasure grow will make it less likely that you will raid your savings for a pizza or to visit the local Casino. Of course having another type of coin that you save for junkets to the local pizza parlor or casino is alright and actually a good idea. Having a separate savings for impulse spending is like an insurance policy against thieving from your main treasure.
Remember, the most important thing in saving money is to actually save it. Simply putting money in a jar when you get home from a store one day and then raiding that jar for money to go shopping with the next day is not really saving money. Instead, you are really just storing the money overnight. In order to save your stash of coins you must adopt the mindset of a leprechaun guarding his gold and guard your coins against anyone who covets your treasure. Of course the worst coveter of your coins will be yourself. Marking on your coin container what exactly you hope to save the money for might help keep you from filching from your treasure. If you have a clear container with a screw on top then gluing or taping the top onto the container and just leaving a slit open to deposit coins will at least make you think a little bit before raiding your savings.
Monday, February 1, 2021
Monday, January 25, 2021
TEACH YOUR KIDS TO SAVE AND YOU WILL SAVE A FORTUNE
“Teach your kids to save and you will save money” is the kind of statement that people of my generation would call a “no brainer”. The less you spend on your kids for fad purchases and impulse buying, the more money you will have to send your kids to a good college so, that you won’t be supplementing the income of a 42 year old that works part time at a drive up window.. There is nothing wrong with any kind of work but, in the real world of rent, car payments and groceries, income counts. It is better (better paying), to have the education to run the store that has the drive up window then to simply be responsible for the window.
Start training the children to save at an early age. When a child is very young, have them make themselves a savings bank. Don’t buy one in the store. Have them make the bank out of, for example, a plastic jar (metal cans might have sharp edges and may rust on the coins and make a mess). For most children you should be the one to cut a slit in the lid of the jar however, the child can decorate the jar either directly with markers or, by using scrap paper or old gift wrap paper. In short, it is best if the child feels ownership in his first savings bank. It also saves the parent the money of buying some lame bank the kid will dump in the back of his/her closet and never put a cent into it.
The main lesson to be leaned by children is that if they want something bad enough then, they must make sacrifices to achieve that item, skill or, to belong to a given group of peers. Life is all about making choices and reaping the rewards and unfortunately, the consequences of those choices. If a child saves $50.00 then, they should first be made to take the $50.00 out of their savings bank before mom or dad kick in any money. If the kid doesn’t have the savings to buy an item they must learn to have the patience to wait, sacrifice, and save for that item.
Over time, the sacrifice and savings ideology may begin to cause your child to automatically make decisions of sacrifice/denial (cost/benefit in business school). The child will no longer come to you for every small purchase because the child will take care of the item themselves out of an analysis of cost/benefit.
Just imagine how much money each family could save if each time little Jimmy or little Suzie wanted a $5.00 item in a store and little Jimmy and little Suzie were confronted with the fact that the cost of the item would come out of their personal savings. If the child was saving that money for something the child thought was important then, the parent could remind the child that by buying the $5.00 item the child would have to earn an additional $5.00 toward the other purchase.
Forcing your kids to make tough choices will save you and, them a fortune. It is a simple “no brainer” that teaching kids to save early in life will save their parents money and will make the kids happier and wealthier individuals. You are not torturing your kids by making them earn money for things they don’t need. Making them earn money for things they need is not always a bad idea either (like fashionable cloths).
We all can remember our parents trying to teach us to save for items that we felt we had to have. Of course there was always something sweet about buying stuff with money you earned and saved. It is a great feeling for kids and it is just as enjoyable for an adult.
Start training the children to save at an early age. When a child is very young, have them make themselves a savings bank. Don’t buy one in the store. Have them make the bank out of, for example, a plastic jar (metal cans might have sharp edges and may rust on the coins and make a mess). For most children you should be the one to cut a slit in the lid of the jar however, the child can decorate the jar either directly with markers or, by using scrap paper or old gift wrap paper. In short, it is best if the child feels ownership in his first savings bank. It also saves the parent the money of buying some lame bank the kid will dump in the back of his/her closet and never put a cent into it.
The main lesson to be leaned by children is that if they want something bad enough then, they must make sacrifices to achieve that item, skill or, to belong to a given group of peers. Life is all about making choices and reaping the rewards and unfortunately, the consequences of those choices. If a child saves $50.00 then, they should first be made to take the $50.00 out of their savings bank before mom or dad kick in any money. If the kid doesn’t have the savings to buy an item they must learn to have the patience to wait, sacrifice, and save for that item.
Over time, the sacrifice and savings ideology may begin to cause your child to automatically make decisions of sacrifice/denial (cost/benefit in business school). The child will no longer come to you for every small purchase because the child will take care of the item themselves out of an analysis of cost/benefit.
Just imagine how much money each family could save if each time little Jimmy or little Suzie wanted a $5.00 item in a store and little Jimmy and little Suzie were confronted with the fact that the cost of the item would come out of their personal savings. If the child was saving that money for something the child thought was important then, the parent could remind the child that by buying the $5.00 item the child would have to earn an additional $5.00 toward the other purchase.
Forcing your kids to make tough choices will save you and, them a fortune. It is a simple “no brainer” that teaching kids to save early in life will save their parents money and will make the kids happier and wealthier individuals. You are not torturing your kids by making them earn money for things they don’t need. Making them earn money for things they need is not always a bad idea either (like fashionable cloths).
We all can remember our parents trying to teach us to save for items that we felt we had to have. Of course there was always something sweet about buying stuff with money you earned and saved. It is a great feeling for kids and it is just as enjoyable for an adult.
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