How I save money

In my childhood, no one taught me how saving money can really help me out in the future. I have been encouraged to spend my money when I have it, because I might not have a chance to do it if I keep it aside. I also learned that if I really want to save, I had to make sure to not mention how much I am saving or else it will go straight into buying foods or paying for bills. Not that I regret helping, it is just that if my family knows I have some spare money, they do their best to try and get me to spend it.

Short-term goals vs. Long-term goals

For my family, they live in the moment. When they have money they think of what they can do with it right now. So they listen to their present needs and wants.

Most of my sisters' purchases are clothes, foods, and other stuff they stopped themselves from buying before. For my older sister, it includes travelling around and having fun with friends and workmates. My parents have always looked for a perfect timing. They don't want to save yet because of multiple reasons. They would much rather borrow some money from people than watch their daughters not eating delicious foods.

In short, there is no one in my family who taight me how to handle my money. Oh, they tell me to save money so we have some to spend if we want to order food or something.

I used to be the same. I used to buy items impulsively without thinking much if I really need them. One time, I went to the mall to buy just one thing to give my sister a gift on her birthday but I ended up buying more than what I planned for. Those things ended up in some storage box, I have around my room, barely seeing the daylight.

When the pandemic started, I have some savings from when we were having face to face classes. Instead of thinking about making sure my money circulated, I thought that the pandemic will end in a few weeks (how naive I was), and decided to spend it in online orders. These orders include kinda expensive foods. What makes it more expensive is that when I want something for myself, I have to make sure that I also ordered foods for my parents and sisters as well. So what is supposed to be my bill is multiplied by 6. I also bought a lot of art materials that I ended up not using much. As well as different things for my hobbies at the time which I then stopped doing since I do not want to deal with the mess they leave.

That is how we use money in our short-term goals. You only live once, they would say. So they will rather spend all the money they get than risk not being able to use it in case of death. It is one thing that we are all very much aware of, that our life can end any moment so they resolved to make the most out of it.

It took my sister investing in stock market (which she soon stopped doing) to get me to look at how much I spent and what I can do to make money circulate as well. This was the tipping point for us. My mother and father also started to try and save money after paying the bills. I also encouraged my mother to just finish paying our debts, and stop borrowing money. My younger sisters are happy in their lives and are spending their money freely. When I try to tell them how to save it or invest it, my mother will tell me to just let it be since my sisters do not have their own money so I should just let them buy things that ended up being another mess in their room.

As for me, I learned how to be more conscious of what I buy. Instead of spending until all cents are gone, I learned how to put aside some for future use, and some on investments.

I also decided to divide every money I receive into parts, with varying percentage. This is how I divide my money:

Needs- 45%

Needs include true necessities like helping pay bills, and giving some money for groceries. This is also where I get some money for clothes and foods that I save for future snacks.

Wants- 20%

Wants are the things that are not necessary but I would like to have. These include things like airdry clay, art materials, jewelries, fabrics, and other stuff for my other hobbies.

Savings- 20%

My savings are divided into two. The first half is for short-term savings. This is the fund that i will use for emergency things like buying load for online classes and some unpredictable things that may happen. The other half is for investments. I do not have a valid ID yet so I mostly store my investments into the GInvest option.

Then now, I also have BCH as an investment. Right now, all BCH I have is something I got for free. I am still waiting for it to soar before setting aside some money to buy another dip.

Donation- 15%

I mentioned earlier that I spent my savings from school to orders, I did not mention that I also gave a huge part of it to struggling people too. The pandemic took a toll on all of us. As someone who were lucky enough to have both my sister and parents receive support from their company during the first lockdown, I thought it is only right to help others with the money I have. So everytime I saw a post then about asking for financial needs, I send them some part of my savings too until the money I had ran out.

This experience made me realized that I want to make sure that every time I receive money, I also give back to the community. It might not be much right now. Other people might be able to give larger amounts. But if I think that way, then maybe that is how other people see it too. So I still donate whatever amount I can afford to give.

There are times when some money I have are accumulated. For example, I did not need to share some money for bills, so I left it alone and it accumulated. I will then start the process of dividing it again. This is how I can afford to spend more money for my wants.

My long term plan right now is to use the BCH I converted to fund the business that I want to have. Then use the earning from that business to buy more BCH and to invest more.

How do I save money?

First, I list down all the things I want to buy. Yes, everything. Then, I look it up on Shopee. I check the lowest price I can find from reputable sellers and write it down as well.

After doing that, I get the sum of the prices of all the things I want to buy. I will be surprised and wonder where I will get my money.

I will then recheck how much money I can spend for these things. After checking, I will look at the list again. Then, I will realize that I do not even need most of it anyway. So I picked the ones I need and want most so it can still fit my budget.

How do I know which ones to buy?

1. Availability

   If I do it buy it now, will I never get the chance to buy it again? Is it a time limited item? Where can I get it if I want to buy it in the future? Does it sold out fast?

   These are the questions I think of to check a product's availability.

2. Urgency

   Do I really need it at this point in time? Do I have to have it now?

   I check to see if I feel like I need it or just only want it because it looks cute.

3. Usability

   Is there anthing more to this product than having a pretty shade of pink? Will I be able to use it in my daily life? Do I have a specific purpose for buying it?

   This one really stopped me from buying things just because I want to. I learn how to see if I will use it. It helped me stop impulse buying most times.

4. Durability

   Will this product last for a long time? Do I have to get one of this again after a short while? Can it stand being delivered even if mishandled by the courier?

   This is an important aspect for me. Since there is a pandemic, I order things online where the possibility of receiving broken items is high. That is why I try to limit all fragile things being delivered to my doorstep if I can help it. I try to think if I want to risk receiving a broken product or just wait until I can buy it myself.

These are some of the ways that I handle my money and some look at how I decide what to buy when I have so many options but kimited budget. The most important thing is to stick to a budget no matter how tempting it is to just ignore it and spend everything for wants.

You can make your own budget plan out of the one I presented. This is just my personal way of doing things and you have different life than I have so you might have more financial responsibilities.

I hope that this article of mine can help you guys out.

Thank you for reading my article. Feel free to check out my latest article for more of my works: https://read.cash/@ZehraSky/a-buried-secret-354cd762

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