Category: Money Savings Tips

My aim with each blog post is to help you move to a better financial future. I believe that there is not enough financial education in the national curriculum and I intend to share anything helpful that I have learned along the way. I am by no means a financial expert. None of the information on this website constitutes financial advice and is provided as general information only. This is my personal finance blog; my marketing blog is over here and I have been blogging there since 2010. I hope you have found this information useful. Thank you for reading.

Best regards,

Mike

What are the Best Savings Accounts for Children?

Top 5 Automatic Savings Apps – Save Your Spare Change

This post may contain affiliate links please read our disclosure for more info.

Image credit: getchip.uk

Wouldn’t it be great if you didn’t have to think and plan every saving that you made each month? It would make saving easier and achievable for those of you who want to save, but struggle to actually do it. Help is at hand on your smartphone. There are now a multitude of general finance and savings apps on both IOS and Android platforms. Below I have given an overview of my top 5, and listed their key features.

Automatic Savings Apps

Money Box

Money Box is a savings app that allows you to invest your spare change from everyday purchases. Over time you can build up your investments with money that you will not miss. Your money can be invested into a Stocks and Shares ISA, Lifetime ISA or general investment account. You can start with £1. More details here.

Chip

The Chip App is similar to Money Box in that it enables you to save spare change against goals that you determine. Please be aware that you need to give the app read only access to your bank account; this fact alone will put some people off. As with every app or account that I mention on this website, always do your own research and only move forward if you are comfortable to do so. More details here.

Money Farm

Money Farm is a wealth management app designed to make investing accessible. Created with families in mind, Money Farm gives its users access to investment advice and well structured investment products. Money Farm operates in the UK and Italy. More details here.

Money Dashboard

As the name suggests, Money Dashboard is a way to keep track of your financial accounts by viewing one dashboard rather than many different websites. It is an account aggregator that makes it very easy to budget and also track spending, The app currently has over 150K users. More details here.

Plum

Plum is not actually not an app, it is a Facebook chatbot and has the same purpose as Moneybox and Chip, allow its users to save without really trying to. The chatbot analyses your transactions, identifies regular income, bills and daily expenditure to calculate an affordable amount that you can save. Your savings are moved to a protected account and then can be invested with RateSetter, who are a peer-to-peer lender. More details here.

For each of these apps, do you own research and make sure that you read the Google reviews too. If you are using an app or website to invest in the stock market remember that Stocks can go down as well as up. Plan to invest for the long term.

Are you currently using any of the apps mentioned in this post? How are you getting on? Let me know in the comments section below.

If you have enjoyed this post you will also like the following posts:

How to Teach Your Children About Money

How to get Value for Money When Buying Foreign Currency

Save up to £500 Per Year With a Sim Only Mobile Phone Deal

Best regards,

Mike

How to get Value for Money When Buying Foreign Currency

What are the Best Savings Accounts for Children?

This post may contain affiliate links please read our disclosure for more info.

Image credit: http://www.newportcreditunion.co.uk/

If you’ve read my most recent post, How to Teach Your Children About Money you could easily have guessed that this would be my next subject. In this post, I give an overview and provide links for a selection of the best savings accounts for children. This is the next logical step, to give your children practical recommendations for where they should save their money. Do not let them lose momentum, they are forming great financial habits; now show them where to save their money.

Do not fall into the trap of advising your children to open an account at your current bank because it is convenient. A low interest rate for savers is not convenient, please give your children the best recommendations for their money.

Below I have listed my top picks for regular saving, easy access and fixed rate savings accounts for children. Please remember none of this constitutes financial advice and you should do your own research. I have provided links to all of the accounts mentioned for that purpose.

Best Savings Accounts for Children

In each example the interest rate quoted is the Annual Equivalent Rate (AER).

Regular Savings

Halifax

The Halifax Kids Regular Saver account pays 4.5 % interest. You are allowed to save between £10 and £100 per month but not allowed to make any withdrawals. More details here.

Saffron Building Society

The Saffron Building Society Children’s Regular Saver account pays 4.0 % You are allowed to save between £5 and £100 per month and can make unlimited withdrawals. More details here.

Nationwide

The Nationwide Flex One Regular Saver account pays 3.5% interest. You can save between £1 and £100 monthly and make unlimited withdrawals. More details here.

Easy Access

Santander

Santander 123 Mini Current Account 123 Mini Current Account pays 3% interest providing you have £300 to £2,000 in it. Account holders can make unlimited withdrawals and those over 11 will receive a debit card. More details here.

HSBC

The HSBC My Savings account pays 2.75% interest for account holders aged between 7 and 17. Account holders receive a cashbook that they can use to make deposits and unlimited withdrawals. More details here.

