How to make every day, savings day!
By: Pier Yvette Alsup, Chief Community Engagement Officer
Together Credit Union
National Savings Day is “celebrated” each year on October 12th to recognize the value of saving and highlight simple steps to making saving easier!
When you think about it, most of us are savers … we save family recipes and heirlooms, flowers from special occasions, school photos, concert ticket stubs, and sporting event programs, and birthday cards. We even save locks of hair from our children’s first haircut! Saving is innate to each of us, so how can we transfer this habit to money? The following are a few tips to make saving easier:
Having a budget helps encourage saving. Start your budget plan with the 50-30-20 rule. This rule allows for spending 50% of your income on your needs (the things you can’t do without, such as groceries, housing, utilities, insurance, and transportation). Additionally, spending 30% of your income on your wants (the things that are flexible, such as cable and streaming services, lawn care, vacation travel, and entertainment). And, finally spending 20% of your income on savings and debt repayment.
Just putting $25 away weekly will give you $1300 in savings within a year! And, that’s a great start to creating an emergency fund. This pandemic has taught us a lot, including the benefit of saving for the unexpected.
You can save daily simply by keeping your change … it is simple and easy with a “change jar”. You’ll be surprised how quickly the jar fills up and ADDS UP!
When you have a family, sometimes it may seem there is never enough money to go around. Saving as a family – when everyone in your household understands what and why you are saving – not only teaches your children the importance of saving, it is less likely your efforts will be pushed aside. Best of all, when you reach your savings goals, everyone celebrates!
For more information on savings and personal finance, visit the Together Credit Union website at www.togethercu.org. The Credit Union and the Together Foundation also offer a variety of financial education and empowerment programs including hosting workshops on saving and money management. For more information on the Foundation, please contact Pier Yvette Alsup at palsup@togethercu.org.
