If there is one goal that’s worth going after it’s having $10,000 in a savings account. But it’s not as hard as you think. In this post, I’ll show you “How to save $10000 in a year.” Plus, I’ll show you some places where you can save some extra money along the way. Sound good? Let’s begin!
if we are going to go deep on this, then there are two parts to saving up $10000 in a year. The first part is the “how to save”
Here is the “How to Save” part:
Step 1: Decide on How Much Money you Want to Save
Got it $10,000. See how easy this is?! A bigger part of this step is to know why you are saving this much money, for me it was easy. I wanted to have a fully funded travel account while saving money to finish our basement. It’s ok to have more than one goal. Just make sure you give it a name, a new car, a house down payment, travel, and an emergency fund.
Anything works as long as you believe in what you are saving up for.
Step 2: Create a Separate Account for this Savings Goal
Why? Because you want to see this money grow without touching it. It’s a lot easier for an account to get bigger when it’s separate from your day to day spending. Personally I use Wealthsimple’s Smart Savings Account when I start a new saving goal.
To get started, I logged into my Wealthsimple account and selected “Create New Account”.
From there, I selected “Smart Savings account”.
Next, I labeled my new Smart Savings account with Wealthsimple: “Travel Fund”.
Psst! If you want a bonus, check out the bottom of the post; there’s a special offer waiting for you!
Step 3: Decide how much and how often
If you are wanting to save $10000 in a year, then you will have to choose between doing this on a weekly, biweekly (every 2 weeks) or monthly basis.
If you want know how to save $10000 in a year, then the amounts are roughly as follows:
- $200 a week
- $400 biweekly
- $850 monthly
There’s no escaping the math. If you are planning on putting larger amounts in then a monthly plan might work, but if you have the funds available then doing the weekly or bi-weekly thing might make more sense to you.
Step 4: Automate Your Savings to Your New Account
Once you have the amount that you need to save every week, then you just have to go into Wealthsimple and set up a weekly transfer.
Mine looks like this! I have a separate account with another $100 going to a different savings goal, namely our basement.
Then There’s “$10000” Part of How to Save $10000 in a year
Ok, so now that we are all done with the “How to Save” part of “How to Save $10,000 in a year” we need to move on to the “$10,000” part.
If you are like me, you may have looked at those numbers and thought, “Yikes! I don’t have an extra $200 a week to save.”
Don’t panic.
There are a lot of places you can save money that you aren’t even aware of.
Likely you can save $100 a week from a few cut backs.
Saving $10,000 in a year means $27.39 a day.
Here’s another way to look at it.
You need to save $200 a week, that works out $28.57 a day in savings. Let’s assume you can handle $100 a week already. Now you only need to come up with half of that.
So roughly $14.30 a day.
Here are a few places that you can find that extra money
Buy a Thermos and Bring Your Coffee to Work
The savings from bringing your own coffee from home are HUGE.
If you have 3 coffees a day (including the morning one) you could save upwards of $1,000 a year. Grab yourself a good coffee mug (I use this Contigo one) and watch the savings pile up. It’s my first go to product that save you money.
Just make sure you are putting that extra money away
Savings per day anywhere from $2 to $10 depending on how much coffee you drink and from where. I’m closer to the $10 consumption level.
Bring Your Lunch from Home
A bag lunch will always be cheaper than buying your lunch at work from a restaurant.
Come up with a standard lunch that you can make quickly, and effortlessly, every night. Or better yet, use last nights leftovers (this is my favorite lunch hack).
Average savings of $5 a day or $10 if you and your spouse both dine out at work.
Right there that might be enough for you to cover the $14. 70 a day you need. But here are a few more for you.
Refinance your High Interest Debt and Mortgage
Interest is that silent amount that sucks your bank accounts dry and leaves you wondering what just happened. Ok all kidding aside, the interest rate on your mortgage (or any other debt) can have a big impact on your spending.
If you owe $200,000 on a mortgage, and can lower your interest rate by 1%, that means that you will be saving an additional $2000 a year. Just by making a small switch like that. If you owe more then you will save an even great amount. Check out the current rates with Lending Tree and see if you can get a lower rate. This could easily be the way that you free up some extra money.
Savings: $2000 a year
Tons of other ways to save money
There are a lot of other ways to save money. We have a bunch of different post on where you can save depending on what you are wanting to focus on. Here are 250 ways to save money, that will keep you thinking about ways.
But the key takeaway is this. A few small cuts will get you that extra amount. We cut a whole bunch of things when we were paying off our mortgage, it was worth it.
Related: 10 + Products that Save you Money
Look for Ways to Earn More Money
If the cutting back part of this doesn’t do anything for you then you can look to start earning some extra money. Here are some ways to make money with no investment. Or you could always start a blog. It’s what I did, and many others before me. This is a great way to earn money, but it does require an up front commitment.
If you are looking for some other ways to make money, service jobs are a quick way to get started. Here are 15 ways to make money with no money, it’s a good list of service jobs that can get you started.
What if I Want to Save $10000 in 6 Months
You can definitely save $10,000 in 6 months, the same principles apply, but you would need to double your amounts.
If you want know how to save $10000 in 6 months, then the amounts are roughly as follows:
- $400 a week
- $800 biweekly
- $1700 monthly
Again the math doesn’t lie. Depending on your earnings and cash flow, this is a possibility. Just make sure you have it on automatic withdrawals, because the faster you do save $10000, the more vigilant you need to be with your savings.
Ready To Take Your Savings to the Next Level?
Take your saving to the next level with Wealthsimple’s Smart Savings account.
If you are ready to get serious about your savings goals I would highly recommend using Wealthsimple’s Smart Savings account. I use them because they offer 1.95% interest in Canada and at least 1% in the US on your deposits.
Plus with no account minimums and free transfers you can rest easy knowing your money is available when you need it. Best of all they offer $50 sign up bonus for readers of Family Money Plan when you save your first $100 with them.
We’ve made the switch to these savings accounts and are really pumped to be doubling our interest rate. Click here to use this link to get your $50 bonus and start saving!
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