Look for ways to increase your savings
By JENNISE VENTURA
It’s a new year, which means new beginnings and memories. It also means creating resolutions. While these resolutions often involve changes within, such as eating healthier, working out and focusing on mental health, what about your financial health? How about resolutions on your spending habits and priorities?
Without fail, close to the holidays, I see people asking for help with food, bills and toys on social media. Living paycheck to paycheck is a risky way to live. What if all of a sudden, you lose your job or your vehicle breaks down? Someone in your family gets sick or worse, passes away? Do you have backup in your savings account?
How do you overcome this? I have a couple of ideas to help you and your family.
First, look at your monthly spending. Write down a list of all your bills and other expenses. How much do you spend on groceries?
After making your list, sit down together and look to see what you can cut down on.
Cellphone bill high? Look at other companies with a less expensive phone plan. Eat out a lot? Buy those family meals and eat leftovers instead. Many fast food restaurants have apps to help you save more money. Or, reduce the visits you eat out and focus on making meals at home. Electric bills making you queasy? Only use electricity when you are home. For colder months, open curtains and shades for the sun to come in. Try to use heat at night, when it’s much colder and pull those warm blankets out. In hotter months, run fans.
Focus on saving at least 10% on your bill and at least 20% of your total expense from your list. Any savings you obtain, put into a savings account and don’t touch it.
Saving money on groceries, household items and personal care items is my key strength in savings. For groceries, I shop at H-E-B and use the MyHEB app to clip digital coupons.
I generally go early in the morning to get first picks on quick-sale produce and meats. Quick-sale produce is 50% off and quick-sale meats are 25% off. Often, there are digital coupons that can be applied for more savings.
These quick-sale items vary every morning in all H-E-B stores. It’s worth checking out. I freeze them until I am ready to use them.
Compare prices between name brand and store brand items. Also use the rebate apps such as Ibotta, Fetch Rewards and Receipt Pal.
If you walk into a grocery store with the intent to spend no more than $100 and you walk out spending $80, put the remaining $20 into your savings account.
For household items and personal care products, I generally go to Walgreens. I also use the Walgreens app with lots of digital coupons. I often check out the digital flyer on there as well.
My only rule to buying items is that it has to be on sale AND have a digital coupon with it. Walgreens also offers bonus rewards for buying a certain dollar amount or quantity.
It also offers a military discount that can be combined with sale price and digital coupons. The discount is 15% off most items (excludes paper, cigarettes, dairy and a few other items) and offered every Saturday at all Killeen, Copperas Cove, Gatesville, Harker Heights and Belton stores.
Another discount that is offered is for senior citizens. The first Tuesday of the month, senior citizens, 55 years or older, get 20% off full-priced items. This discount can also be combined with store and manufacturer coupons as well.
During that first week, seniors can also use the Walgreens app or website to order online for delivery (free shipping over $35) or for in-store pickup and use online code SENIOR20 to receive the discount. You can use this discount twice in the same week, per store. If you go to
Walgreens to spend $50 on detergent and you save $10, put that $10 into a savings account.
Have a spending goal in mind before you shop and focus on how much you can save. Any savings you make can go into your savings account and you can watch it grow. This would be your emergency/backup money just in case you need it.