Different name, different attitude to saving!

A simple change of tactic can make the world of difference when it comes to getting the family on board with saving! Our family recently did a $21 Challenge. To begin with, I was talking with my daughter, when the children started carrying on about the challenge, (the eldest child in that household in 21!). The other adult in the house said nothing, but his expression said everything. What was I going to do to get them on board? I had a lightbulb moment and told them that I was playing SURVIVOR, with help from my fridge, my freezer and my garden. Did I get any more criticism? No way. What I got was discussions on which family member would be able to survive with what is available at home, and for how long. This discussion went on for a week or more. I heard no more complaints and we spent just $2.99 over a fortnight! Next goal is a $41.00 challenge for a whole month. I just need to set a date, and get my support team going again!

Many meals from one rolled roast

I have found a way to get maximum meals and value from one single rolled roast. I bought a rolled pork roast which was way too big for just the two of us. Not wanting to be living on leftovers all week, I decided to cut it in half before cooking it. As I was about to place the uncooked half in the freezer, I decided to cut it into thinner slices and use the meat as pork chops instead. This has worked well! I also plan to cut the rolled roast into chunks in future, to use for stir fry, sweet and sour pork and so on. Normally you could never get pork chops or stir fry for $7.99 a kilo! There's no reason why you couldn't use this method with other rolled roasts too.

Declare war on the mortgage

We decided to get rid of the $96,000 mortgage on our home within three years. The massive load of interest we would pay to the bank was over the top and we felt that the bank owned us. The entire family bought into the project one hundred percent.

1) We replaced the nice modern cars with older, less costly ones. The net difference and any savings we had and $700 from a garage sale were paid off the mortgage.

2) We agreed to budget as if we were in a life and death war and the war had to be won in three years. I developed an Excel budget spreadsheet and we tweaked the numbers until we had a 'do-able' weekly saving of $220 extra to pay off the mortgage. Clothes purchases would be done exclusively at 'Harrods', our Salvation Army shop, until the war was over.

We decided to run any item not budgeted for over three 'hurdles'.

The first hurdle was 'could it shorten the mortgage war?'

The second hurdle was 'is it a health issue?' and if so what was the least-cost workable solution?

The third hurdle was 'could it wait until the end of the three years?'

3) As time progressed we became pretty smart at reassigning money to reward ourselves for enduring the war. This meant we could have a low cost take away sometimes, or spend on an out of budget item we had set our hearts on.

It took nearly four years to knock off the mortgage. Yes, we won the war a little later than hoped, but we won. If it had taken eight or nine years to win, it would still have been worth it.

The legacy of our war against the mortgage is that we have developed great money saving skills for life. And life is great.

'E-money jar' perfect for cashless society

I have saved $50 in virtual coins in just a few weeks, since I started using my online money jar! I like the idea of emptying out my purse at the end of every day and placing loose change into a money jar to help me to save. The trouble is, I don't really carry any cash on me any more! Whenever I need to buy something I transfer the exact amount onto my debit card then go out and buy it. This ensures I never have excess cash to spend but it makes it difficult to save loose change. So I came up with this idea. Every time I log on to Internet banking I check all my savings accounts and transfer all the cents into a separate savings account called my 'e-Money Jar'. It's working perfectly and is amazing how quickly those few cents soon mount up!