Save without the sacrifice

CLEVER HACKS TO BOOST YOUR BANK BALANCE NO DENIAL NEEDED.

- BY RUTH BLOOMFIELD

Most New Year resolutions — from getting fit to drinking less — come with a seasoning of self-control and a hefty side order of pain and misery. Similarly most advice about boosting your savings, whether you are trying to build up a deposit for a first home or want to reduce your mortgage costs, are all about denial. But Homes & Property would never order you to stop enjoying your daily macchiato — because there are plenty of ways to save without suffering. These hacks promise to help you shave thousands of pounds off your annual spend.

SET BOUNDARIES

The worst way to save is to wait until the end of the month, see what — if any — money is left in your account and put that aside. What you need to do, says chartered financial planner Matthew Beck, of Smith & Pinching, is arrange for a direct debit into a separate savings account immediately after payday. “By reducing the ‘disposable’ balance in their current account early in the month, they create a forced scarcity that curbs impulsive spending,” he says.

MICRO-SAVING

If you feel like you’ve got very little slack in your budget then Rajan Lakhani, personal finance expert at finance app Plum, suggests trying the penny challenge. If you put a penny into a savings account on day one, two pence on day two and so on then within a year you will have accumulated £667.95 without much pain. If this feels too fiddly think about, try the 52-week challenge — putting away £1 in week one, £2 in week two, and so on. By the end of a year you will have put aside £1,378.

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