June 23, 2024 • 29 mins
How to reduce debt there are two things can do to achieve this goal. First to increase income second decrease spending so how to get these things done.
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Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Charles McDonald (00:01):
Hello, I'm your host, Mr. Chuck, a retired
accountant turned truck driver,I reduce my debt in a relatively
short period of time, debtreduction to achieve financial
freedom takes commitment,confidence, determination,
save savings to reduce debt, howto reduce debt, there are two
(00:24):
things you can do to achievethis goal. First, to increase
income, second, decreasespending. So how do you get
these things done? This is justa episode to give you ideas,
whether it's to increase yourincome or to look for new ways
(00:47):
or ideas for ways to save moremoney, there are only two things
you can do to achieve the goalof increasing your savings to
reduce your debt. And either youcan increase your income,
whether you are working in afield where you can change jobs
and get a nice increase. Maybeyou don't like your current
(01:10):
employer for whatever reason,and you can maybe move somewhere
else, make more money and behappier. Or you can find a
second income, maybe a weekendjob or a part time job, whatever
that's up to you to figure outwhat you want to do. Another
ways to get some more incomewould be to have a garage sale,
(01:33):
sell the things you're no longerusing and get some cash. If you
don't want to spend the time ondoing a garage sale because it
might take all day or even acouple of days. Depending on how
much stuff you got. You canconsider putting everything
you're no longer using anddonate it to charity and get a
(01:55):
receipt and deducted from yourtaxes. That is only if you
itemize your deductions. So ifyou have a mortgage, pay real
estate taxes, you're probablyhave itemized deductions unless
your mortgage is almost paidoff. So that can help you it
might save you a couple $100 inincome taxes because you made a
(02:18):
charitable donation. Don'tovervalue things don't
undervalue but be reasonable onthat. But that's a way you can
reduce your income taxes, whichis a once a year thing. So if
you save a couple 100 bucks, yousave a couple $100 These are
just ideas of things you can doto increase your income, or to
(02:42):
decrease your income taxes ordecrease your overall spending.
The second thing is to decreasespending. If you've been
listening to this podcast, youknow you guys should be do
tracking, you know, you shouldcreate a budget, you know, you
should review everything and doaway with those things you're no
(03:04):
longer using and cancel anysubscriptions, you're no longer
using our name. And that isgonna reduce your spending, do
away with duplicate things thatyou're paying for twice for the
same service and look for waysto get the same service at a
lower cost. Those are thingsI've talked about in the past.
(03:29):
How do you decrease yourspending, it's got to be a
mindset. You have to beconscious, you got to try to
spend less money so that you cansave more money. I have a link
in my show notes that I'm goingto be referring to. Okay, one of
(03:53):
the ways you can try to reduceyour spending, I know there are
certain things you absolutelyhave to buy. And that would be
groceries gas for theautomobile. And I'll pay your
insurance on all your monthlybills and make them pay them on
time and avoid those latepenalties and fees that you
(04:17):
might be paying. And that'sgoing to help you save some
money if you pay things on time.
And it's going to help yourcredit rating and the better
credit credit rating will helpyou get your insurance a little
bit cheaper. So it all kind ofworks together. So one of the
ideas you can do to try to spendless is have a no spend day with
(04:40):
within your week. You want totake more control your personal
finances, try introducing a nospend day into your week where
you don't spend money onanything except for maybe
essentials, like a subway rideto work and back If it turns out
to be really tough, you'll getsome useful insight into your
(05:02):
spending habits. So if you tryto go a whole day, without
spending any money, other thanpaying for a way to get to and
from work, that's what thearticle is saying. That'll give
you some ideas or some insightof how, where your spending is,
(05:23):
and may be ways to reduce youroverall spending. So if you're
not going to spend anything forthe day, and you go into work,
that means you have to pack yourlunch and take your lunch. Well,
you do it one day a week, whynot do it five days a week, Ill
make your dinner and you make alittle extra and then the next
(05:45):
day you take the leftovers, andthat's your lunch. And you'll
probably be eaten a little bitmore healthier. Also, try
walking more, instead of gettingthat cab ride to go to blocks or
getting on a bus to go one blockor whatever the case, depending
on where you live, try to walkinstead of paying fares for
(06:09):
rides or taxis or Ubers orwhatever. And then we have a 30
day rule. And it's somethingintriguing but non essential
item catches your eye. Sayyou're thinking you want a new
computer a wait 30 days beforeyou buy if you still want it
after a month and go ahead andtake the spoilers and many cases
(06:31):
the weight will make you realizeyou can do without. So thank
you, you have an old computeryou think it's getting slow, or
your hard drive is gettingfilled up and you want to buy a
new computer. Well don't do it.
Wait 30 days and within that 30days, you might figure out oh, I
(06:54):
could buy an external hard drivefor $130 and add more storage to
my computer. Or I can get thisfree malware software stuff and
try to clean up my stop mycomputer and get all the things
working back up to peakefficiency. It still won't be as
(07:17):
fast as that brand new computer.
