For many Americans, January marks a special moment to jot down a couple of New Year resolutions and planning on how to live true to them.
Understandably, a central theme in most resolutions is better budgeting and looking into the different ways to save money.
If you’re looking to cut back on your expenditure, then, it’s best to start off small. Instead of focusing on the grand projects like canceling vacations and eating take out, you need to pay a close eye at the little stuff you spend money on without noticing.
Usually, such engagements can eat away at your savings slowly ending up in the thousands of dollars ballpark.
According to Warren Ward, a top financial analyst at Columbus, once his clients expend their energies reviewing fees and other hidden costs in their budgets, it’ becomes an obsession. He noted that many of them begin reviewing all other ways they may be leaking money. Noticeably, many have reported that the more savings they make, the better the odds they have to keep doing it.
In a bid to get you started, here are a couple of top money-saving tips to help you get on the mend.
Car Insurance
As divulged by Margarita Dilone, an expert insurance agent at Crystal Insurance, the collision insurance coverage on cars exponentially increases once the cars are older than 10 years.
She shared that consumers can avert this situation by reading the fine print on their car insurance policy in order to confirm whether the amounts payable for collision coverage add up or are more than the cars net worth.
During her address, she specifically cautioned clients not to purchase collision coverage for the Honda Civic. She mentioned that while the car was no more than 10 years, it had a couple of mechanical faults that severely depreciated its value. Some of the things she highlighted include the cars rusting paint and the $3,000 blue book value.
She adviced that owners with dilapidated vehicles need to skip the collision coverage and slash their insurance payments by about 75%.
Separate Purchase of Insurance Policies
You can realize a significant bump in monies owed by combining numerous insurance policies altogether.
This assertion was confirmed by Anna Bryant, the spokesperson at State Farm. She pointed out that automobile insurance policies are usually discounted in the range of 5-20% in numerous states, provided you have a separate insurance policy with State Farm. Some of the popular options clients have with State Farm include homeowners and renters insurance policies.
On the same note, Bryant confirmed that people with homeowners insurance policy stand a chance of getting discounted prices totaling about 20-35% of the premium. Just like in the previous scenario, the only requirement necessary to qualify for one is a State Farm auto policy.
One survey by InsuranceQuotes showed that many U.S. consumers can make massive 16.1% savings (translating to $322 per annum) on premiums, by simply combining their home and auto insurance covers.
Programmable Thermostats
Information released by WalletHub has shown that on average, energy costs account for about 5-22% of the overall income in family settings. To lower the costs incurred, it’s best to get yourself one of those programmable thermostats.
While the initial cost may be a bit pricey at $200, in the long term, you’ll enjoy having the nifty devices thanks to the savings registered. Ideally, you can realize savings amounting to as much as 10% provided you keep the temperatures between 7-10 degrees for 8 hours per day.
Research conducted by energy.gov has shown that the average American family can make savings amounting to $200 provided they have a programmable thermostat at the ready.
Too Many Subscriptions
With all the tech innovation in the world, many enterprises are registering huge profits by having a large number of the masses hooked on subscription services.
One study by McKinsey & Company has shown that many Americans have 2 running subscription services. While that’s not a bad figure, the only problem comes in the fact that many people subscribe, take advantage of the services offered for a couple of months, then, forget they even exist.
Without canceling the services, the companies will keep charging you a premium at the end of each month.
Since the fees are usually diminutive, you may not notice them at first. However, once you do the math later on, you’re bound to discover that you’re losing plenty of money that can be put to better use elsewhere.
To keep your subscriptions in check, now’s the perfect opportunity to review your monthly statements and cancel the subscriptions that make little sense to you. You can review whether you still need subscriptions like Hulu, Netflix, magazine reads and Amazon Prime.
If you’re unsure about what needs to go, you can take advantage of a service like Truebill that will analyze your account and give you feedback on which subscriptions you hardly make us of.
