Creating a super savings plan

If as Dave Ramsey says "personal finance is 80% behaviour" then changing that behaviour is central to your success. Creating a super savings plan will provide you with the tools you need to achieve your financial goals. 

First of what is a savings/plan goal?
While your budget takes care of your monthly expenses a savings plan take a more long term view, whilst it is connected to how you budget it is essentially deicing how much you are going to set aside, to save for a specific purpose. 

How to create a successful savings plan?

Budget Mastery
Central to saving success is having control on your budget. If you are not already doing so, taking the time each and every month to go over the previous months spending, looking at where change can be made, and praising yourself for your successes, before moving on to making a plan for the coming month. Once you have managed to wrestle your budget under control you will be in a better position to see how much money you actually have available each and every month to contribute to your savings plan. 

You might find that you are budgeting, but yet there is not money spare to contribute to savings. There are two ways to tackle this, either by reducing expenditure or increasing your income (or a combination of both). By having a solid grasp of your budget you will be able to easily identify where you are spending your money, and in turn where you can make cutbacks. 

Earn More, Spend Less
There will be expenses, essentials which it will not be possible to cut down spending. It is worthwhile separating expenses into two categories, essential and non-essential. Then rank those non-essentials in order of importance. Know you know which of your non-essential expenses is least important to you, this is where you will start making cutbacks, progressively working up the list of importance until you are able to cut back the amount you want to contribute to your savings goal. 

The alternative is to increase you income, there are lots of ways to add additional income beyond simply picking up as second job , we have plenty of them on our site that work around busy schedules so be sure to check out all your options. 

Goal Setting 
Setting goals is very important but setting goals in the right manner is the key to achieving them. You might remember as a child SMART goals, a principle of goal setting that increases you success rate. 

This means that these goals must be:
- Specific
- Measurable
- Attainable
- Relevant
- Time 

An example could be "I am going to save £50 a month, towards my car maintenance sinking fund, for 12 months". 

Lets break down this goal
- It is specific, it is for the purpose of a sinking fund. We know where the money is going and what it will be used for. 
- It is measurable by the set amount each month, rather than "I'll just save a bit each month".
- It is attainable because it is not a huge amount to contribute each month, though of course, this should assessed in light of your budget. 
- It is relevant to the needs of car ownership.
- It is time specific, only for the duration of 12 months. 

Accountability 
Now you've determined your SMART savings goal, it is important to write out your plan for success. Maybe even consider filling out a chart where you colour in as you make progress such as these ones.  Share your goals with others for added accountability. 

What are your savings goals at the moment?