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Financial Experts have said people may need a nest egg of more than $1 million to carry them through a 30-year retirement. I’ve mentioned in other posts that people are going to live longer especially women.
A recent study said 41% of workers said they hoped their savings would afford them a vacation home, and a little more than a third said they would like to spend their time with loved ones in their golden years, followed by traveling the world.
The reality is however over half of Americans, or 57 percent, have less than $1,000 in their savings accounts, according to a separate GOBankingRates survey.
So how do you get crack-a-lacking and get moving on making sure you have the savings for the retirement you want.
Great So Show Me How to Save Money – An Extra $1000 a Month
You need to start finding ways to save more money.
In my current job, I’ve got a pretty sweet pension so I can’t complain, but I still want to ensure that I can do lots of things that my pension may not be able to pay for. In retirement I want to travel everywhere, golf, volunteer, be active, etc.
There are so many unknown’s (health, family situation, etc.) you need to prepare as best you can and not guess how much you will need.
As always your situation may be different than mine, but I’ve decided that I want less material items and focus on these 3 things to save more money and make more money for retirement.
We sold one of our cars.
In our quest to save an extra $1000 a month we knew sacrifices would have to be made. We made a conscious decision to start downsizing by getting rid of stuff we don’t need and either sell them or donate them to charity so others can use them. I’m 49 and I’m really starting look at what’s important and the amount of “stuff” we have accumulated over the years is kinda gross because well, we just didn’t need most of it.
I’ve had three Jeeps in my life. My pride and joy was my 2015 Jeep Wrangler. It was jacked up, big tires terrifying bumper. I loved that thing…. sadly it was hardly a great commuting car. It was a gas-guzzling, pig, the payments weren’t high but it was $420 a month and of course, there was the monthly car insurance.
My wife and I decided to try going to one car, this year. I would take the bus to work and she would take the car. This was a big decision, I hadn’t taken the bus in 10 years, I only live 15 mins from work and parking was free so it took a little self-convincing.
In the end, it was the right choice when you look at the dollars involved.
The reality was that after a week of figuring out when the buses came and ensuring I was there when it came. The 15-minute bus ride is not terrible. I get some time to myself, listen to my podcasts in peace. I don’t have to worry about sitting in traffic and getting frustrated.
Another upside was that I actually have to walk to the bus stop instead of hopping in my car in the driveway, so I’m even getting a little exercise that is desperately needed.
So back to the Jeep.
We sold the jeep for a profit (amazing right!) via Adesa. Adesa is an automobile auction house that sells vehicles. I thought they only sold for dealers and car rentals places like Enterprise, but they also sell for the public.
Their fees are quite reasonable. If the Jeep sold they charged $875 flat rate. If they sold over the asking price they took 25% of each $1000 over.
They first sit with to go over what previous vehicles sold for based on your vehicle. Then you set a price based on that information. You get three weeks to sell. In this case, there was an auction each Thursday.
All that to say we sold it on the third Thursday for the price we agreed to.
Based on the price we sold for made $3000 on top of not paying for it anymore.
Payment = $420
Gas/month= $200
Insurance= $100
Total Monthly Savings= $620
(minus cost for a monthly bus pass $100/month)
Scaled-Back Kids Activities
In the quest to save an extra $1000 a month you may have to think outside the box so this may be a bit controversial but hear me out.
My eldest daughter is very active (the other…not so much lol!) She swims for school, takes kickboxing and participates in other school sports.
We discussed a few weeks ago about the frequency that she attends her kickboxing classes. She was only going once or twice a week because she was so busy with other activities.
It was a great discussion on the value of money and what she was getting out of the classes vs. what we were paying. When I broke down the total cost over the year, she understood that it was a big expense that she/we really weren’t seeing the value for what we were paying for.
The deal we made was that if she stopped Kickboxing I would sign the both of us up to Planet Fitness 2 $20 a month vs. $200 a month.
Find a Planet Fitness near you at https://www.planetfitness.com/
Kickboxing classes = $200
Total Monthly Savings $180
(minus Planet Fitness costs)
Lunches for work
I’ve said it before if you want to save boatloads of money bring your own lunch to work.
Read my post on other ways to save money with Instant Pot here.
https://www.wickedretirement.com/save-thousands-instant-pot/
I’ve got an Instant Pot (a slow cooker works as well) and do my lunches every Sunday it costs me approximately $20 for ingredients for the week.
The other thing to consider here is that you’re also eating healthier. You buy fresh vegetables and a protein and you are good to go. I see people eating these microwave pouches every day and think how many chemicals are in that meal and really you can make something way tastier in your kitchen.
