We millennials are big on the FIRE movement – that’s “Financially Independent and Retired Early” for all you other generations out there 🙂 KIDDING – I think being financially free and able to set our own schedules on a daily basis is one of the most universal human desires. But the road to retirement starts with saving money. If you’re not a natural saver, that can be a daunting task. So where do you start? Here are five tips that can help you save more – or start saving – each month.

Save eating out for special occasions.

You’d be amazed at how much money you can spend by eating out regularly during the month. If you’re the type of person that eats out once a week or more, you can save a ton of money by cutting back on that.

I know, it’s tough to do, especially when all your friends are pressuring you to go out. But do you want to retire someday… or does the thought of greeting people at the front of a Walmart when you’re 80 fill you with joy?

Tough call.

Here’s the thing: you don’t have to cut back on eating nice meals in order to save money. Just make them at home, instead of buying them out. You can have a nice steak with a glass of wine for way less money at home than you would at a restaurant.

And you know what else? Those special occasions when you do decide to eat out will feel way more special because of how infrequent they are, and you’ll probably enjoy the experience even more than you did before.

Here, I’ve even taken the liberty of listing out some of my favourite online recipes for you to get started with:

• Korean Beef Bowls by Damn Delicious
• Instant Pot Chili by pressurecookrecipes.com
• Grilled Salmon with Avocado Salsa by Tasty.co
• Roman-Style Chicken by The Food Network

Track all of your spending for a month or two.

If you’re not convinced about how much money you can save by making small changes to your weekly habits, prove it to yourself. Track all of your monthly expenses for two months in a row. Categorize your spending into buckets that make sense for you, like entertainment, groceries, transportation, and so on.

I know, tracking your spending sounds gross, and it is. But man, is it ever eye-opening. Take me, for example. When I started tracking my monthly spending, I realized that not only was I spending hundreds of dollars each month on eating out, I was also spending hundreds more on booze.

By cutting back a bit in both areas, I was able to put hundreds of dollars more away each month, and I didn’t even feel a lifestyle hit while I was at it.

Go visit a developing country.

Didn’t expect this, did you? I’m serious though. Go visit a country where most of the locals get by with far less than you have. My trip to Bali back in 2017 was a life-changing experience for me. Not only was that trip the inspiration behind me starting this blog, it also completely changed the way I think about spending and material possessions. Seeing the people there getting by with so much less than we have here in North America, and realizing they were also happier than I was, was eye-opening.

I know you might be sitting being like “yeah, I know people in developing countries have less. Doesn’t change anything for me.” If that sounds like you, it’s probably because you haven’t had any real conversations with those people. Knowing something and experiencing it first-hand are two very different things, and the former is no substitute for the latter.

Take it from me: if you’re a spender, go mingle with the locals in a developing country. Have a few real conversations with them. If it doesn’t rock your worldview, I’ll eat my flipflops.

Automate the crap out of it.

Many of us are our own worst enemies when it comes to saving more money. If there’s dollar signs in our bank account, we’re prone to spend it all.

The solution?

Automate that shit. Get out of your own way. Most of the time, we spend because we can, not because we have to. By automating the money that comes out of your account each paycheque, you won’t have an opportunity to spend it. There are a few ways to automate your saving, but here are two that I’m a fan of.

Use pre-authorized chequing.

Pre-authorized chequing automatically pulls a set amount of money from your account each period. You can choose bi-weekly, monthly, or another timeframe that works for you, and your money will automatically be squirreled away into a savings or investment account.

This is great because you can align it with whenever you get paid, so that you’re putting some money into savings almost as soon as it gets deposited into your bank account. In Wealthy Barber speak, this is called paying yourself first. The term basically just means that you treat your savings just like you would your rent – as a non-negotiable expense that you need to cover off no matter what.

• Use a micro-saving app.

Micro-saving apps are apps that offer the ability to round up your purchases and invest the difference into a savings or investment account for you. I like this concept because you’ll never feel the pinch of rounding a transaction up a few cents, but you will feel the benefit later on.

Think of how many transactions we make on a monthly basis. If you put a few cents away for each one, at the end of a year you’ll have a nice chunk of change that you probably forgot about, all because you decided to round up on your transactions.

If you’re looking for a good place to start, the Mylo app for Canadians is a good bet. You pay a small monthly fee – $1 to $3 depending on the level of account you choose – in exchange for your money automatically being invested by professional money managers. A pretty good trade, if you ask me.

Don’t sabotage yourself!!!

If you’ve managed to follow the other tips and built some momentum, way to go. You’ve probably got some savings in the bank. The next step, which is as important as all of the others combined, is not to spend the money you’ve worked so hard to save.

Making all this effort to put some money away for future you and then spending it on something dumb is like fighting a fire with one hand while pouring gasoline onto it with the other. Don’t do it!

If you’re the type of person that just cannot resist putting your hand in the cookie jar, then my advice would be to put your money into a Registered Retirement Savings Plan, or RRSP. RRSPs let your money grow on tax-deferred basis, which is a fancy way of saying that you don’t pay any tax on money you make in the account until you take it out in retirement.

That’s good.

RRSPs also penalize you for trying to take your money out before you’re ready to retire. You can do it, but not only will you pay tax on any money you withdraw, you’ll also pay a withholding tax penalty on top of that.

That’s great.

It means you won’t be nearly as tempted to dip into your retirement savings for the sake of getting that new barbeque/sound system/drone/whatever else. Getting out of your own way is one of the most important things you can do for your financial future.

Wrapping it Up

Saving money doesn’t have to be painful. It just takes a deliberate approach that involves slightly more than burying your head in the metaphorical sand when it comes to your finances. By first realigning your perspective, and then realigning some basic behaviours each month, you’ll be able to save way more money than you ever thought possible.

So what are you waiting for? The best time to start saving is right now. The longer you save, the harder you can make compound interest work for you. Make it happen, cap’n!