Five Tips To Saving Money On Your Daily Needs

Being able to save money, in any fashion, can make you feel protected and secure, especially in shaky financial times. The easy part is the planning, because anyone can fantasize about building that nest egg. The hard part is the actual doing, because when the reality of cutting corners actually hits, you may begin to doubt your plan of action. The good news is, you can do this, it will just take some strategizing, and some iron willpower.

Dumping The Luxuries

One reason that many people wind up spending way more money than they need to is because of all the luxuries that they honestly believe they cannot live without. If you are serious about saving money every month, you will have to draw some lines, painful though they may be. To start, see if you can downsize to a basic plan on the following: internet, cable and phone. Some companies offer reduced price plans, as well as ways to bundle all three onto one bill, for less money per month. Miss the movies? Watch them online for less.

Develop Some Shopping Tactics

One of the biggest expenses in any household budget is groceries. As has been done by many generations before you, you will have to become familiar with your local markets, and their sale days. A sale day is usually mid-week, and will be the beginning date of that week’s sale list. Any stock that is listed as being on sale will be available on the first day, but may not be the rest of the week. Find out what will be on sale, and then see if there are any coupons available for them. You can get them off the internet and out of newspapers. Combine all of this with store reward cards, and you will rack up some considerable savings on things you buy on a regular basis.

Speaking Of Cards

There was a time when the reward cards offered by the major chains only gave you a discount on your total bill when shopping there. Those times have definitely changed for the better! Possessing those cards can now earn you discounts and freebies at other stores, simply by continuing to be a loyal customer. For example, one major chain of grocery stores offers their customers a discount on their next gasoline purchase at a participating petroleum chain, if they spend X dollars on groceries. Combining discounts is a wonderful way to save money on a daily basis.

Freebies

While you are surfing the internet, looking for coupons, check out some of the ads you will see touting freebies on a lot of the coupon sites. You can get everything these days from free samples to full size product packages, simply by registering your email address with these websites. Some of them are for consumer survey sites, while others are sites connected to the manufacturers themselves. With the freebies sent in the mail, you will also receive even more coupons to use on your next shopping trip.

Bring It

And, then, there is the timeless method of saving a few bucks a week: bring it from home! Pack a lunch, bring your own coffee, each and every work day, simple as that. On average, this will save you 8 to 10 dollars a day, depending on how much coffee you would have, or where you would go to eat.

About Author: Alisa Martin is a proficient author and writes articles on Finance. She regularly contributes for the website Dollarquick.com.

Don't Throw a Retired Retirement Party! Make That Last Bash Count

In years past, retirement parties were solemn affairs held to acknowledge the end of a career and to commemorate years of loyal service. Today's active retirees, however, are far more likely to view their retirement as a beginning rather than an ending, and may feel that it is the outdated ideas about retirement parties that need to be retired, not them. Make that last bash for a faithful employee a resounding success with a festive celebration that recognizes that the retiree is about to embark on new and exciting adventures. 

Planning and Preparation

Before any party preparation can begin, you'll need to establish a budget, finalize the guest list, and choose a date and venue for the event. Make sure that the invitation list includes the most important people in the retiree's life, including lifelong friends, as well as family. Today's smart phone applications make it easy to keep all the details involved in party planning organized. A dedicated binder to hold items like itineraries, vendor brochures and guest lists offers a low-tech alternative.

Choose a Theme

For a fun and laid-back party, start by choosing a theme that will reflect the retiree's unique personality. Enlist help from the family and friends to find out about personal interests and hobbies that can inspire the ideal theme. Golfing, gardening, and travel themes are all popular choices. Choosing a theme is a simple way to coordinate all the aspects of party throwing, from the invitations and decorations to the choices for food and beverages.

The Perfect Soundtrack

Parties need an infusion of energy and dynamism to keep the action rolling, and nothing impacts a party's atmosphere quite like live music. A live band will keep the party-goers up and moving, but be careful to select a band from sonicbids that will play music that everyone can enjoy. When you have an atmosphere everyone can enjoy, it can help ensure the whole affair is memorable and fun.

The Party Program

No retirement party is complete without a few toasts, speeches, and gifts for the honoree but avoid bringing the festivities to a screeching halt with a stuffy award ceremony. Instead of allowing each guest to make a speech, consider hiring a videographer that can mingle among the crowd and record individual comments. Create a banner where attendees can write personal notes and congratulations throughout the evening is another great idea.

Retirement is no longer viewed as an end of a purposeful life, but as a chance to discover new adventures and opportunities. Plan for the event as if it's a bon voyage bash rather than a retirement party, and you'll increase the likelihood that the festivity is enjoyable for everyone involved.

Reach Your Retirement Goals Faster Playing The Budget Game!

Throughout our entire lives, we dream of financial freedom. We think of what it will be like to retire and finally be able to do the things that we enjoy full time! So, we work and work and save and save hoping to reach a retirement goal that we set years back. But, wouldn't it be great to reach those goals faster than you thought simply by getting competitive with yourself? Well, you can!

Recently, I got bored with budgeting. I mean, really bored! So much so that I stopped keeping track all together. Oh boy, was that a great idea or what? A couple of months flew by as they always do and, I started to realize, I wasn't saving any money or making much of a dent in the debt I was working so hard to pay off! It should come as no surprise that I quickly updated my budget and took a look at my bank statement to see where all the money was going. Small purchases were killing my retirement plan because they weren't being made in moderation with the help of a budget.

Now, there is no one on this planet that doesn't like budgeting as much as me so, if it is one of your least favorite things to do, join the club! What came as a shock to me is, there are overwhelming amounts of people out there that feel the same way I do about budgeting. I found that out as I sifted through several different personal finance websites around the web. 

After reading up on ways to make the process fun, I came to the conclusion that none of the approaches I'd found would work for me. Why? Well, they were all great but, I'm a competitive person! I like to play games, keep score and of course, WIN! So, I figured, why not try and turn my budget into a game. In the game, every dollar would signify a point and there would be set barriers to break. 

I started by cleaning up my budget spreadsheet. Once I did, I totaled up my debt goals and savings goals. I had to do at least this much to get a positive score. For every dollar I spent that went over my goals for that month, I would give myself a point. Month by month, I started to track my progress. 

In the first month, I ended up with a negative score which, well, frustrated me. But, I didn't reach my goals and now, I was being told I didn't by a score board! So, I did some tweaking. I looked at where my money was going and made some changes to how it was being spent. The next month, I scored 11 points! Which was not much considering I had a 219 point dent to cover from the month before.

So, I worked and worked, tweaking little spending habits and eventually, I got the high score of 376 points! I'm still working to beat it but, what that means is $376 more than my goals made it to pay off my debts or pad my savings a bit in one month! That's great considering I have pretty aggressive goals! That being said, I'm going to challenge you to start playing the budget game. All the instructions for how to set up your score board and play the budget game are available in my recent article, How To Make Budgeting More Fun. 

About The Author – Joshua Rodriguez
This article was written by Joshua Rodriguez, proud owner and founder of CNA Finance and avid personal finance journalist. Join the conversation with Joshua on Google+!