Nationwide

The Nationwide Smart Limited Access account pays 2.5% on amounts up to £50,000. Account holders must be between 7 and 17 years old. It’s important to note that you are only allowed to make one withdrawal per year. More details here.

Fixed Rates

The Cambridge Building Society 3 Year Children’s Fixed Rate Bond pays 2% interest. You are permitted to deposit between £1000 and £20,000 More details here .

The Kent Reliance two year fixed bond pays 1.85% interest and has no minimum age. Withdrawals and closures are permitted subject to 180 days’ loss of interest on the amount withdrawn. More details here.

Have your children got any of the accounts mentioned above? Let me know how in the comments section below.

If you have enjoyed this post you will also like the following posts:

Save up to £500 Per Year With a Sim Only Mobile Phone Deal

I hope you have found this information useful. Thank you for reading.

Best regards,

Mike

How to get Value for Money When Buying Foreign Currency

How to Teach Your Children About Money

This post may contain affiliate links please read our disclosure for more info.

Image credit: http://chillmaadi.com/

Few adults have truly mastered money and yet it is incumbent on adults who are also parents to teach their children about money. Parents are the number one influence on children’s future financial behaviour. If parents always seemed to be concerned about money or the lack of it, this is what their children will learn. However, by being proactive and intentional about the lessons we teach our children, we can set them up for future financial success. Below I have listed six key points that you can teach your children that will help them understand money. They have certainly helped me explain money to my son, I hope those of you who have children find them useful too.

Teaching Children About Money

Making a Choice

Explain to your child that you have a limited amount of money, it could be £10 or $10. The next step is for you and your child to decide to buy product x or product y, because you cannot afford to buy both.Those of you who have studied microeconomics, will recognise this as the ‘opportunity cost’ attached to the decision. This is a great way to introduce needs and wants too.

It’ is good for children of all ages to understand the need to make a choice between the two. Use it with real world examples when you are out and about. This website is great resource for explaining money to your children. Please make use of it.

Now or Later

Slightly more difficult to explain to many children is the concept of delayed gratification. Instead of buying something now, why not save your pocket money/ birthday money and save up to buy a larger item in a few weeks’ time? If a look of incredulity comes onto your child’s face, do not worry, you’re not alone. Once again, demonstrate with practical examples from their daily life.

Managing Pocket Money and Expenditure

Another great financial lesson is encouraging your children to have some financial freedom to make their own choices. If you are able, allow them to ‘earn’ pocket money by keeping their room tidy and helping out with chores. The money they earn is theirs and they should budget, save and donate; the remainder can be spend as they see fit. Please explain that if they deposit their money into a savings account it has a chance to grow because of the interest. Money stored in a piggy bank will not of course.

Financial Rationale & Commentary

I provide my son with a financial rationale for financial choices to build up his knowledge and help him to understand concepts such as value for money. For example, I have explained why I filled up the car with fuel at the local petrol station ahead of a long journey instead of at motorway services. Today, he told me that he would buy a Ferrari if he had the money so I’m not sure if everything I’ve said has been taken on board. 🙂

Regular Saving and Compound Interest

This website is a great resource that will help you explain to you child how compound interest works over time. The great amounts that can be created by regular saving and compound interest, as demonstrated by the website’s calculator tool should excite them.

As your children get older, over 14 years of age from example, there will be many opportunities to have specific discussions around money. Some may relate to the costs of higher education or how to sensibly use credit and debit cards. I will not be able to cover them all in this post.

How have your discussions with your children about money been? Were there any areas they struggled with? Let me know how in the comments section below.

If you have enjoyed this post you will also like the following posts:

Save up to £500 Per Year With a Sim Only Mobile Phone Deal

I hope you have found this information useful. Thank you for reading.

Best regards,

Mike

Save up to £500 Per Year With a Sim Only Mobile Phone Deal

How to get Value For Money When Buying Foreign Currency

This post may contain affiliate links please read our disclosure for more info.

Many of you will have realised at one point or another that you have not received a good deal when exchanging your hard earned Sterling for foreign currency.

In many cases, a zero percent commission might be accompanied by a transaction charge that you were unaware of. There may have been hidden fees that you only realised when you received your credit card or bank statements a few weeks later.

This experience is very common, I have been through it myself. It’s not a great feeling. If you are still buying foreign currency from your bank, the post office or worst of all, at the airport, you should stop now. The same applies for expensive travellers cheques.

via GIPHY

Exchanging your currency at the airport will result in a less than favourable exchange rate and fees. It’s similar to buying fuel for your car at motorway services instead of at your local supermarket prior to starting your journey.

Value For Money Foreign Currency

So, how should you buy foreign currency? Lets start with a slight mind-shift, shall we? You don’t actually need lots of foreign currency before you travel.

