by Pam on February 25, 2011
Many folks work really hard in order to pay off their debt, including credit card debt, car loans, student loans, and their mortgage. This is an excellent idea, although, sometimes once our debt has been paid off, we get careless with our money. We suddenly have all this extra money at our disposal and it can be tempting to splurge.
Instead of blowing money that you no longer need to use to pay off debt, consider saving that money instead. For example, if you were making $350 payments towards your car loan and then you finally paid it off, why not allocate the $350 towards contributing to your retirement savings and other investment accounts to save for your short and long term goals?
[click to read…]
by Pam on January 30, 2011
Too many Canadians are wasting at least $2 every week by buying lottery tickets. Although it is true that a lucky few do win big, most folks might get a free ticket once in a while, or win a minimal amount of money to keep them hooked.
If everyone who was in the habit of buying lottery tickets regularly decided to save their $2 every week instead, this would mean that they could save $104 per year. Now over one year that doesn’t’ sound like much, but over 10 years that is a savings of $1040, not to mention interest or growth earned from the amount saved.
[click to read…]
by Pam on January 26, 2011
Are you saving for something specific right now? Do you have any upcoming vacation plans or are you saving to buy a newer vehicle within the next couple of years? Whatever your savings goals might be, there is a really great tool called the Basic Savings Calculator that can help you determine how attainable your goals are.
Simply enter your information into the fields and you will get a basic idea as to how long it will take you to achieve your specific goal and how much you need to save. Every once in a while, use this calculator to do a quick “check up” to see how you are doing.
[click to read…]
by Pam on January 4, 2011
Have you ever stopped to think about how long your retirement may last? For some people, retirement can be as much as one third of their lives! That can be a daunting thought considering we need to prepare for retirement during our working years and hope we have saved enough.
Due to advanced technology in the healthcare field, it is much easier for many folks to live a lot longer than they might have anticipated. In order to prepare thoroughly, we must start saving for retirement as soon as possible.
[click to read…]
Imagine you just received an unexpected gift of money, won a lottery, or your business did much better than expected. Suddenly you have extra money that you need to decide what to do with. What do you think you would do with it?
The answer will be different for everyone as we all have different ideas for what to do with extra cash. Due to our unique situations in life, it might make more sense for some of us to pay down debt, while others should be topping up their emergency fund a bit more. Still others might be wise to invest in the stock market or start up that business project they’ve always wanted to work on.
[click to read…]
Today is the last day of my 100-Day Challenge. It has indeed been a challenge, but I am really glad I decided to do it as the extra exercise as well as the extra money I have saved has been a positive thing for me.
Since my last update my husband and I went on vacation for two weeks, so for that period of time I did not count my entertainment expenses as we already set aside a vacation budget specifically for that time period. However, outside of our vacation spending, I was able to stick within my $100 entertainment budget, with money to spare. We went to the seafood buffet again, so I still have $15 left. Not bad. I wasn’t sure if I would be able to do it. I guess that means today I can go out and spend $15! Just kidding!
[click to read…]
Well, this will be my last update until the end of my 100-Day Challenge. With only 26 days to go, time has really flown by. I have felt more positive about the challenge lately. Exercising has become a more normal part of my routine each day. I even went for a walk one day during a break at work, which was nice. I think I will start to do more of that even after the challenge is over.
My entertainment is down to just $35 now as I went to a concert that cost me $20. I think I can manage to stick within this budget during the rest of this challenge without too much trouble.
[click to read…]
