Being organised in everything you do can help you save more than you can imagine. Read on to know more.
Disorganisation leads to confusion and chaos. Nothing good has ever come out of it. Apart from making it hard to find things, it also increases your stress levels. Imagine a scenario where you’re desperately looking for some important loan documents or your Credit Card bills, but you just can’t seem to locate them. Not a particularly pleasant situation to be in.
Before figuring out ways to organise your finances better, let’s see how being more organised in your day-to-day life can actually help you save more.
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Be Responsible
Many people tend to spend money on replacing lost items instead of organising themselves in a certain way so that the chances of losing said items are slim. It could be anything from mobile phones to jewellery to random household items.
Remember, a casual or lazy attitude towards our belongings can work against us financially. The more organised you are, the lower the chances are of losing things. Replacing expensive items like mobile phones could lead to unnecessary dents in your budget, so always ensure that your surroundings are clutter-free at all times.
Additional Reading: The 5 Best Smartphones Under Rs. 20,000
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Waste Less
What you eat doesn’t just affect your health and waist line. It also has a direct impact on your finances. If you buy only what’s needed and consume it all instead of wasting too much, you tend to save more.
By avoiding those extra trips to the supermarket, you’re indirectly saving more. Sometimes, we get so excited at the grocery store that we end up buying things we don’t really need or won’t really consume. As a result, we end up splurging unnecessarily.
Food wastage, therefore, is a big no-no. Managing your food stock well, decluttering your refrigerator, making a list of things before heading out to the grocery store and buying in bulk are some ways that can help you save more.
Organised food shelves and refrigerators give you a better idea of what’s available at home and what needs to be refilled. Remember to only buy what you need and nothing more!
Additional Reading: 8 Ways Foodies Can Save Money While Eating Out
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Take Advantage of Net Banking
Do you keep forgetting to do things? Like paying utility or Credit Card bills? One of the major reasons for this Ghajini-like behaviour is disorganisation. Since everything around you is in a disorganised state, you’re more likely to forget what’s important and what isn’t.
One way to tackle this is by setting up an auto debit via your netbanking facility to pay your bills every month on a certain date. This way, you can start tackling other areas in your life that are in dire need of organisation without having to worry about paying late payment fees or penalties.
Additional Reading: Credit Card Payment Through Net Banking
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Curb Your Impulses
Do you love making impulsive purchases every now and then? Do you go weak in the knees and end up swiping your Credit/Debit Card without giving it a second thought?
Well, this happens due to a disorganised budget plan. If you don’t have a sound budget in place, chances are you will end up spending recklessly. By organising your finances and planning your budget accordingly, you will get a clearer picture of how much you can and cannot spend every month.
By sticking to the budget you’ve drawn up, you will learn to control your impulses over time, helping you save more in the long run.
Additional Reading: A Superbly Easy Way To Keep A Budget
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Less Clutter, More Space
The less cluttered your surroundings are, the less storage space you’ll need. Unnecessarily hoarding things at home can eat into your finances especially if you keep buying furniture to keep all your unwanted junk in.
Get rid of everything you don’t need. You could hold a garage sale or even make use of online sites to sell things you barely use. That way you could even recover some of the money you spent.
Additional Reading: Financial Planning For Homemakers
Now that you know how decluttering and being more organised can help you save more, here are a few tips to help you declutter and organise your finances as well.
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Too many salary accounts? Time to shut them down.
We know you are a career-conscious person and love looking for better job opportunities. Understandably, you’ve switched a couple of jobs along the way. Nothing wrong with that, but what you need to worry about is all those salary accounts that are no longer in use.
Close any dormant salary accounts you have as soon as you make a job switch. It’s an important part of cleaning up your financial closet. Why? All those unused Savings Accounts don’t serve any purpose and you just end up paying penalties for non-maintenance of minimum balance.
It may not be a huge amount, but a penny saved is a penny earned. There’s nothing more frustrating than paying a penalty for something that isn’t of much use to you.
Additional Reading: Dormant Savings Accounts 101
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Multiple Savings Accounts? Bad idea!
Like multiple salary accounts don’t make any sense, the same concept applies to regular Savings Accounts as well. One of the first steps towards uncluttering your finances is getting rid of all those inactive bank accounts.
Don’t be under the impression that having multiple bank accounts can help you save better. It won’t! On the contrary, it might just make you poorer by slowly draining your money in the form of all those account maintenance penalties.
Moreover, keeping a fixed number of ‘active’ bank accounts also simplifies your life. You no longer need to keep a track of multiple accounts and jumble everything up. Instead of trying to save more using multiple Savings Accounts, you must look into other ways of making your money grow, like investing in SIPs, opening a Fixed Deposit etc.
Additional Reading: Smart SIP Strategies
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When was the last time you checked your Mutual Funds portfolio?
Still haven’t started investing in Mutual Funds? It’s time you did. If you know the market inside out, the returns can be pretty good. If you don’t, do your research before diving into the deep end.
If some of your funds have similar holding patterns, your chances of making a profit drop significantly. Duplication and overlapping won’t help you make more. Therefore, it’s essential to check your Mutual Funds portfolio regularly. It’ll help you filter out the underperforming ones.
Additional Reading: Top-Performing Mutual Funds In India
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Love juggling your Credit Cards? Think again!
The feeling of having multiple Credit Cards might make your wallet look bulky and make you look cool, but eventually, it does strain your finances.
The more the number of Credit Cards, the higher are your chances of giving into the temptation of splurging. Give up the cards you don’t really need and limit yourself to one or two cards that give you maximum benefits.
Tip: Close the Credit Cards with higher rates of interest first.
Additional Reading: 5 Credit Card Mistakes To Avoid
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Heard about it?
Keeping yourself well-insured not only helps take care of expenses during unfortunate incidents, it also acts as a protective financial instrument. If you still haven’t opted for insurance, pick a life cover plan that compensates your annual income.
Getting a Life Insurance policy isn’t enough. You also need to check whether your Health and Motor Insurance are in place. Just like your stock market investments, you need to have a well-defined insurance portfolio as well. Three to four policies is all you should aim for.
Additional Reading: 5 Things To Keep In Mind While Buying Term Insurance
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Loan here. Loan there. Loans everywhere!
If you have too many loan repayments to take care of then maybe it’s time to review your existing loans and think twice before opting for more.
Start with your high cost loans. Start exploring all possible options to close them down as early as you possibly can. You can choose to increase your monthly EMIs and reduce the loan tenure to close them as soon as you can.
This option will work only if you have enough extra free cash to spare. Otherwise, just talk to your bank and see what they have to say.
Additional Reading: 3 Loans That You Should Close Quickly
We hope this will convince you to declutter and organise your life and your finances. Now that you’re well informed, it’s time to think about making your money grow by investing in a Fixed Deposit.