Are You Broke by the End of Every Month ?

If you have a 9 to 5 job like me and the majority of the world, you are broke by the end of every month.

Am I right or am I just RIGHT?

This means that you live paycheck to paycheck. Your monthly salary disappears within a few days after you receive it. Basically, you are screwed if your office delays your salary for the month.

And I didn't even ask how much your salary is. It doesn't matter! For some strange reason, the amount you spend always seems to equal the amount you earn. And you also end up borrowing sometimes.

Why does that happen?

This happens because you equate more money with more opportunities to spend it.

Don't take me wrong, that is actually true. We work our butt off in the office we don't like so we can stop worrying about affording the basic pleasures of life. But if you have to wish and pray to get the next salary as early as possible, aren't you one step away from extreme poverty?

Well then, Mr. SmartyPants, what do I do?

Here are 5 ways you can stop spending all you earn and actually save for the future. Remember, you will likely not be a millionaire merely by saving. But it is a good place to start straightening your financial health. After all, some money is so much better than no money.

1. Watch Your Spending, Buddy!

Are you spending more money than needed to fulfil your filthy pleasures? Maybe you call your partner too often? Maybe you can't live without pizza! Or uploading a pic on a new cafe every week is your top priority?

And you can't say no to your friends if they make a plan in the last minute. That's a sin, right? There is one rule in life and that is to never say no to your friends. Or is there?

Can I tell you an interesting thing about yourself? If you do not have cash in your hand, you can actually survive without spending on all of the above. You have experienced this yourself. Strangely, you can go on perfectly without fancy expenses when you don't have any money with you. Basically, you live like a king when you have money with you. And if you are out of it, you get back to living like a pauper. But why spend on luxuries when your bank balance is tattered and torn?

If I have to be specific, the one thing where people in Kathmandu spend the most money is transportation. We all need to showcase our bike when we could just walk the distance. And we all need to use Tootle or Pathao when we could take a bus or a tempo.

"Oh, you haven't seen the traffic in Kathmandu. I do that to save my time," you say. 

Which brings us to the next point.

2. Believe it or not, you manage your money by managing your time.

Have you ever bought something you didn't need to only because your life is so messed up?

The day when I wake up late is the worst day in my life. I get late for office and not everything is in the place where it's supposed to be. The result? I end up buying a whole new pair of socks, hair gel, and even nailcutters. This reckless behaviour of mine has taken cold, hard cash away from me numerous times. Only if I had managed my time properly, I would have saved that money. This is just one example of how being a messy time manager makes you pay, literally.

Maybe your friends' last minute plans are costing you a fortune. Friends, family, and colleagues will respect your time only if you do. Do not be like a dried leaf that goes where the breeze takes it. Set your priorities and stick to them.

Anyway, will anyone borrow my extra nailcutters?

3. If saving is impossible, force it.

You and I are alike. I am preaching financial literacy to you today but I myself can't resist spending when I can.

Before you call me a hypocrite, I have found a way to force saving on days when I don't want to. I do this by immediately depositing the extra cash I have in my bank account. And I use the ATM as less as possible. This means that I'll have to go to my bank and write a cheque for myself to withdraw my money. Since this is embarrassing, I avoid it altogether. No money withdrawn is money saved.

Pats his own back.

4. If you think you can afford it, you can't.

What do I mean by this?

Do you remember the last time you bought chewing gum? You don't. Also, did you debate with yourself about whether buying this chewing gum affected your finance? You didn't.

This is because you can easily afford it. So, buying goes smoothly. You do not stress so much over it because you are rich enough to buy that gum.

However, recall the time when you had to decide whether you could afford that fancy dress. Or the time when you thought hard whether to say yes to eating out. It certainly took a whole lot of your thought-process, right?

That is because you really can't afford it. Sorry. I know you'll be rich enough one day so that the price tags of things don't matter. Till then, you can cut back your spending a bit on these things.

In better words,

If you have to think whether you can afford it, you can't afford it.

5. The Discount Trap

If you are a female, you are more prone to the discount trap than males. Well, this is because males are dumb enough to buy their stuff without bargaining in the first place, so I am not looking down on you ladies.

(Photo by Artem Beliaikin from Pexels)

I'll give you an example. If an item that is selling for Rs. 100 is at a massive 30% discount, how much money do you save if you buy it?

Now, being the maths guru that you are, you will answer correctly and say that you saved Rs. 3o. But you're wrong. If an item sells for Rs. 100 and you buy it at Rs. 70, you don't SAVE Rs. 30. You actually SPEND Rs. 70.

Shop owners know this trick very well. So they like to stick discount rates on every item they sell. Similarly, there are other tactics they use to entice you to buy their product. Another trick is to label an item at Rs. 9,999 instead of at Rs. 10,000, for example. The difference is just a mere Rs. 1, but the four-figure price seems a lot cheaper to the human mind.

Wrapping Up: No matter how much you earn, you can actually make enough money to spend on your necessities, burn a few of it on useless pleasures, and also save some for the future.

Just watch your spending, manage your time properly, save some in the bank, and please, for the sake of God, do not fall for the tactics of marketing crooks.

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Writer is also associated with www.nepalearn.com