But you can make it faster byjust learning how to maintain
your current device. And you cansay 800 900 1000 $1,200 He
didn't have to spend because youwaited 30 days and within that
30 days you found ways tocorrect your problem. Other than
(07:38):
buying a new computer, replacebeauty products with do it d y i
y A turnips beauty products areexpensive, a lot of them can be
filled with harmful chemicals.
Consider making your own whichis a few ingredients. Now this
is mostly for the ladies outthere. So if you're spending
(08:02):
more than $50 a month on beautyproducts and I know you are
because they're very expensivebecause I had my niece this
bought some and I know that wasa lot of money. Try doing your
own look, Google YouTubewhatever of ways to do the same
thing with you know productsthat you already have within the
(08:26):
house or that are cheaper tobuy. And you do the same thing
with cleaning products. Brushand floss twice a day you can
brushing and flossing and saveyour money. Dental Care is
mighty expensive. takepreventative action today avoid
big expenses in the future.
Well, just for a health reasonyou should brush and floss at
least twice a day. Take upbiking. Apart from the natural
(08:49):
cost of a bike biking is a formof transportation that's mostly
free of charge, minus theoccasional tune up. Plus biking
has been shown to make peoplehappier and healthier when when
if you're within a couple milesfrom work instead of driving the
work. Maybe it'll take you toolong to walk. You get a bicycle
(09:10):
and ride to work and ride home.
Not only are you getting somehealth benefits, but you're also
saving the cost of gas andmaintenance on the automobile
which over time will add up. Nowif you live in a place where you
(09:30):
get a lot of deep snow you can'tdo it in the winter. You can
only do it in the summer Iunderstand, but you're getting
the idea. We're looking for waysto reduce our spending whether
it's driving the car last orbuying less stuff or stretching
out what we have the go fartheror using products to do
(09:53):
something they weren't initiallylike beauty Perino like from
beauty related or cleaning relayit. So we're just looking for
ways we can reduce our spending.
And maybe it only be 10 or 15 or$5 a month. But it all adds up
have the whole cumulative ofeverything that you're doing is
gonna add up and over time, itdefinitely will make a
(10:18):
difference. You can also carpoolwith a co worker, do you have
any co workers that live nearyou, you can drive the work,
consider carpooling and save gasmoney, take turns driving, one
drives for a week and the otherdrives for a week. If you can do
that. And I know some jobs youmay be you're an outside
salesperson, you might go intothe office, but then you have to
(10:41):
have your own vehicle to go callon your customers find new
routes to avoid temptation. Doyou have a favorite bakery of
botique that you pass by all thetime. But if you can't help
yourself from stopping in,consider switching your route to
avoid temptation, out of sightout of mind, instead of stopping
(11:03):
for that coffee that you pay $5for and maybe that donut or
whatever coffee cake or whateveryou're getting, take a different
route where you don't pass by itand you don't buy it. So you're
saving some money there. Andagain, you're not, you're gonna
(11:24):
lose some weight because you'reeating healthier, hopefully,
plan your errands. Don't makemultiple trips over a period of
time, combine them into onetrip. So say you need to go and
buy lightbulbs at the hardwarestore, but you're out of milk.
So you need to go to the grocerystore, or someplace to get milk
(11:46):
when maybe you need gas for thelaw more. Well don't do three
separate trips. Combine them allin one trip and get it over with
if you can do it all at once. Soyou need to look and plan ahead,
check before you leave, you'regoing to get the light balls but
check the refrigerator to yourlow A melki low and anything you
(12:10):
might need to replace in thenext couple of days. Check your
gas for your lawn more or yourlower out. I'll take it with you
do one trip, do multiple thingsand then avoid doing a bunch of
trips for doing the same thing.
Beware of the treat yourselfmentally to treat yourself
(12:32):
Montra could be destroy asavings account. Instead of
training self with a fancy spaand fine leather goods. Practice
free self care. He can trymedicating exercising or writing
in a journal I stopped buyingfashion fast fashion every time
I walk into forever 21 Theclothes are completely
(12:53):
different. Stores like thesehave a rapid turnover because
their clothes aren't built tolast fast fashion with has
higher price tags than yourealize. And encourage people to
throw out clauses and shopcontinuously. Consider investing
in higher quality pieces with aclassic look that lasts a long
time. And don't buy jeans thatare wore out looking. Because
(13:17):
just buy new jeans and Weyermanntill they look like that sweat i
do this at your secondhand storeor online can shop consignment
shop. Instead of buying brandnew look for hidden treasure a
secondhand clothing store intown or online. Yes, you can do
that. And I have seen what I didwhen I was looking for tools
until I discovered HarborFreight where I can buy tools
(13:40):
very cheap. Some of them are notso good. Some of them are okay
but you get what you pay for.
But I'm saving money to trackdown free events in your city or
town that something's going on.