You just need to set aside one hour to put it all together on a Sunday.
Eating out in a restaurant or stopping at a McDonald’s drive-thru on the way to work in the morning is another wallet killer. (Can’t do that on the Bus LOL!) Let’s face it, it adds up fast not only reducing your bank account but also increasing your waist size. it’s just not good for you.
Instead of paying upwards of $70 – $90 per week eating out at a restaurant or at the cafeteria every day. (doesn’t include coffee – that’s another story)
Making Lunch per month = $80
Buying Lunch per Month = $280
Total Monthly Savings $200
There you have it how to save an extra $1000 a month = $12k a year that’s huge savings
I always say
“I’d rather keep my money in my pocket than give it to someone else”
So as you can see here are three ways, there are many more. See my other posts on that.
Given that it seems that no one is saving for their retirement these days and we are going to be around longer than we think, I can’t stress enough how important it is to start saving now!
I read a stat the other day that if every child started saving $50 from each paycheck when they start working until the time they retire they would amass over $2.5M by the time they retire! AMAZING $50 every paycheck. $50 is not much, but that shows you the power of compound interest.
Obviously, the earlier you start the better but stop wondering how much to save if your 30, 40 or 50 years old.
Make simple changes that have a small if negligible impact on your life or lifestyle and go from there.
That’s Super, But I Don’t Have an Extra Car or That Much Money to Save
Answer = Then You Need to Make More Money – It’s That Simple!
If you find you’re at a point where you can’t save enough money, then you need to consider how to make more money.
You can find ideas for that here.
Top 5 Easy Ways to Make Extra Money
Top 5 Best Ways to Get Out of Debt Faster
My two favorites to make more money right now are:
1. Providing rides for people via Lyft or Uber.
You can get paid the same day with Uber.
A co-worker does Uber to pay for his daughter’s school. It’s brilliant, he makes $400-$600 a week which directly goes to her education.
He has arranged his work hours to start at 9:30 AM each morning. He works a couple of hours in the morning and after supper, he works another few hours.
When you consider most Americans watch over 4 hours of television each day. Consider what if you did Uber for 2 of those hours or even all of those hours how much more money would you be able to save for retirement?
At the Christmas party this year he showed me his December earnings on the Uber app. Each week he averaged $500 a week… a week! He made over $2000 in one month over and above his current salary.
It’s cost you next to nothing ($40 to safety your car) your gas is approx. 20% of what you make. Be nice! That’s it!
2. Start a blog.
It takes some time and it’s hard work but if you blog about something you are passionate about you can monetize it down the road and make extra money that way. I’ve been having a blast doing it and you’re helping people at the same time.
This one takes more time, but to me, it’s a great option as I’m always wondering what am I going to do with myself during retirement? Blogging is going to be my hobby or at least one of them.
Blogging has been really fun, I’ve learned a ton and really I really enjoy helping people so its win-win.
My advice is you should start with a mentor. There are many people out there asking for a lot of money to show you how to blog. Believe me! I’ve wasted money on them. But there are people out there who genuinely want to share their knowledge and help you get off on the right track.
The point is you should get some good advice when you start so you don’t go down a road too far that you have to go back and fix everything.
You can blog about anything from sewing to surfing. Whatever you have an interest in there are thousands if not millions of people on the planet looking for an answer that you may be able to provide them.
Blogging has a very low start-up cost and with billions of people around with internet access, regardless of your topic, there is someone out there searching for what you are interested in as well.
You’re providing a service. It’s very rewarding to see your site traffic go up each month which tells you that people are interested and looking for what you are providing them. It will take time to save an extra $1000 a month but if you stick to it with the right advice You can do it.
Once you are established you can make money with your blog.
Whether your goal is an extra $250 a month or $10K a month if you put in the time you can be successful but it’s not a get rich quick scheme but it’s fun and it’s yours.
As always, I highly recommend if you are at all interested in creating your own blog (I have had so much fun with it!) Consider Alex and Lauren’s courses at Create and Go. They have tried it all and now offer these courses on how to set up your own blog and avoid the mistakes they made.
You can make money Blogging, by the way, they made $150K last month, so they know what they are talking about. It is an affiliate link, but I have purchased all their courses and love them. They are by far the experts in this area and genuinely want you to be successful.
My review of their Launch your Blog Course is here.
All the resources I recommend can be found on the Resources Page. I wouldn’t recommend them if I didn’t use them myself.
If you have any questions don’t hesitate to drop me a line at theteam@wickedretirement.com
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