How To Save Money Without Touching It

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Overview

Saving money. We all know we should be doing it, and most of us would rather be spending it. After all, it’s not good for much else. But, if we’re going to meet any type of long-term goal, we need to be doing some saving. Here we’ll look at how to save money without touching it.

I was thinking today about how I bought my wife’s engagement ring. At the time, I was not particularly focused on personal finance. I had, however, taken out a car loan at my local teacher’s credit union. This meant payments could be deducted directly from my paycheck. Well, fortunately, even after the car loan was paid, I had requested for the deductions to continue. When the time came to buy a ring, I figured I’d check and see if I had any funds available in that account to help with the cost. It paid for the whole thing.

Now, I do not recommend being so unaware of your financial accounts that you don’t realize you have thousands of dollars sitting in your credit union. That’s not the point. The point is that I had accidentally stumbled into some pretty good strategies that I think we can apply more intentionally and come up with some excellent savings plans.

Five strategies for how to save money without touching it include:

Separate Savings From Your Other Funds
Automate The Saving Process
Let Your Savings Grow
Make Savings Difficult To Access
Remember What You’re Saving For

If you follow these steps, I think saving may just become a little easier for you. Let’s look at each strategy a little closer.

How To Save Money Without Touching It- Strategy #1: Separate It

The first and probably most obvious step to take to create untouchable savings is to separate them from your other money.

It just doesn’t make much sense to have your savings in the same account with the money you intend to live off of. There are several reasons for this.

First, checking accounts aren’t gaining you interest. Now look, I know interest rates for most savings accounts at banks and even credit unions aren’t exactly anything to celebrate, but something beats nothing.

Also, anytime you blow your budget, it’s your savings that take the hit. And, you’re probably going to be more prone to budget blowing knowing that there’s a cushion there to fall back on.

Instead, open up a separate savings account. Like I mentioned before, I have money in our local credit union and also savings accounts through our regular bank.

Put your savings in whatever institution you prefer, but just get them out of your checking account.

How To Save Money Without Touching It- Strategy #2: Automate It

This strategy comes directly from my story above. Because I’d gotten so accustomed to living without the money I had set on auto-draft, I didn’t even think about the fact that I had a pile of savings building up. That was a rare pleasant financial surprise.

Now again, don’t be like I was and be unaware of what you’re money is doing. That’s not what I’m saying. My point is just this: if you have the ability to set it and forget it, take it.

By setting up an automated system, you can remove the burden of transferring money from yourself. This ensures you save money whether you remember to make the transfer to savings or not.

How To Save Money Without Touching It- Strategy #3: Grow It

I mentioned this above in passing, but it’s worth a brief discussion on it’s own. Let your money grow.

Savings accounts aren’t going to have great interest rates. That’s fine. The money will still grow some. Just let that money sit there. Track it. Be aware of it. But leave it alone. The more it builds up, the more interest it creates.

Investing your savings in something more volatile is probably not the way to go. Savings, by definition, are funds you need to be able to access fairly quickly. Investments take time to get to. But, If you are “saving” for a goal that is five or ten years out, it may be a good idea to look at some low-risk investments. You’ll be more likely to get better growth in some mutual funds. But, do some research before making that decision.

Bottom line: Once you have money moving into some savings accounts, leave it alone and let it grow.

How To Save Money Without Touching It- Strategy #4: Hide It From Yourself

Not literally. You need to know where your money is.

All I mean here is that you should make your money more difficult to access than the money in your checking account. Otherwise, why even bother separating it out?

Think about it: You aren’t going to be spending this money until a designated moment in the future. Why do you need to be carrying around a debit card that grants you immediate access to it?

Know where your savings are, and know how to get to them. But, make sure that getting to this money takes enough effort that you won’t act impulsively in a weak moment and ruin your hard work.

How To Save Money Without Touching It- Strategy #5: Remember What It’s For

Finally, just know why it is you’re saving. I’ve written about understanding your financial purpose previously, but it really applies here.

My wife and I have goals, and we talk about those goals. We keep them at the front of our minds. Those goals bring us closer together, and those goals give us a reason to save, to go after some extra income, and to cut costs.

Know your goals and know your purpose. Focus on those things when saving gets tough.

Learn About Finding Your Financial Purpose

Conclusion

And that’s it. Saving money doesn’t have to be difficult. If I can do it accidentally, you can certainly do it on purpose, and with purpose!

To review:

Separate Savings From Your Other Funds
Automate The Saving Process
Let Your Savings Grow
Make Savings Difficult To Access
Remember What You’re Saving For

And as always, regardless of your money goals, you can “Bank on a Budget” to get you from where you are to where you want to be!

Learn More About Saving Using “Sinking Funds”

If we’re going to meet any type of long-term goal, we need to be doing some saving.

Bio
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Alex

Hello, my name is Alex! I'm a public school teacher who has achieved some big financial goals just by getting control of my money using some simple strategies like using a monthly budget. Now I'd like to share what I've learned with you. Welcome to "Bank on a Budget!"