You want to go out with yourspouse. If there's a free event
going on. Go do that or go for awalk in the park or something
(14:01):
else. Plan cheap fun dates withyour significant other have a
night end on occasion. You don'thave to go out every single
weekend. Save money by stayingand sometimes skip the happy
hour with your co workers andfight a couple of friends over
to play board games instead ofgoing to clubs a great way to
have fun because I'm spending alot of money. Abandoned online
(14:24):
shopping. I never put my creditcard. I never save it into an
online account. Whether it'sAmazon or whoever I don't leave
it there because if you have acredit card there and say you go
back six months later you forgothe put something in your
shopping cart and then needs asign if you go to pay for it. He
(14:46):
hit a button and all sudden youbought it and you really wasn't
ready didn't have a chance toapply your discount code because
you had that credit card alreadyin there. So don't save credit
cards to any on Line account forsecurity reasons. And four, make
that extra effort when you go tobuy something, that's what it's
(15:08):
going to come down to. If youhave to make extra effort to
purchase something online,they'll give you some time to
rethink it. And maybe you don'tneed to buy it at this time. So
Saving money is a mindset issomething that you have to be
conscious about, and be doing ona regular basis. And don't look
(15:33):
for ways to save $100 or $500look for things that will save
50 cents or $1, or a quartercoupons at the grocery store is
a good way to save some money.
But don't buy things younormally don't buy or things you
normally don't use.
(15:55):
You coupons for newer productsthat get you to try a new
product. And and definitely be aname brand product. And it's
probably something you're notgoing to always buy when you go
in the grocery store by thegrocery store brand products
because they're lesserexpensive. So you'd look for
(16:16):
every angle to reduce yourspending to save a little bit of
money, what I've started doingwas I would guesstimate how my
miles I'm going to drive betweenpay periods. And I would put in
just enough gas to drive thatdistance, maybe a little bit
(16:36):
more just in case, then I triedto reduce the driving as much as
possible and stay within thatperiod, I used to go and fill up
the car. And that was when I wasa lot cheaper. But today would
cost me 50 $60. So instead ofspending $60, instead of putting
(16:57):
my money in the gas tank, Iwould just put $20 in and try to
stretch it out as long aspossible. And that gave me $40
in my checking account to doother things with now I tried to
keep some of it in case I waslow on gas. And I need to put
(17:19):
another 10 or $20 in. But youget the idea. You're not saving
money there, really. But you'renot spending money. You can't
save money by spending. So let'ssay the store has a sale. And
they say you save 50% He didn'tsave a penny because she had to
(17:44):
spend money, you spend 50% less,but you save zero. That's the
way you have to think I mean, ifyou saved 50%, did you go to the
bank and put 50% of whateverthat was into your savings
account? Probably not. Becauseyou probably paid for it by
(18:07):
using a credit card. And now youhave a bill that's going to come
due in a few days or a few weeksor at least a month. So where
did you save money? You don'tsay money when you spend money.
You only say money when youdon't spend it. And the reason
(18:28):
you want to do this is so thatyou can build up your savings
account so that you can thenreduce your dad and then build
your savings account and reduceyour debt. And over time as your
debt goes away, your savingswill increase a much faster
(18:48):
rate. Once you have zero thatyour savings will increase a lot
because you're spending lesslike all those minimum payments
you're no longer paying. Andthat's money. Where is it gonna
go? Well, some of it you'regonna use for groceries and
everything else clothes in yournormal living expenses. But over
(19:12):
time, you're gonna build up yourchecking account where he
anyway, but you don't want tokeep four or 5000 in your
checking account. You want toput that into a high yield
savings or money market accountwhere you can earn some interest
and build up that emergencyfund. Put the money to work for
(19:35):
you to help you build it into alarger fund. And then when it
gets over six months or a year'sworth of your living expenses
for your emergency fund, andthen anything over that you can
start investing however you wantto do. It should be savings for
(19:55):
your retirement from day one. Ifyou work for an employer or
offers or 401k, or any type ofsavings plan for retirement, you
should contribute to it, mostlikely, they're gonna have some
type of match. Even if theydon't have a match, if you put
five or $10 of pay in there overa long period of time over a
(20:20):
lifetime, that's gonna buildinto more and more money is
something you won't miss a smallamount you won't miss today. But
over your lifetime of workingfor 30 or 40 years, it can grow
into a million half million,three quarters of a million
million and a half, depending onhow much you increase it over
(20:44):
time and how you invest it andhow the investments do. So put
your money to work for you, whenyou have debt, you're working
for the money. And that's notthe way to get through life, you
need to have them your moneyworking for you. And you do that
by being conscious on how youspend your money. So you can
(21:09):
increase the amount of moneythat you're saving over a longer
period of time. Another way isto review everything that you
pay for on a monthly basis isthere any way you can get the
same level of service for alesser price? Check around with
(21:30):
competition, that cell phone,that'd be internet service, that
would be insurance on your car,your home, whatever you have
insurance on, it's all thingsyou can shop for and get a
better price for the same levelof service. And they need to do
(21:50):
that at least once a year, hegot to do review or you might be
paying more than what you needto be paying. And that would be
not saving money. In themindset. Wait 30 days for any
purchase larger than unlimiteddate you set I say 250 bucks,
(22:10):
$100 500? Whatever it is, wait30 days, give you a time to
think about it. Can you livewithout it? Do you really need
it? Is there at are things youcan do instead of what you're
planning on that could becheaper and solve the same
problem. Now you got if you'regonna spend some money like
(22:32):
that, you may maybe there's aproblem. What's the other
alternatives to solving thatproblem, there's more than one
way to do it. Have you triedevery other solution before this
one that's going to cost you abunch of money. That is what you
got to be thinking about. Andit's a never ending process.
