How to Save Money On A Tight Budget

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Saving money on a tight budget can be challenging but it very possible.

There’s a way to save money on a tight budget that allowed us to save £4,000 in a year on one income!

The one thing that it requires is intentionality.

Our Back Story

We got married in 2015 and we were pretty good with money to be fair.

But I’ll be honest, it was easy to save when I was living with my parents and Lindie was a penny pinching undergrad.

What we didn’t anticipate is how different life will be after getting married with there being the 2 of us in one roof.

Lindie wasn’t working at the time and I was earning less than £20,000, so to say saving money was tight is an understatement.

We lived on a tight budget at that time whilst trying to save money for our goals.

Can you relate to that?

Our Stumbles On A Tight Budget

We started to save but in our ambitious mindset we started saving 10-20% of our salary.

This didn’t work because we were living within our means and not beneath it.

Or, if it was even a possibility to cut back as we weren’t living lavishly or anything.

Despite that we kept putting money in our so-called ‘savings’.

We weren’t saving, but going through the motions of saving only to transfer it back within a week or so.

Lindie couldn’t get a job because of the old chicken and egg situation within the job market.

To get a job you need experience but to get experience you need a job!

It makes no sense to me how there are jobs that ask for experience yet they are looking for “fresh graduates”. Anyway, I’ll rant about that another time.

Our Humbling Process

Soon we had to bring our ambitions down from thinking blue sky to reality.

I had the mindset that if we’re not putting away at least £50 per month then there’s no point in saving.

We had dreams of buying a house, getting a newer car, and taking long trip holidays. All are big ticket items; so what would saving £10 per month do?!

To make matters worse we faced other financial pressures that make it hard to save money.

Our car started to give us problems, our rent was increased, and we had just got married.

We wanted to enjoy ourselves through going to restaurants for dates, and having good experiences.

But we couldn’t ignore the feeling of ‘we need to save money’, and we had a moment!

A moment that made us face reality and ask ourselves “what are we going to do?

Our Moment

We weren’t standing in an ATM looking at a £7 balance, going bankrupt, or being evicted from our house like so many rags to riches stories are!

Our moment was simply, the day we went to get a car on finance because our Corsa was draining us.

We were quoted the value of the car to fix it, but we couldn’t sell it.

When you have a need but no savings to cover that need, what normally happens? You borrow money.

And that’s what we did, we took a car finance.

We negotiated a £100pm car payment as we didn’t need the latest model, it was a necessity not a luxury.

Whilst you’re here, we want to let you know we’ve designed a budgeting spreadsheet for you. It is the Ultimate Money Plan spreadsheet template with everything you need to take charge of your finances and crush your money goals.

This is the key to achieving your money goals on a tight budget!

How To Save Money On A Tight Budget

Going back to our moment we acknowledged two key things, we need start saving, and we need to start now.

It’s very possible to live on a tight budget and save money.

A journey of a thousand miles begins with a single step and our journey of saving £’000s began with £1. We are playing the long game here!

Save £1 in month one, and double the amount you are saving each month.

You can adopt this method to fit your own schedule such as weekly or bi-weekly.

Your savings plan will look like this (for monthly):

You can start with any amount, but the key is to start with something then DOUBLE it every month.

You could start with £25, then move to £50 and so on.

1st Benefit – Building the Skill to Save Money On A Tight Budget

The reason why this works is because we can all afford to start small and build big.

The first 6 months are not about the amount but rather building the savings habit.

Start with £1 in month one, I’m sure you won’t even miss it. Then each month double it and by month 8 you’ll be in the three figure savings range.

£1 means that ANYBODY can do it no matter your income level.

Again, you can tweak this and start with £5, £10, or £20, and double those amounts each month.

You can even tweak the time to double the amount every week, or every 3 months.

The focus is to build the savings habit to consistently save money on a tight budget.

Consistency is key with money.

2nd Benefit – Know How Much You Can Afford To Save

You may reach a certain month and realise that you can’t afford to double that amount towards your savings.

Or you may find that you can save more than the previous amount but not as much as double that amount.

This then forms your baseline for savings.

Remember this is not about saving money just so you withdraw it again the following week.

This is about finding out what you can save WITHOUT touching it.

If you want to live on a tight budget ad save money you’ll need to be realistic about your savings ability.

Your journey to save money for your financial goals will start from £1 in week/month 1.

These 2 benefits will see you in your journey to consistently saving by developing the skill.

No matter how much you earn, you know HOW to save and HOW MUCH to save whilst living on a tight budget.

Take Action

Start to save money today! I am so sure you have £1 somewhere.

Slow and steady always wins the race, don’t run too fast or you’ll burnout and become weary of saving – which is what happened to us.

Share this with your friend, family, or partner to encourage them start saving consistently too.

Check out the Ultimate Money Plan Budgeting Spreadsheet for you to take total control of your money.

Let us know how you’re getting along by getting in touch with us, we’d love to hear from you

Knowledge is powerless without action

So take action, and take care

Thando