Post last updated May 3, 2021
If you’re in a paycheck to paycheck rut, finding new ways to preserve some cash is essential to start making progress on beating debt or amassing savings. In this post, learn to use the power of $10 choices to save money fast. A list of other money saving tips to layer on to your saving strategy are included at the end of this post to accelerate your progress saving money!
What's In This Post
$10 decisions or save $100: which is easier?
A technique I recommend is to make it a monthly goal to make 10 decisions that save you $10 each. Anyone can use this method to start saving money immediately.
Thinking twice and stopping yourself from spending $10 on multiple separate occasions is a much easier goal than “put $100 in your bank account each month,” especially when you’re cash strapped.
It breaks the “save $100” goal into 10 simple decisions that you can manage one at a time.
I recommend giving yourself a ‘point’ for each $10 choice. You can grab my printable $10 decision tracker to make this fun and easy. Or maybe use a tally mark on the ‘fridge or your planner, wherever you see it frequently.
Either way you track, each time you consciously choose to make a small spending sacrifice in view of your greater goals, give yourself a pat on the back and mark it down. I like $10 because it’s about the amount of a fast takeout lunch during the workday or a drive through meal. It’s an easy amount to add up to $100 per month, or more!
A $100 saved scenario
Perhaps you pack a PB&J and an apple for lunch two days at work this month instead of buying lunch, and there’s two points (i.e. 2 choices saving $10 each).
You leave an item in your Amazon cart for the month instead of checking out right away- if it was a $20 item, you just earned two more points. I’m willing to bet if it was something you could do without for the month, you’ll probably decide you didn’t need it anyway and can delete from your cart altogether.
Two Starbucks runs deleted from your routine this month, one point.
(You’re halfway there!)
Eat at home before you go on date night so you can have drinks and split an appetizer instead, you just earned at least two but maybe four or more points there.
Opt for different cuts of meat, or a lower cost protein at the grocery store one week, another point.
Spanning these more frugal choices across the array of things you spend money on in a single month, it is usually pretty easy to get to 10 choices.
And those 10 choices just saved you an easy $100. A great trick is to formally transfer each of these $10 choices (or even their exact amount) to your savings account immediately. Then you have the reinforcement of watching your savings grow!
Related reading:
- Short Term Financial Goals: Your Action Plan for a Better Future
- Tracking Savings: Your Key For Turning Dreams Into Reality
- What is the purpose of a budget? 7 goals a budget can conquer
Tips for getting started making $10 choices
The possibilities are endless and are as varied as people’s habits and indulgences are varied. So it’s up to you to think through all the potential spots you can make a choice than preserves $10 for your more important priorities.
It may help to brainstorm a list before you begin and, if you have pretty predictable habits, go ahead and just ‘schedule’ yourself a few of these right off the bat.
For example, offices lunches are not so much impulse purchases, but quite predictable (you show up at the office without a packed lunch, you know what’s going to happen at noon!). You could plan a few lunching-out skips on certain days when you know being out with colleagues isn’t crucial anyway.
As for impulse purchases, think through where and when these happen… with friends, on weekends, cruising certain store websites in the evening, whatever it may be. Knowing when or where your least needed spending happens ahead of time can help you imagine where you’ll find these $10 decisions.
More ways to save money on a tight budget
- Continue to adopt being frugal to make spending less money natural to you, instead of a constant challenge.
- Learn how to use money fasting and spending freezes to always stick to your monthly spending cap. Routine behavior techniques like these for regular spending control is the best way to save money on a tight budget.
- Stop automatic charges for subscriptions and services that aren’t essential.
- Regularly renegotiate your car insurance premium or switch companies for a lower price.
- Avoid credit card interest at all costs. Treat credit cards as tools to manage well-controlled, frugal spending – just never pay interest.
- Reduce your biggest utility costs: heating your home and heating your water.
Key takeaways
That’s it! A simple and fun approach to building the habit of eliminating small unimportant spending. And watching your savings grow for the big picture stuff that supports your vision for your life and your family.
No big cuts or spending categories to limit. Depending on your income and spending level, you could easily do this same method aiming for 15, 20, or more of these small $10 decisions. But make sure to keep it an amount that feels somewhat trivial in your day to day spending, something totally doable. You can always go up from there if you feel it’s just too darn easy!
So go get making your winning choices and see how it feels. Ideally, you see the fruits of your (relatively easy) labor quickly. And such habits will then become more typical- order water instead of a cocktail on certain dinner out occasions, skip the bottled beverages at the grocery store this week, pack your lunch more often, etc etc.
When you make the hard choices and then (hopefully) afterward realize it wasn’t actually that hard, you’re well on your way to better personal finance habits. And now each month you’ve freed up $100 for your greater life priorities with only 10 small decisions a month.
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