(22:55):
Over time, it'll become naturalfor you. And you'll
automatically do it. And youwon't even think about when you
go into the store. You walked bythe front door where all the
high price stuff is you'll knowwhere to go where they marked
down stuff, look through theclearance stuff. Look for the
(23:17):
stuff that you use on a dailybasis that you don't want to pay
full price for, such as Jeans,Shorts, socks, underwear, stuff
like that, no, find a deal. Lookfor a clearance item, look for
something, look for ways to savemoney, and it's a never ending
process. I'll be back in onemoment with my final thoughts.
(23:41):
If you're interested, and thesoftware that I use personally,
to reduce my debt, I have a linkin my show notes, shop
financial.com, copy and pasteit. And it'll take you to the
website. If you are looking forany spreadsheets or other
information that I talk aboutfrom time to time. I have links
(24:02):
in my show notes. And I alwayshave links to the articles I
refer to and my show notes. Plusother things like the happy
draft.org, which is a anotherorganization that helps you with
your debt. So feel free to go onmy show notes and link and check
out whatever I'm putting outthere. I appreciate it very
(24:22):
much. If you would like to makea contribution to help keep this
alive, then I would gladlyaccept that said my shownotes.
Thank you very much. If you'relooking for ideas, to say money,
once you start it my debtreduction plan, let's go over
(24:44):
that for a second.
You quit using credit. You'remaking a minimum payment on all
your credit cards and all otherdebt. You've set up your
emergency fund. You're puttingmoney in a savings account.
You're building that up Overtime, when you have a minimum of
1000, he continue to build upuntil you have a maximum, this
(25:08):
is $1 amount that you can set, Isay 4000. Because the more you
have in there, when somethingbad or unforeseen happens, the
better off you're going to be inthe long run. Once you build up
to your maximum, then you takethe difference between the
minimum and the maximum1004 1000 or 3000. And you apply
(25:31):
it to one of your debts, Ialways recommend you who pay off
the credit card with thesmallest balance first, that
might take a couple times ormore. But you don't, once you
get it to a zero balance, you donot close it or cancel the
account. Unless they do it foryou. You want to leave that
(25:54):
credit card open but do not useit. Why? Because down the road,
they might send you an offer,where you can do a balance
transfer and have up to 18months of zero interest, you pay
to transfer the balance usuallya percentage of the amount you
(26:16):
transfer 3% to 5%, I think Ipaid 3%. And you can genuinely
recoup that money that you paidto transfer it within 30 to 60
days of not having to payinterest on that balance that
you transferred in there.
Because now you get zerointerest, you pay it off in that
time period. That's theimportant part, you have to pay
(26:40):
it off before the time periodexpires. Or they may go back to
the beginning and clear andcalculate all the interest you
should have paid. And thenthey'll charge it to you. So you
don't want that to happen. Andthat will help you reduce your
debt a little bit faster,because you're paying less
(27:04):
interest because you got thisinterest free loan on that
credit card that you paid off.
First, you're gonna transfer abalance from a credit card with
the highest interest rate, yougot the maximize your savings,
and then you're gonna continuetrying to pay off the highest
(27:25):
interest rate credit card, asyou're making those monthly
payments, it's important to paythat one off with that free
interest. And you got to figureout how much you can afford to
transform it to it how much tomake a monthly payment, which
becomes your new minimum paymentthat you want to pay and not
(27:48):
stress out the rest of yourbudget $50 a month, $100 a
month, whatever it is, you don'twant to stress out your budget,
you're using it as a tool toreduce the amount of interest
you're paying, which will resultin paying off the principal
faster. When you do that you'llpay less interest overall, that
(28:10):
is a very important tip. Andthat's what I talk about in my
debt reduction plan. Make yourcredit cards work for you
instead of you work in for them.
That's the key concept here. Toget to that point. You need to
be consciously thinking, how canI say money? Do I never do I
(28:32):
really need to buy that product.
Or I really need this new dressthis new coat those new shoes,
whatever it is, you're going tobuy thing? Do you need it? Why
do you need it? Or do you justwant it because of fashion?
(28:55):
Where you want it? Because youwant to keep up with the Jones?