Instead buy a minimal amount of foreign currency for taxis from the airport and light snacks. Buy this minimal amount from the best currency exchange you can find. This is a good place to search.

A month or so before you travel, apply for and receive a specialist credit card that allows you to spend in your required currency without fees.

This Revolut card is a great example. The card allows you to spend fee free with the real exchange rate in over 130 currencies.

It’s not the only option, The Halifax Clarity Card is similar. Please ensure you research them and apply for the one that best suits your needs.

These two steps should ensure that you get value for money when buying foreign currency and spending abroad. Feel free to let me know how you get on in the comments section below.

If you have enjoyed this post you will also like the following posts:

My aim with each blog post is to help you move to a better financial future. I believe that financial education is largely absent from the national curriculum and I intend to share anything helpful that I have learned along the way. I am by no means a financial expert. None of the information on this website constitutes financial advice and is provided as general information only. This is my personal finance blog; my marketing blog is over here and I have been blogging there since 2010.

I hope you have found this information useful. Thank you for reading.

Best regards,

Mike

Image credit: https://www.prestwick-airport-guide.co.uk/

Save up to £500 per year with a Sim Only Mobile Phone Deal

This post may contain affiliate links please read our disclosure for more info.

The lure of a new shiny mobile phone is very effective at keeping many people overpaying mobile phone companies. In most cases, customers upgrade to a new handset because they want to have the latest iPhone or Samsung handset. This is more to do with ‘keeping up with the Joneses’ rather than any new technical need. I have discussed this with friends and colleagues and have asked them the question, ‘What is it that your new phone can do that your current phone can’t?’ Most are stumped and cannot think of anything.

Rather than upgrading your phone for the sake of it when your contract runs out, why not consider a sim only mobile phone deal ? This means that you keep your existing phone and pay only for the text, call and data allowance that you select.

How to Select a Sim Only Deal

The process I went through to achieve this saving started with me calling my existing mobile phone company and asking them to review my recent call, text and data usage over the last 3 to 4 months. This only took a few minutes, once I’ d reviewed my actual usage it was clear that the most appropriate sim card only deal would cost me around £15 per month.

Please note, most of my work is online and because of that I probably need more data than you. It is likely that you will be able to follow the same process that I did and find an appropriate Sim conly deal for around £10 per month; there are even some available for £5 per month. When I switched to a sim only deal, I started saving £40 per month which equates to £480 per year. You can start searching for sim card only deals here via this link.

The money that you save could go towards paying off a debt or into one of one of your savings accounts. That choice is up to to you.

If you have enjoyed this post you will also like the following posts:

I hope you have found this information useful. Thank you for reading.

Best regards,

Mike

Image credit: http://www.smarttouchpro.com/

What’s the Best Strategy for Clearing Debts?

This post may contain affiliate links please read our disclosure for more info.

Image credit: https://www.bloemfonteincourant.co.za/

It’s no coincidence that debt is a four letter word. As adults, we understand that debts are something we should eradicate from our lives as much as possible. There are different forms of debt of course; mortgage and student loan debts are deemed acceptable by most, whereas credit card debts and loans are not. It’s not a mystery how debt occurs, it is simply a result of spending more money than you have whether in the short term or on an ongoing basis. Debt can have far reaching psychological effects on people and unfortunately many people struggle to cope with the pressure it brings. If you feel this way, please contact the National Debt line via this link.

Strategy for Clearing Debts

Paying debts off can be a fantastic experience, which is quite strange when you consider there is nothing tangible at the end. There is no trophy, certificate or awards ceremony for paying off a debt. What is the best strategy for paying off debts? Individual circumstances may vary of course, but broadly speaking the approach I have outlined below is a good one for most people.

Calculate the Total Amount that You Owe

Be intentional about this, create a spreadsheet with all your debts and interest rates listed. It may not be pleasant reading but facing up to the full extent of your debts is a great first step.

Work Out Which Debt ‘Costs’ You More

In most cases this will be the debt with the highest interest rate. It is likely to be a credit card, they tend to have higher interest rates and cost more. The worst of your credit cards should be your focus. Prioritise this card for any payments you make towards debt without jeopardising your monthly budget.

If Possible Make Minimum Payments on Other Debts

I know, this is easier said than done of course; you may be presented with the choice of paying more of a costlier debt at the expense of missing a payment for a less costly debt. In that situation, I would pay more of the costlier debt. Ultimately, you will reduce your worst debt quicker that way.

Communicate with Your Creditors

Be careful with how much information you communicate to your creditors for this reason, you cannot predict how each will react. ‘Radio silence’ is not an option but proceed with caution. Let’s imagine that you have been made redundant. I don’t need to imagine because that has happened to me. When you tell some of creditors they may be sympathetic and give you some additional flexibility whilst you get back on your feet. However, some will now categorise you as ‘high risk’ and this will affect your credit rating and access to money even for basic essentials.

