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Savings tips for real people

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Innovative Fin24 users are not short of ideas on how to save money. In response to an article which decries the debt denial syndrome, savings hero Wayne Gadow provides his savings strategy:

* Always, but always, pay yourself first. I always save first on pay day by depositing money into my money market account before doing anything else.

* When you get that yearly increase, take at least half of the increase amount and add it to the above savings portion. You didn’t have this money the year before and don’t need it now. You will still be upping your standard of living with the other half.

* Get a cellphone with just the right amount of value you need for emergencies. It’s a waste of money when you have a business contract paying hundreds of rands and all you have is hundreds of free minutes. If you aren’t using your free minutes, then you didn’t need to pay the expensive subscription in the first place.

* For the guys, when shopping always buy things that you can wear with lots of different items, like a shirt that can be worn both with a jeans or a suit. Get at least two different pairs of dress shoes in both black and brown so that you can alternate them; they’ll last for years if you don’t wear the same shoes every day.

* Stop buying the most expensive blades for your morning shave – the cheaper ones actually last longer and will cost you a fraction of the price. Expensive blades almost never last as long.

* Buy good quality instant coffee and make your own at work. Buying coffee daily can eat into anyone’s budget. You get excellent instant coffee these days at a fraction of the cost of expensive coffee shops.

* Create a game for yourself and see how much money you can have in your account the day before pay day. Anything, even a couple of rands, should be transferred into your savings. Try and get the amount to be more each month - you won’t believe how quickly this can add up.

* Go shopping for clothes, entertainment, etc every two months. Save the money you would have spent every alternative month.

 - Fin24

Consider yourself a savings hero? Tell us about it and you could get published. You could also:

* Write a guest post
* Ask the experts 

 
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