Or what's the reason and unlessyou can justify to yourself the
reasons why you need to buysomething. Perhaps you shouldn't
buy it. Get that dirty 30 dayrule. In fact, even if you do
for smaller items, anything $100to $200 a seven day rule. You
(29:20):
wait seven days before you spendthe money on it. One can I
afford it, too? Do I really needit? What's what's the problem
I'm trying to solve? What arethe other alternatives to solve
that problem? If you think likethat and analyze it before you
spend your money, you'll havemore money to put in your
(29:44):
savings account, and you'll beglad you did so
Hello, I'm your host, Mr. Chuck, a retired
accountant turned truck driver,I reduce my debt in a relatively
short period of time, debtreduction to achieve financial
freedom takes commitment,confidence, determination,
save savings to reduce debt, howto reduce debt, there are two
(00:24):
things you can do to achievethis goal. First, to increase
income, second, decreasespending. So how do you get
these things done? This is justa episode to give you ideas,
whether it's to increase yourincome or to look for new ways
(00:47):
or ideas for ways to save moremoney, there are only two things
you can do to achieve the goalof increasing your savings to
reduce your debt. And either youcan increase your income,
whether you are working in afield where you can change jobs
and get a nice increase. Maybeyou don't like your current
(01:10):
employer for whatever reason,and you can maybe move somewhere
else, make more money and behappier. Or you can find a
second income, maybe a weekendjob or a part time job, whatever
that's up to you to figure outwhat you want to do. Another
ways to get some more incomewould be to have a garage sale,
(01:33):
sell the things you're no longerusing and get some cash. If you
don't want to spend the time ondoing a garage sale because it
might take all day or even acouple of days. Depending on how
much stuff you got. You canconsider putting everything
you're no longer using anddonate it to charity and get a
(01:55):
receipt and deducted from yourtaxes. That is only if you
itemize your deductions. So ifyou have a mortgage, pay real
estate taxes, you're probablyhave itemized deductions unless
your mortgage is almost paidoff. So that can help you it
might save you a couple $100 inincome taxes because you made a
(02:18):
charitable donation. Don'tovervalue things don't
undervalue but be reasonable onthat. But that's a way you can
reduce your income taxes, whichis a once a year thing. So if
you save a couple 100 bucks, yousave a couple $100 These are
just ideas of things you can doto increase your income, or to
(02:42):
decrease your income taxes ordecrease your overall spending.
The second thing is to decreasespending. If you've been
listening to this podcast, youknow you guys should be do
tracking, you know, you shouldcreate a budget, you know, you
should review everything and doaway with those things you're no
(03:04):
longer using and cancel anysubscriptions, you're no longer
using our name. And that isgonna reduce your spending, do
away with duplicate things thatyou're paying for twice for the
same service and look for waysto get the same service at a
lower cost. Those are thingsI've talked about in the past.
(03:29):
How do you decrease yourspending, it's got to be a
mindset. You have to beconscious, you got to try to
spend less money so that you cansave more money. I have a link
in my show notes that I'm goingto be referring to. Okay, one of
(03:53):
the ways you can try to reduceyour spending, I know there are
certain things you absolutelyhave to buy. And that would be
groceries gas for theautomobile. And I'll pay your
insurance on all your monthlybills and make them pay them on
time and avoid those latepenalties and fees that you
(04:17):
might be paying. And that'sgoing to help you save some
money if you pay things on time.
And it's going to help yourcredit rating and the better
credit credit rating will helpyou get your insurance a little
bit cheaper. So it all kind ofworks together. So one of the
ideas you can do to try to spendless is have a no spend day with
(04:40):
within your week. You want totake more control your personal
finances, try introducing a nospend day into your week where
you don't spend money onanything except for maybe
essentials, like a subway rideto work and back If it turns out
to be really tough, you'll getsome useful insight into your
(05:02):
spending habits. So if you tryto go a whole day, without
spending any money, other thanpaying for a way to get to and
from work, that's what thearticle is saying. That'll give
you some ideas or some insightof how, where your spending is,
(05:23):
and may be ways to reduce youroverall spending. So if you're
not going to spend anything forthe day, and you go into work,
that means you have to pack yourlunch and take your lunch. Well,
you do it one day a week, whynot do it five days a week, Ill
make your dinner and you make alittle extra and then the next
(05:45):
day you take the leftovers, andthat's your lunch. And you'll
probably be eaten a little bitmore healthier. Also, try
walking more, instead of gettingthat cab ride to go to blocks or
getting on a bus to go one blockor whatever the case, depending
on where you live, try to walkinstead of paying fares for
(06:09):
rides or taxis or Ubers orwhatever. And then we have a 30
day rule. And it's somethingintriguing but non essential
item catches your eye. Sayyou're thinking you want a new
computer a wait 30 days beforeyou buy if you still want it
after a month and go ahead andtake the spoilers and many cases
(06:31):
the weight will make you realizeyou can do without. So thank
you, you have an old computeryou think it's getting slow, or
your hard drive is gettingfilled up and you want to buy a
new computer. Well don't do it.
Wait 30 days and within that 30days, you might figure out oh, I
(06:54):
could buy an external hard drivefor $130 and add more storage to
my computer. Or I can get thisfree malware software stuff and
try to clean up my stop mycomputer and get all the things
working back up to peakefficiency. It still won't be as
(07:17):
fast as that brand new computer.
