If you build a healthy habit of saving, you will have more control over your finances.

You can start with small changes and watch the savings add up!

In this episode, I lay out some of my favorite savings hacks I’ve learned from different clients over the years. These hacks can easily be implemented to help you start building a habit that helps you decrease your spending and increase your savings.

Here are my 5 favorite Savings Hacks:

1-Analyze Your Spending: Understand how much money you have going out each month. What are your biggest expenses? Use a program like QuickBooks to help know the exact amount of each expense you have and to better understand which expenses you can eliminate or decrease.

2-Address Credit Card Debt: Bring your credit card use down. Get the available balance up to about 50% on each of your cards to help your credit rating. Pay off your lowest balance first and then tackle the rest, and always pay attention to your interest rates.

3-Regularly Increase Your Savings: Start a habit of increasing your savings every six months or so. Increase your 401K contribution by 1%. Open and fund an extra savings account and send $100 a month to it.

4-Piggy Bank Savings & Mental Spending: Once a month, withdraw an actual $100 bill from your bank account. Put the bill in a special piggy bank or container of your choice. Watch it grow and use it only for special occasions. For visual spending, keep a $100 bill in your wallet and mentally spend it and save it!

5-The Best Things in Life are Free: Make a list of five things that give you a tremendous amount of pleasure, a tremendous amount of fun, that don't have a lot of expense associated with them—and do them. You can call a friend, make a yummy dinner at home, meditate, color, or so many other things, and most importantly, don’t forget to laugh!

In this episode, you’ll also hear:

• What details financial planning covers
• Why you must pay attention to credit card interest rates
• Different ways to save $100

Must-listen moments:

[00:06:57] The first step at saving money might be to take a look at where you're actually spending your money. What are your actual expenses?

[00:10:30] There are times in our lives when we have to use credit cards; we don't have a choice and that is what they're there for—it's for emergencies. Also, you can use them for regular spending, as long as you're paying them off each month.

[00:16:00] When you're doing a regular addition to savings, it adds up. If you can get into the habit of increasing your savings a little bit every six months or so, then you are going to get to a really great place very quickly.

[00:22:30] We can spend money on all these things, but really when it comes down to it, the things that give us the most pleasure, the most enjoyment tend to not have a lot of cost.

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Connect with Danette:

E-mail: Danette@TruNorthWealth.com

Phone: 775.364.0010

Follow Danette Lowe on LinkedIn:

https://www.linkedin.com/in/danette-lowe-cfp%C2%AE-9b7bb716/

Visit www.trunorthwealth.com to Download your free workbook - Three Steps to Planning an Epic Retirement

This podcast is for informational purposes only. The situations used herein do not constitute a recommendation as to the suitability of any investment for any person or persons having circumstances similar to those portrayed, and a financial advisor should be consulted for your specific situation. Neither Commonwealth Financial Network nor your representative provides tax advice.