How to Have $3,000 by the End of the Year

I was watching television last night and heard a statistic that just floored me. I imagine it might surprise you, as well. People who eat out for lunch every day spend as much as $3,000 in one year, just on lunch. $3,000.

Think about what you could do if you had an extra $3,000 to spend at the end of the year: 

• Take a vacation
• Pay off debt
• Make a down payment on a vehicle
• Go on a shopping spree
• Make renovations to you home

The list goes on and on. Regardless of how you spend it, or even save it, the point is that you don’t have to do much or give up much to save a significant amount of money.

Most people who eat out do it because they say it’s easier. That’s not necessarily true. If you make dinner every night, why not make enough to pack for lunch the next day? That’s what I do for my husband. He takes leftovers every day and warms them in the microwave at work.

Don’t have a microwave at work? You can still have a warm lunch from home. Just buy hot and cold packs from the grocery store – something that keeps food cold when frozen or warm when heated. When cleaning up from dinner every night, fix your leftovers in a portable bowl or container and refrigerate them. In the morning, microwave them and the hot pack at the same time and stick them both in a thermal bag or lunch kit. Your food will stay warm all day if you need it to.

You can even pack warm lunches for your kids and save the nearly $3 a day charged by the cafeteria. My son loves soft tacos or burritos. I make them with whole grain tortillas, shredded cheese and vegetarian refried beans (which taste exactly like regular refried beans. They just don’t have lard.) Obviously, he can’t heat his lunch at school, so I purchased a thermos for $1 at Wal-Mart. I make the taco at night and refrigerate it. In the morning, when I am making his breakfast, I boil water, poor it in the thermos and let it sit for five minutes while I am fixing the rest of his lunch. When the timer goes off, I microwave his taco or burrito, wrap it in foil, spill out the water from the thermos and stick the food in the thermos. It stays warm, even with an ice pack in his lunch box to keep the other elements of his lunch cold.

To me, that’s a whole lot easier than leaving the office, getting in the car and driving to a restaurant where I either have to wait in line or wait for a seat. It’s even faster than standing in line in the cafeteria at work.

Even if it doesn’t seem easier, it’s a small sacrifice to make for $3,000 a year. Try it. You may like it.

 

Don’t Take Their Word for it – Read the Fine Print

A while back, I blogged about how excited I was to pick up a smart phone and data plan that didn’t cost any more than the monthly plan for my old cell phone. I have since found out that the person who sold us the phones wasn’t completely honest with us. The plan is still the same price, but she included a lot of extras we didn’t verbally agree to.

It’s been several months since we got our new smartphones, and as busy as the holiday season tends to be, I wasn’t very diligent about reading my monthly bill. I just went online and paid it. Last week, however, I spent some time organizing my online banking merchants, checking that their addresses were still correct, my account numbers were accurate, etc., I had gotten into the habit of paying bills on each company’s website, and I wanted to streamline that for the new year.

When it came time to pay my cell phone bill, I realized it was almost double what it used to be. Thinking that maybe I overlooked a payment, I went out to the cell phone provider’s website to look at my bill. I was shocked at what I found. They have been charging us $15 per phone for insurance and another $7 per phone for a warranty each month. With two phones, that’s an extra $44 a month. Why am I paying for a warranty on a phone? It should already be covered by the manufacturer. And why do I need insurance if the phone is covered under a warranty. These are questions I can’t answer yet, because I haven’t had a chance to call that company. That’s on my list to do this week.

There are two important lessons to learn here. First, don’t take a salesperson’s word as gold. I am positive that I would have turned down any extended warranties and insurance had she mentioned it. I’m sure it’s on the paperwork, but I trusted her and did not read the paperwork. That was a mistake. The second lesson is to pay attention to your bill each month. If I had been paying attention to the bill for the past few months, I would saved myself over $100. My choice to be lazy was an expensive one.

Sometimes saving money is about paying attention. When you shop at a store, you pay attention to prices, right? You know what you’re willing to spend and what you think is just too much money. It shouldn’t be any different with your monthly bills. Know what you are willing to pay and know what you are paying for. It could save you a lot of money in the long run.

Setting Financial Goals for the New Year

It’s hard to believe the holidays are over and a new year has begun. Wasn’t it just yesterday that we were ringing in 2011? As we get back to work, back to school and back to reality, it’s a good time to start thinking of our financial goals for 2012.

This is sometimes a painful process for people. We know we may have over spent during the holidays, and we’re not ready to see exactly how much. Or, we already know we have too much debt, and we don’t think there is any way to get out of it. Maybe you haven’t been saving enough, and you’re dreading giving up something you love to put that money in savings.

Now is the time to start dealing with those feelings and taking action to make your situation better.

If debt is your major concern, you may be able to consolidate your high-interest credit cards into one low interest loan, which will help you pay down your debt faster. Sometimes just calling the credit card companies and asking for a lower interest rate helps, especially if you tell them you have an offer from another credit card to consolidate your debt at zero percent interest.

If savings is your major concern, figure out what you can give up that won’t feel like too much of a sacrifice. If you eat lunch out every day, maybe you can cut back two days a week. If you stop for coffee every day, perhaps you can buy yourself a coffee maker with a timer and get it ready the night before so you always have coffee when you wake up.

The important thing about setting goals is to be realistic. Much like dieting, if you set goals that make you feel like you are giving up too much, you’re not going to stick to them. If you have $10,000 in debt, figure out what you need to do to pay off maybe $2,000 this year. If you can, make more than the minimum payment, or consolidate your loans.

If your goal is to save more money and you’ve never done that before, don’t start by saving $100 a paycheck (unless you feel that’s comfortable for you). Start small with maybe $10 a pay check, and have it deducted automatically from your pay check and deposited to a savings account. If you find you can do more, increase that amount next month or later in the year.

Whatever your goals, take baby steps. You didn’t get into debt over night, and you won’t get out of debt every night. You didn’t spend your savings overnight, and you won’t build it back up over night. Be patient, and you’ll be amazed at how well you do.