But you can make it faster byjust learning how to maintain
your current device. And you cansay 800 900 1000 $1,200 He
didn't have to spend because youwaited 30 days and within that
30 days you found ways tocorrect your problem. Other than
(07:38):
buying a new computer, replacebeauty products with do it d y i
y A turnips beauty products areexpensive, a lot of them can be
filled with harmful chemicals.
Consider making your own whichis a few ingredients. Now this
is mostly for the ladies outthere. So if you're spending
(08:02):
more than $50 a month on beautyproducts and I know you are
because they're very expensivebecause I had my niece this
bought some and I know that wasa lot of money. Try doing your
own look, Google YouTubewhatever of ways to do the same
thing with you know productsthat you already have within the
(08:26):
house or that are cheaper tobuy. And you do the same thing
with cleaning products. Brushand floss twice a day you can
brushing and flossing and saveyour money. Dental Care is
mighty expensive. takepreventative action today avoid
big expenses in the future.
Well, just for a health reasonyou should brush and floss at
least twice a day. Take upbiking. Apart from the natural
(08:49):
cost of a bike biking is a formof transportation that's mostly
free of charge, minus theoccasional tune up. Plus biking
has been shown to make peoplehappier and healthier when when
if you're within a couple milesfrom work instead of driving the
work. Maybe it'll take you toolong to walk. You get a bicycle
(09:10):
and ride to work and ride home.
Not only are you getting somehealth benefits, but you're also
saving the cost of gas andmaintenance on the automobile
which over time will add up. Nowif you live in a place where you
(09:30):
get a lot of deep snow you can'tdo it in the winter. You can
only do it in the summer Iunderstand, but you're getting
the idea. We're looking for waysto reduce our spending whether
it's driving the car last orbuying less stuff or stretching
out what we have the go fartheror using products to do
(09:53):
something they weren't initiallylike beauty Perino like from
beauty related or cleaning relayit. So we're just looking for
ways we can reduce our spending.
And maybe it only be 10 or 15 or$5 a month. But it all adds up
have the whole cumulative ofeverything that you're doing is
gonna add up and over time, itdefinitely will make a
(10:18):
difference. You can also carpoolwith a co worker, do you have
any co workers that live nearyou, you can drive the work,
consider carpooling and save gasmoney, take turns driving, one
drives for a week and the otherdrives for a week. If you can do
that. And I know some jobs youmay be you're an outside
salesperson, you might go intothe office, but then you have to
(10:41):
have your own vehicle to go callon your customers find new
routes to avoid temptation. Doyou have a favorite bakery of
botique that you pass by all thetime. But if you can't help
yourself from stopping in,consider switching your route to
avoid temptation, out of sightout of mind, instead of stopping
(11:03):
for that coffee that you pay $5for and maybe that donut or
whatever coffee cake or whateveryou're getting, take a different
route where you don't pass by itand you don't buy it. So you're
saving some money there. Andagain, you're not, you're gonna
(11:24):
lose some weight because you'reeating healthier, hopefully,
plan your errands. Don't makemultiple trips over a period of
time, combine them into onetrip. So say you need to go and
buy lightbulbs at the hardwarestore, but you're out of milk.
So you need to go to the grocerystore, or someplace to get milk
(11:46):
when maybe you need gas for thelaw more. Well don't do three
separate trips. Combine them allin one trip and get it over with
if you can do it all at once. Soyou need to look and plan ahead,
check before you leave, you'regoing to get the light balls but
check the refrigerator to yourlow A melki low and anything you
(12:10):
might need to replace in thenext couple of days. Check your
gas for your lawn more or yourlower out. I'll take it with you
do one trip, do multiple thingsand then avoid doing a bunch of
trips for doing the same thing.
Beware of the treat yourselfmentally to treat yourself
(12:32):
Montra could be destroy asavings account. Instead of
training self with a fancy spaand fine leather goods. Practice
free self care. He can trymedicating exercising or writing
in a journal I stopped buyingfashion fast fashion every time
I walk into forever 21 Theclothes are completely
(12:53):
different. Stores like thesehave a rapid turnover because
their clothes aren't built tolast fast fashion with has
higher price tags than yourealize. And encourage people to
throw out clauses and shopcontinuously. Consider investing
in higher quality pieces with aclassic look that lasts a long
time. And don't buy jeans thatare wore out looking. Because
(13:17):
just buy new jeans and Weyermanntill they look like that sweat i
do this at your secondhand storeor online can shop consignment
shop. Instead of buying brandnew look for hidden treasure a
secondhand clothing store intown or online. Yes, you can do
that. And I have seen what I didwhen I was looking for tools
until I discovered HarborFreight where I can buy tools
(13:40):
very cheap. Some of them are notso good. Some of them are okay
but you get what you pay for.
But I'm saving money to trackdown free events in your city or
town that something's going on.
