Is money saving hard?

Andybez38

Do you have to look and at what your spending in every area. Then scrimp and scrape to find the bargains?

Hard_Up_Hester

It can be hard until you get into the swing of it, it depends a bit on where/if you are wasting money.
Babysteps is best so you don't get overwhelmed, if you try to cut down in all directions at once you could fail and then get disheartened.

moneyistooshorttomention

I would think the first and foremost thing about it imo is the reason as to why one is doing it.

If it's by choice - ie in order to save up for something major (eg a house or a trip round the world) and it's time-limited as to how long one has to do it for = that's one thing. At that point it's basically a hobby and a challenge.

But if it's by necessity - ie because there simply isn't a high enough income coming in to the house (despite making all reasonable efforts to make it be so and being reasonable at money management) and that looks likely to go on for the foreseeable future = it will be a lot harder. That would be because it's being imposed - rather than something that's done by choice.

Add that the older one is then the worse it would feel imo to have to do moneysaving by necessity, rather than choice (because there comes a point in one's life at which the phrase "By my age I should have....." starts coming up in one's mind) and that adds to the difficulty in coping with it.

Islandmaid

Of course it's hard - if it wasn't we'd all be loaded and debt free

Think of it like dieting - I'm a chubby middle aged woman, who is bright enough to know that if I ate less, and moved more - I'd be slimmer...

Financial cutbacks are just the same - we would all love to buy what we wanted, when we wanted it, but we'd end up with a fat debt rather than a fat butt...

Add up you're income, deduct you're essential household bills, split what's left over into 5, that's you're disposable income - deduct your groceries and a little (and I mean a little) 'pin' money and what's left goes to pay off debt or save, depending on your circumstances.

Sounds easy.... It's not, but like any diet, make it a lifestyle change not a binge diet, and hopefully you will come out a beautiful financial butterfly

Good luck and keep reading, there is a wealth (excuse the pun) of knowledge on here :j

GreyQueen

Andybez38 wrote: »

Do you have to look and at what your spending in every area. Then scrimp and scrape to find the bargains?

You can get through a lot of money buying bargains.

The thing you don't buy at all is the best bargain. For the other things, think needs not wants, and make your pleasures economical ones. I love to read and have read 97 books in 2016.

Many came from the library, the rest came from chazzers, average price sub 50p each. Imagine how much money I could have spent on books had I been buying all of them new........... hundreds of £££££.

Money-saving is second nature, literally something I do without thinking. I'll be out and about in the next few days buying speciality seasonal food like meats, cheeses, biscuits etc for considerably less than full-retail.

Many things can be frozen, even fruit cakes. Norralorra people know that.

Andybez38

GreyQueen wrote: »

You can get through a lot of money buying bargains.

Can you get addicted to saving as well as spending?

GreyQueen

Andybez38 wrote: »

Can you get addicted to saving as well as spending?

Yup! I get my leg pulled by the checkout staff at my local Tosspots if I buy something not on yellow stickers...........:rotfl:

Caterina

The OP seems to post a lot of questions all over the forum. Draw your own conclusions.

Pollycat

Andybez38 wrote: »

Do you have to look and at what your spending in every area. Then scrimp and scrape to find the bargains?

I'd say the answer to both those questions is
'Yes, if your financial position is such that you 'have to'.

They are - at least to me - strange questions.

If you need to cut back - either in general or to afford something specific (e.g. a holiday or wedding) - then of course you need to look at what you are spending.

Try looking on the Debt Free Wannabe board - you don't have to be in debt to pick up great ideas for reducing your outgoings.

[Deleted User]

Its sorting whats needs are as oppossed to wants
i.e. I need say 'a bottle of milk' ,
I want 'a bottle of wine' ,
commonsense tells you that milk will go on your cereal or in your tea whereas as a bottle of wine will not.(we it could but probably wouldn't.
or I need a warm roof over my head and food in the cupboard . but I want a Lamborghini to whizz around and show off in is totally different

So proritising your needs, as opposed to your wants, soon sorts out your spending

I need a decent budget monthly that I will use to buy my food ,but I also want a nice family holiday next year as usual.

So compromise tells me that by sticking to my monthly budget and coming in under budget means any let over cash will get swept into my holiday account to help pay for my holiday house rental.

So I budget carefully and by doing so it enables me to get a nice holiday with my family.