How to optimise your money spending
We have all been there. You get to the last Friday of the month, get paid and go out with your friends to celebrate. By Monday morning you look at your bank account and wonder where the money has gone- how did you manage to spend so much in so little time?
The truth is that most people struggle with making sure they don’t overspend and with ensuring that when they do, it is going towards necessary and beneficiary expenses. But you don’t have to be most people anymore, because I am about to teach you how to optimise your spending and save you the stress of seeing fewer zeros to right on your account balance after payday.
Write down your necessary expenses beforehand and pay them straight away:
As horrible as it is to notice you no longer have money, the worse thing that could happen is to notice that you no longer have enough left to pay for your essential bills. Not paying rent could have you out in the streets and being late on your bills could affect your credit score. That’s bad news. So how do you avoid it? By writing down all of your essential bills beforehand, including how much each one will cost, and ensuring that the first thing you do is pay them straight away. This way you will not only ensure you are up-to-date with your bills, but you will also have an idea of how much will be left for lesser expenses and leisure. If you are prone to forgetting, setting up reminders on your phone, or direct debits might be worth considering.
Plan and budget for your outings ahead of time:
It might sound unreasonable to ask you to keep to a strict budget regarding where you want to go and how much you purchase every time you do go out. It is. Hence why I am not telling you to do that. What you should do in its place is have a rough idea of where you want to go, what you want to buy and how much approximately it will take out of your wages. A good idea is to set aside x amount of pounds maximum spend for each outing and sticking to it. Depending on where you plan to go, there might be hours in which the drinks are cheaper or discounts that apply to certain dates, so make sure you research ahead. Doing this will be a sure method towards avoiding the realisation that half of your wages were spent on a cocktail bar
Find bargains:
On the subject of looking for discounts and happy hours, finding yourself bargains for your more impulsive and miscellaneous purchases is essential. The fact is that we can’t meticulously plan and budget all of our expenses. One day you might have left work a little later than expected and be left with little patience to spend an hour or more cooking, so, you decide to get a takeaway. Maybe your feed is showing you some gorgeous new coat that you are just dying to try on. Hey! This is a judgment-free zone! However, impulsive buying doesn’t need to create a hole in your wallet. Chances are that there are discount codes, cheaper options and sales that can get you what you are craving for cheaper. Make sure you are always on the lookout for those.
Cancel unnecessary and unused subscriptions:
Okay, picture this: There is a new show out on a streaming service. You sign on for a thirty-day trial and forget to cancel. Next month you get charged for it, and the month after, and after that.. you have totally forgotten about that subscription and the £10 out of your account go almost unnoticed. Just like that, you have lost an additional £120 which could be used to cover other expenses. What a waste! Here’s how to stop wasting: make sure you always cancel your subscriptions. If they are a free trial and you know you won’t be using the service past the duration of the trial- cancel it straight after subscribing. If that’s not possible, place a reminder on your phone for one week before the free trial deadline. If this is another subscription you have been paying for and not using, make sure you keep an eye on your bank movements so that you can identify and cancel them at an appropriate time. There are even online tools that help you identify your unused subscriptions, so it’s time to trim out the money-wasting fat.
Re-Invest your money:
How else can an initial expenditure turn into profit? By investing of course, and this isn’t only limited to buying stocks (though that’s also a massive part of it and you should absolutely do it), it can also mean investing in your side hustle, podcast, YouTube channel, Instagram page, etc, so you can produce better content or better quality products/service, which in turn means more revenue. Take a little out of your monthly wages after budgeting and applying all the other tips I’ve given you and save enough to get equipment, expertise, stocks or whatever else is necessary to improve your operation or optimise your use of money. All that will be left to do is sit back, relax and be comfortable in knowing you never have to worry about feeling like you have been robbed after a night of spending.
So, what are you waiting for? Go out there and apply these tips and I guarantee that your wages will seem to stretch much more than you thought possible.
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