You want to go out with yourspouse. If there's a free event
going on. Go do that or go for awalk in the park or something
(14:01):
else. Plan cheap fun dates withyour significant other have a
night end on occasion. You don'thave to go out every single
weekend. Save money by stayingand sometimes skip the happy
hour with your co workers andfight a couple of friends over
to play board games instead ofgoing to clubs a great way to
have fun because I'm spending alot of money. Abandoned online
(14:24):
shopping. I never put my creditcard. I never save it into an
online account. Whether it'sAmazon or whoever I don't leave
it there because if you have acredit card there and say you go
back six months later you forgothe put something in your
shopping cart and then needs asign if you go to pay for it. He
(14:46):
hit a button and all sudden youbought it and you really wasn't
ready didn't have a chance toapply your discount code because
you had that credit card alreadyin there. So don't save credit
cards to any on Line account forsecurity reasons. And four, make
that extra effort when you go tobuy something, that's what it's
(15:08):
going to come down to. If youhave to make extra effort to
purchase something online,they'll give you some time to
rethink it. And maybe you don'tneed to buy it at this time. So
Saving money is a mindset issomething that you have to be
conscious about, and be doing ona regular basis. And don't look
(15:33):
for ways to save $100 or $500look for things that will save
50 cents or $1, or a quartercoupons at the grocery store is
a good way to save some money.
But don't buy things younormally don't buy or things you
normally don't use.
(15:55):
You coupons for newer productsthat get you to try a new
product. And and definitely be aname brand product. And it's
probably something you're notgoing to always buy when you go
in the grocery store by thegrocery store brand products
because they're lesserexpensive. So you'd look for
(16:16):
every angle to reduce yourspending to save a little bit of
money, what I've started doingwas I would guesstimate how my
miles I'm going to drive betweenpay periods. And I would put in
just enough gas to drive thatdistance, maybe a little bit
(16:36):
more just in case, then I triedto reduce the driving as much as
possible and stay within thatperiod, I used to go and fill up
the car. And that was when I wasa lot cheaper. But today would
cost me 50 $60. So instead ofspending $60, instead of putting
(16:57):
my money in the gas tank, Iwould just put $20 in and try to
stretch it out as long aspossible. And that gave me $40
in my checking account to doother things with now I tried to
keep some of it in case I waslow on gas. And I need to put
(17:19):
another 10 or $20 in. But youget the idea. You're not saving
money there, really. But you'renot spending money. You can't
save money by spending. So let'ssay the store has a sale. And
they say you save 50% He didn'tsave a penny because she had to
(17:44):
spend money, you spend 50% less,but you save zero. That's the
way you have to think I mean, ifyou saved 50%, did you go to the
bank and put 50% of whateverthat was into your savings
account? Probably not. Becauseyou probably paid for it by
(18:07):
using a credit card. And now youhave a bill that's going to come
due in a few days or a few weeksor at least a month. So where
did you save money? You don'tsay money when you spend money.
You only say money when youdon't spend it. And the reason
(18:28):
you want to do this is so thatyou can build up your savings
account so that you can thenreduce your dad and then build
your savings account and reduceyour debt. And over time as your
debt goes away, your savingswill increase a much faster
(18:48):
rate. Once you have zero thatyour savings will increase a lot
because you're spending lesslike all those minimum payments
you're no longer paying. Andthat's money. Where is it gonna
go? Well, some of it you'regonna use for groceries and
everything else clothes in yournormal living expenses. But over
(19:12):
time, you're gonna build up yourchecking account where he
anyway, but you don't want tokeep four or 5000 in your
checking account. You want toput that into a high yield
savings or money market accountwhere you can earn some interest
and build up that emergencyfund. Put the money to work for
(19:35):
you to help you build it into alarger fund. And then when it
gets over six months or a year'sworth of your living expenses
for your emergency fund, andthen anything over that you can
start investing however you wantto do. It should be savings for
(19:55):
your retirement from day one. Ifyou work for an employer or
offers or 401k, or any type ofsavings plan for retirement, you
should contribute to it, mostlikely, they're gonna have some
type of match. Even if theydon't have a match, if you put
five or $10 of pay in there overa long period of time over a
(20:20):
lifetime, that's gonna buildinto more and more money is
something you won't miss a smallamount you won't miss today. But
over your lifetime of workingfor 30 or 40 years, it can grow
into a million half million,three quarters of a million
million and a half, depending onhow much you increase it over
(20:44):
time and how you invest it andhow the investments do. So put
your money to work for you, whenyou have debt, you're working
for the money. And that's notthe way to get through life, you
need to have them your moneyworking for you. And you do that
by being conscious on how youspend your money. So you can
(21:09):
increase the amount of moneythat you're saving over a longer
period of time. Another way isto review everything that you
pay for on a monthly basis isthere any way you can get the
same level of service for alesser price? Check around with
(21:30):
competition, that cell phone,that'd be internet service, that
would be insurance on your car,your home, whatever you have
insurance on, it's all thingsyou can shop for and get a
better price for the same levelof service. And they need to do
(21:50):
that at least once a year, hegot to do review or you might be
paying more than what you needto be paying. And that would be
not saving money. In themindset. Wait 30 days for any
purchase larger than unlimiteddate you set I say 250 bucks,
(22:10):
$100 500? Whatever it is, wait30 days, give you a time to
think about it. Can you livewithout it? Do you really need
it? Is there at are things youcan do instead of what you're
planning on that could becheaper and solve the same
problem. Now you got if you'regonna spend some money like
(22:32):
that, you may maybe there's aproblem. What's the other
alternatives to solving thatproblem, there's more than one
way to do it. Have you triedevery other solution before this
one that's going to cost you abunch of money. That is what you
got to be thinking about. Andit's a never ending process.
