In Need of Inspiration

Masomnia

Apodemus wrote: »

I do that one the other way round, and find it much more powerful: to sustainably spend that extra £1,250 on depreciation each year I would need to save an extra £31,250 (£1,250x25) into my retirement fund. The iPhone would be £15,000 (£60x25) divided by its expected life (five years?) so true cost to me would come to £3,000. Even a £62.50 Starbucks coffee becomes a bit steep!

I don't think I'll ever be able to spend money again without thinking 'Now what's this coffee x 25...'

Very powerful way of looking at it indeed!

darkidoe

A Brief History of Time:Compound interest

I like analogIves.. Imagine you have a fruit which you can either eat it now or plant it to grow a tree which can produce more fruits after some time. You plant that fruit and harvest more fruits from the single tree and then you replant those fruits you harvest to grow more trees which produces even more fruits. Now each fruit you decide to eat will lose it potential to produce many many fruits down the line exponentially. So eat less fruits, plant more trees until a point where the fruits you are harvesting are plentiful enough to sustain you eating more of it whilst replanting them. Imagine the person who decides to eat his first single fruit rather than plant it compared to the person who plant the first fruit. He might still be eating fruits on loan with interest!?! #motivation

BLB53

Is anyone else out there looking to max their savings with long term goals and how do you all keep focused!?

One small tactic you may find useful...I always have in mind when I make a purchase, how much capital would be needed to generate the income required to buy the item.

Say I get 4% return from my investments, then I need to have saved an extra £50 to buy that cup of coffee on the go or £750 for that meal out...just times the cost by x25 and you will be surprised by how much you do not really need.

enthusiasticsaver

The motivation I always used to save once we had our house was to save 25% of our disposable income to cover home improvements, holidays and new car. At the beginning of the year we would decide which holidays we wanted to go on, whether we were going to do any major diy or need to replace the car that year. If we got to the end of the year and it wasn't spent we would either pay it off the mortgage (interest rates higher then) or keep it back for the following year. Emergency fund was separate.

I found the sight of the savings growing satisfactory though. Now it is investing which excites me and the thought that as the portfolio grows the close of my early retirement date gets nearer.

george4064

A really good source of inspiration is from others, so why not join the 'Save 12k in 2016 thread'? Link here: https://forums.moneysavingexpert.com/discussion/5369493

You can find more about it in the thread, all I can say is that it really inspires me seeing other peoples progress and updates.