For many of you saving has not been a priority. It is not because you don’t want to have savings but because you don’t think you have any money to save. Learning to save takes effort at the beginning. It takes discipline. How do you start? Start by saving a small amount each month. You want to have the beginnings of an emergency fund. Your goal initially should be to save $1,000. This might seem like a large amount, but you need it in place.
Why should you start? What would happen right now if you did not have that $1,000 and your car needed new tires? How are you going to pay for it? Chances are you’ll reach for the credit card because this is an emergency. What you have just done is added to your debt. This is not something you want to do. You want to eliminate debt not add to it. This is the reason to start saving.
When you create a spending plan/cash flow plan/budget you allocate a percentage of your money to savings each time you get paid. If you have it automatically go to a savings account, you won’t fill the pinch as badly. The key to start saving is to have a spending plan/cash flow plan/budget in place.
Once you achieve the $1,000 goal, you don’t stop saving. You want to keep adding to that savings, so that eventually you will have eight to twelve months of expenses in that emergency fund. You can save that money in a money market account and earn a small amount of interest. You cannot touch it for anything other than an emergency. You’ll be glad that it’s in place should something happen and you find yourself with a cutback in work hours or a job loss. You’ll have money to pay for your living expenses until you get more hours again, a different job, or find a job.