(22:55):
Over time, it'll become naturalfor you. And you'll
automatically do it. And youwon't even think about when you
go into the store. You walked bythe front door where all the
high price stuff is you'll knowwhere to go where they marked
down stuff, look through theclearance stuff. Look for the
(23:17):
stuff that you use on a dailybasis that you don't want to pay
full price for, such as Jeans,Shorts, socks, underwear, stuff
like that, no, find a deal. Lookfor a clearance item, look for
something, look for ways to savemoney, and it's a never ending
process. I'll be back in onemoment with my final thoughts.
(23:41):
If you're interested, and thesoftware that I use personally,
to reduce my debt, I have a linkin my show notes, shop
financial.com, copy and pasteit. And it'll take you to the
website. If you are looking forany spreadsheets or other
information that I talk aboutfrom time to time. I have links
(24:02):
in my show notes. And I alwayshave links to the articles I
refer to and my show notes. Plusother things like the happy
draft.org, which is a anotherorganization that helps you with
your debt. So feel free to go onmy show notes and link and check
out whatever I'm putting outthere. I appreciate it very
(24:22):
much. If you would like to makea contribution to help keep this
alive, then I would gladlyaccept that said my shownotes.
Thank you very much. If you'relooking for ideas, to say money,
once you start it my debtreduction plan, let's go over
(24:44):
that for a second.
You quit using credit. You'remaking a minimum payment on all
your credit cards and all otherdebt. You've set up your
emergency fund. You're puttingmoney in a savings account.
You're building that up Overtime, when you have a minimum of
1000, he continue to build upuntil you have a maximum, this
(25:08):
is $1 amount that you can set, Isay 4000. Because the more you
have in there, when somethingbad or unforeseen happens, the
better off you're going to be inthe long run. Once you build up
to your maximum, then you takethe difference between the
minimum and the maximum1004 1000 or 3000. And you apply
(25:31):
it to one of your debts, Ialways recommend you who pay off
the credit card with thesmallest balance first, that
might take a couple times ormore. But you don't, once you
get it to a zero balance, you donot close it or cancel the
account. Unless they do it foryou. You want to leave that
(25:54):
credit card open but do not useit. Why? Because down the road,
they might send you an offer,where you can do a balance
transfer and have up to 18months of zero interest, you pay
to transfer the balance usuallya percentage of the amount you
(26:16):
transfer 3% to 5%, I think Ipaid 3%. And you can genuinely
recoup that money that you paidto transfer it within 30 to 60
days of not having to payinterest on that balance that
you transferred in there.
Because now you get zerointerest, you pay it off in that
time period. That's theimportant part, you have to pay
(26:40):
it off before the time periodexpires. Or they may go back to
the beginning and clear andcalculate all the interest you
should have paid. And thenthey'll charge it to you. So you
don't want that to happen. Andthat will help you reduce your
debt a little bit faster,because you're paying less
(27:04):
interest because you got thisinterest free loan on that
credit card that you paid off.
First, you're gonna transfer abalance from a credit card with
the highest interest rate, yougot the maximize your savings,
and then you're gonna continuetrying to pay off the highest
(27:25):
interest rate credit card, asyou're making those monthly
payments, it's important to paythat one off with that free
interest. And you got to figureout how much you can afford to
transform it to it how much tomake a monthly payment, which
becomes your new minimum paymentthat you want to pay and not
(27:48):
stress out the rest of yourbudget $50 a month, $100 a
month, whatever it is, you don'twant to stress out your budget,
you're using it as a tool toreduce the amount of interest
you're paying, which will resultin paying off the principal
faster. When you do that you'llpay less interest overall, that
(28:10):
is a very important tip. Andthat's what I talk about in my
debt reduction plan. Make yourcredit cards work for you
instead of you work in for them.
That's the key concept here. Toget to that point. You need to
be consciously thinking, how canI say money? Do I never do I
(28:32):
really need to buy that product.
Or I really need this new dressthis new coat those new shoes,
whatever it is, you're going tobuy thing? Do you need it? Why
do you need it? Or do you justwant it because of fashion?
(28:55):
Where you want it? Because youwant to keep up with the Jones?
Or what's the reason and unlessyou can justify to yourself the
reasons why you need to buysomething. Perhaps you shouldn't
buy it. Get that dirty 30 dayrule. In fact, even if you do
for smaller items, anything $100to $200 a seven day rule. You
(29:20):
wait seven days before you spendthe money on it. One can I
afford it, too? Do I really needit? What's what's the problem
I'm trying to solve? What arethe other alternatives to solve
that problem? If you think likethat and analyze it before you
spend your money, you'll havemore money to put in your
(29:44):
savings account, and you'll beglad you did so
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