As counter intuitive as it might sound, being intentional about saving money during tough economic times, like these, is just as important as saving when life is good. In fact, it’s arguably more prudent during tough economic times. Think of it this way: the incredibly high interest rates and prohibitive borrowing costs makes it the best time to save more. Similarly, the same high interest rates that make goods and services so expensive also mean that consumers can get more bang for their savings bucks.
How does one begin their journey to getting into good financial shape by the time Savings Month 2025 comes round? Ester Ochse, Product Head at FNB Integrated Advice, shares some simple yet effective insider tips when saving for short or long-term financial goals.
- Start small
While many of us understand the importance of making saving money an integral part of our financial fitness journey, emotionally and psychologically there may be some blocks that prevent us from progressing. The thought of having to save money, or even the thought of how far behind you might be in your savings journey, can be daunting. To make the journey more manageable, it’s important to start small.
“Imagine you want to lose some weight, and you’ve set a certain goal that you want to reach by a certain time, so you decide to go on a diet,” says Ochse. “In this case, what’s more sustainable than telling yourself you’ll never eat dessert again is committing to only eating dessert once a week.”
“It’s important to take the same approach to your savings journey, for it to be sustainable in the long run. Once you build small habits, like reducing how many energy drinks or takeaways you buy in a week, you can incrementally turn up the ambition and intensity as you move along in your journey to better financial fitness.”
Set small milestones for yourself, at the beginning, build regular habits, and stick with them so that you can build up the muscle memory of saving.
- Make budgeting central to you plan of attack
Budgeting and saving can be a bit of a chicken-and-egg situation but, regardless of which one comes first in your life, both are incredibly important and impact each other in equal weighting. Once you’ve established that you’re going to start small, having a clear understanding of where your money goes every month is key – and it starts with having a set budget.
“Trying to start a savings journey without a budget, and insights into exactly how you already spend your money month-on-month, is a bit like going on a road trip without Google Maps or Waze,” adds Ochse. “You’ll soon find yourself going round in circles and not making any progress because you are essentially directionless.”
Luckily, budgeting your personal finances has become much easier over the years. There are myriad resources out there, like mobile applications in your device’s application marketplace dedicated to budgeting, and even budgeting-focused features and tools in your banking app.
“At FNB, we help consumers by making budgeting really easy, through the intuitive tools available on our banking App like Track My Spend and Smart budget on nav» Money.”
- Automate everything
Some innovative people in the financial services industry seemingly understood just how difficult taking that first, and even subsequent, step to becoming a habitual saver. As such, banks have made cultivating the habit of saving so easy that we’re running out of excuses not to save.
“Think of automating your savings like having a financial remote control in your hand. You could just walk up to your TV and press some buttons on it to turn up the volume or the brightness or the contrast. But these days you don’t have to walk up – you can do all that with your remote control. Automating your savings through your banking application serves pretty much the same purpose but in a setting that’s slightly more high stakes than just turning up the volume so you can hear your favourite comedian’s joke,” highlights Ochse.
Setting up automated transfers from a main account to a savings account takes away the fuss of needing to remember to do it and eliminates the actual admin, making consumers habitual savers with very little effort. It also goes back the old adage of ‘save and then spend’.
- Maximise on loyalty programmes
Rewards programmes can be invaluable in one’s journey to financial freedom. Look at it this way: just as time for your savings habit rolls around every month so does the opportunity to free up your cashflow by using loyalty programmes to maximise on readily available virtual money instead of real money.
“How many times have you, in a crunch, reached out to your FNB eBucks folder to buy electricity, data or airtime?” asks Ochse.
Loyalty programmes can often be our saving grace in our day-to-day lives and even more so as you scale back on our spending and save. “You can potentially put back thousands of rands into your pocket just by diligently following guidelines on how to use your different banking accounts and facilities in order to earn eBucks to buy essentials like electricity and so much more.”
- More jedi mind tricks
The more distraction-free one can make their savings environment, the more successful once can become in their journey to financial fitness. “A lot of it is in the mind. But also, out of sight out of mind,” says Ochse.
“Did you know that on the FNB banking app, for example, you can hide certain accounts from your main accounts view. That way, you can eliminate the temptation of dipping into your savings account once you start seeing that your main account is running low,” continues Ochse.
“You can also rename your accounts. I have one simply titled ‘Car’ and that’s where I store funds every month for upkeep of my personal vehicle.”
Becoming financially unrecognisable by the time the next Savings Month comes around will take some small, smart, and intentional changes. “These changes will add up, as long as you stick to them, and they will lead you well on your way to financial independence and financial freedom, come rain or shine,” concluded Ochse.
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