Be Consistent and Keep up the Momentum

You may be tempted to reward yourself for making progress reducing your debts. In principle this is fine, but my recommendation would be that the celebration is extremely low cost; your favourite bar of chocolate rather than a bottle of champagne, for example.

Peer Group Support

If you know of other people who are on a similar debt reduction journey form a group with them and support each other. It will strengthen your resolve. There are also lots of online communities, websites and podcasts that will give you additional support. Make use of them.

If you follow the steps above you will reduce your debt and by being consistent you will reach the day when you are debt free. On that day, I think you definitely should upgrade your reward or celebration. You will have earned it.

One final consideration for you, in the United States there is a personal finance guru called Dave Ramsey. Rather than the approach I have outlined above, he advocates starting with the smallest debt irrespective of the interest rate in what he calls the Debt Snowball. His rationale is that your Debt Snowball builds momentum and helps you to keep going.

If you have liked this post you will also like the following posts:

I hope you have found this information useful. Thank you for reading.

Best regards,

Mike

What are the Different Types of Savings Accounts?

This post may contain affiliate links please read our disclosure for more info.

Image credit: http://meridican.com/

I hope that you read my last post and you joined me in making a commitment to increasing your level of saving each month. If you have not had time to read it yet, you can read it here, How Much Should you Save?

In this post, I will give an overview of the different types of savings accounts that are available for most adults in the UK.

Bank Savings Accounts

Perhaps the easiest to set up, these are savings accounts that are usually in the same bank that handles your current account. It is very easy to transfer money from your current account into your savings account each month. The transfer can be achieved very quickly via your bank’s app, assuming that you have downloaded and are using your bank’s app. Unfortunately, this ease of access without any penalties can work against you too. It can be a little too easy to transfer money from your savings account back into your current account, more on that in a future post.

Regular Savings Accounts

If are able to commit to a regular savings account you should be able to secure a higher interest rate than a normal savings account. There are limits to the amounts that you can save and also for how long, but they are definitely worth having if you are able to.

Easy Access Cash ISA

If you open a Easy Access Cash ISA, you will be able to save up to £20,000 tax free each year and still have access to it if you need to. Individual Savings Accounts (ISA) were first introduced in 1999, initially with a limit of £7000. Now the amount you can shield in a tax free ISA is £20,000.

Fixed Rate Cash ISA

The Fixed Rate Cash ISA differs from the Easy Access Cash ISA because savers must commit to not accessing their funds for a fixed term. This term could be one, two or three years. If savers access their funds before the fixed term has finished they are penalised with a loss of interest.

Fixed Rate Savings

If you are comfortable locking away your money for a couple of years, you should consider fixed rate savings because you will secure a higher interest rate

Notice Savings Accounts

As the same suggests, notice savings accounts require the account holder to give notice before they withdraw money. This notice period could be 30, 60 or 90 days in advance.

It used to be that you had to consider the tax implications of savings accounts. However, the introduction of the Personal Savings Allowance in 2016 has meant that most people now no longer pay tax on savings interest.

What type of savings account do you use? Let me know in the comments section below.

If you have liked this post you will also like the following posts:

I hope you have found this information useful. Thank you for reading.

Best regards,

Mike

How Much Should You Save?

This post may contain affiliate links please read our disclosure for more info.

Image credit: http://yourmoneyrelationship.com/

For many people, saving money is not exciting; when they consider what their savings may allow in the future it can become more exciting. This may mean the chance to have an expensive family holiday or a more comfortable retirement.

Save Money

Whatever your level of salary or wages, you should aim to save 20% of your earnings. Depending on where you currently are in terms of your financial health, this 20% figure could seem insurmountable or very manageable. Please remember this is a guideline.

This guideline is based on the following breakdown of income; 50% on mandatory expenditure including accommodation and associated bills, 30% on discretionary expenditure and 20% on savings.

Is this the Dream versus Reality?

The chart above is from Trading Economics and clearly demonstrates that in the UK most households are not getting anywhere near the 20% figure. My own anecdotal evidence is that there are times when I have been able save above the 20% and other times when no saving has been possible at all.

For our US readers, the situation is actually slightly worse, as you can see from the chart below. There is data from other countries as well on the website, so please explore to find figures for your country if you are not from the UK or US.

I would like everyone who reads this post to take a step forward to a better financial future. We have just started a new month, commit with me to saving 20% of your income, or as close to that as you can. If you comfortable doing so, leave a comment below indicating the percentage of your income that you will save this month, this month being June 2018.

If you have liked this post you will also like the following posts: