Saving money every month is not easy, especially when we have to face the rent or mortgage, the shopping basket, electricity and other expenses that do not stop rising. And the cost of living does not stop rising, while salaries remain stagnant or barely grow. Many people try to save some money at the end of the month, but the reality is that after paying all the bills, there is hardly anything left in the bank account.
Despite this, financial expert Natalia de Santiago assures that there is a way to better organize our domestic economy and that it does not necessarily consist of stopping going out to dinner or just stopping doing things we like. The key is to change the way we manage our salary and, above all, to decide when we save.
This is how he explained it in an interview in Telvawhere he points out that “you don’t save after spending, you spend after saving.” That is, instead of waiting until the end of the month to save the money we have left over, we should separate a part of our income as soon as we collect it. This must be accompanied by a long-term investment strategy, since leaving the money standing still is not enough and, in fact, is “a bad decision” as economist Pedro Becerro said.
Save first and spend later
Natalia de Santiago’s recommendation is simple and consists of establishing a monthly savings amount that we can assume without compromising our necessary expenses. It does not have to be a high number, but rather we can maintain it over time.
“The fundamental key is that you don’t save after spending, you spend after saving. It can be a small amount, but it has to be realistic and possible. If you have a payroll, the easiest thing is to set a fixed amount and schedule an automatic transfer each month, and forget about it,” explains the expert.
In this way, the money intended for savings is automatically separated from the salary, preventing us from ending up spending it on purchases that we had not planned. In addition, it recommends saving it in a different account than the one we usually use to pay bills or make purchases.
Review fixed expenses to save more money
Another of the financial divulger’s tips has to do with the expenses we pay every month. Although we normally think that to save we must stop eating out or reduce our leisure, De Santiago believes that it is more interesting to start with fixed expenses.
“People tend to think that they always have to get rid of leisure, that it is a quick expense to do without, but it is more interesting to look for a way to reduce fixed expenses, since what you save here will be repeated every month, even if it is little,” says Natalia de Santiago.
Among its recommendations are reviewing telephone and Internet rates, looking for cheaper insurance, negotiating banking fees or checking which subscriptions we continue to pay for without needing them. It also advises studying whether we can improve the conditions of our mortgage.
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They are small changes that can allow us to save every month without having to constantly be aware of every euro we spend. Because, as the expert explains, the important thing is not to save large amounts at once, but to make saving become a habit.