Grow Your Money

Strategies for Saving

The key to saving is to pay yourself first. Look at saving as a necessary bill and make it easy by having money automatically deducted from your paycheck or checking account and deposited into a savings account. Wondering where you're going to find the extra cash to stash away? It might be in your coffee cup or on your lunch plate.

The little things add up!

Item

Cost

Weekly Cost

Yearly Cost

Starbuck's coffee

$3.00

$15

$780

Lunch take-out (M-F)

$6 - $10

$30 - $50

$1560 - $2600

DVD/CDs

$10

$20

$1040

2 packs cigarettes/week

$5.50 each

$11

$572

Begin saving by building an emergency savings fund. This money should be held in an easily accessible account, such as a regular or online savings account, money-market fund or short-term certificate of deposit (CD), and should include enough money to cover three to six months' worth of living expenses. The purpose of this account is to help you meet unexpected expenses such as car repairs, losing your part-time job, or getting sick. A few sample tools for savings are compared below. These are sample rates are for one bank? call your bank to inquire about fees or visit Bankrate.com for comparison tools.

Sample Tools for Saving

Account Type

Minimum Opening Balance

Maintenance Fee

Withdrawals

Fee charged for withdrawals

Interest Rate

Savings

$.01 - $50

Free -$3.00/monthly

Unlimited

None

0.65% - 2.00%

Money
Market

$50

$15.00/monthly, unless $5000 average daily balance

4 per month

$5.00 each additional withdrawal

1.00% - 3.3%

Certificate of Deposit (CDs)

$500

None

Can not withdraw until term ends
(3 mos.?5 yrs.)

Penalty charged

3.00% - 5.12%

Online Savings
or Money Market

$1

Free

Unlimited

None

4.68% - 5.05%

Once you've started on your emergency fund, you can start building savings for other goals? like vacation, a new computer, or a new MP3 player. You can also start building your retirement savings. The 70-20-10 Rule shows you how to successfully divide your money into amounts saved for emergencies, short-term and intermediate goals, and retirement.