Unpredictable things happen all the time in life. With an emergency savings account, it’s much simpler to fix your cars, maintain your home, buy any home devices, or cover an unforeseen expenditure. Then again, having extra cash on hand for emergencies is a crucial component of your financial health. Most experts recommend having enough emergency savings to cover three to six months of expenses. Even the most well-intentioned saver may be put off by the daunting sum of money needed to reach that goal.
But don’t quit before you even try! Practicing how to build an emergency fund is primarily a mental game, and you can win at it. Even if you start with nothing, putting money away regularly, even if it’s just a small amount, will help you reach your goal. It just takes some time and some self-control.
If you’re ready to start, and all the more so if you don’t think you can, here are five ideas that might answer your question on how to build emergency funds.
1. Make a monthly budget that lets you save money.
When you stick to a monthly budget, it’s easier to put together your emergency savings. Budgeting can be accomplished by dividing your salary into three categories: needs, wants, and savings. This method can help you keep track of where your money goes each week.
Start by adding up your monthly bills before deciding how much to spend on wants and needs. How much do you spend each month? It includes everything from housing to transportation to clothing to insurance. The more you know about how much you spend each month, the more purposefully you can know how to build an emergency funds and start saving. Finding ways to cut back on your spending to save more money is a possibility during the process of making this decision.
Once you’ve learned how much you want to keep for your emergency savings each month, you may set up automated transfers so that a particular proportion of each paycheck automatically goes into a designated savings account. Putting your savings on autopilot is the easiest way to know how to build emergency funds, and it will also help you keep saving.
2. Save your spare change.
Another way how to build an emergency funds is by saving your spare change. If you like to pay in cash, starting an emergency savings account is easier by keeping your change.
Let’s imagine you go to a convenience store and buy a drink and a snack, breaking a five-dollar note and getting a clutch of change. Put that money in a large glass jar when you get home. Bring the jar to the bank when it’s full and deposit the money. You can accomplish the same thing if you break a $20 bill. When you receive fives and singles as change, place them in the jar and take them in when you’re ready to deposit the money into your emergency savings account.
3. Don’t spend more each month or get new credit cards.
Onceyou know how to build an emergency funds, don’t be fooled into a false feeling of security and allow spending to creep back up. For instance, you wouldn’t be saving anything if you stopped buying a brand-new pair of shoes each month to replace them later with a different monthly purchasing habit!
If you have $50 left over at the end of each month, you might not be saving enough. You might put too much on your credit card if you don’t have $50 to spare. Neither is helpful. You shouldn’t stop having fun while saving up for an emergency, but you shouldn’t forget how important it is.
You can also always reduce your spending and lower your expenses. If you usually buy coffee and eat lunch out, this might be the best time to bring coffee and lunch from your home. The $5 coffee or $10 lunch you buy daily adds up. If you make your coffee and lunch for work, you’ll save money and be able to put that money into your emergency savings instead. In the same way, it will be much easier to save more each month if you shop for groceries and make meals at home instead of going out to eat.
Having good emergency savings is very important for your financial health. Be realistic, yet try to achieve your ultimate emergency savings target as quickly as possible. That might be enough to make life more fun.
4. Don’t over-save
Or, to be more precise, don’t put too much money in your emergency savings account.
Knowing that it is money you can get quickly teaches you how to build emergency funds. That means you’re probably putting it in something with a low return, like a savings bank account with a minimal interest rate.
Because of that, you should stop putting money into that account once you’ve reached your final goal. Start putting funds into an account where it can start making money on its own. Your retirement accounts are the best place for this to happen over time.
On a side note, if you are paying off large or high-interest debts or credit cards, make sure you balance your need to get off debt with your desire to save for your emergency savings.
It’s essential to save money for your emergency savings, but every day you’re still in debt costs you money. The interest you pay on one account could likely wind up canceling out the money you save in the other.
Instead, you might want to start with a smaller goal for your emergency savings and put any of your extra money to pay off your debt. Once that’s paid off, you can speed up your savings, and that’s when you know how to build an emergency fund. By doing this, you can even raise your target or goal. In the meantime, it’s better to have a small cushion than none.
5. Maximize your car loan
Another unusual and ironic way to have your emergency savings instantly is maximizing your car loan. For instance, car loan Philippines lets you borrow money without having your car surrendered and with no credit history required. Not to mention that application processing is usually fast, so getting those instant emergency savings is easy.
Most car loan Philippines has the exact basic standard requirements. Having a valid driver’s license, a copy of the vehicle’s OR/CR, salary stubs, and some corporate paperwork (if you run a corporation) are all required. A few simple requirements make it easy to get a loan quickly.
In BlendPH’s Auto-Sangla (ORCR) Loan, interested car owners can get approved faster and have more ways to pay for their cars.
After all, BlendPH is considered to have the easiest and fastest application processing in the country. It is a type of car loan Philippines where the borrower shows the authentic Certificate of Registration and Official Receipt (ORCR) of an owner’s vehicle to get a loan quickly and easily. The registration papers for the car are used as security. BlendPH’s Auto Sangla loan is available through partner lenders like Forbes Lending Solutions Corporation, which are part of the peer-to-peer funding platform. It is easy to get approved for, and if the borrower doesn’t repay the loan, the lender can take the car.
For a loanable amount between 10,000 to 3,000,000 pesos, BlendPH offers one of the lowest interest rates of 1.5% each month within six to 24 months, among other lending car loan Philippines. Within 24 to 48 hours, car loan Philippines processing applications can get approved.
Compared to other car loan Philippines lending companies, borrowers can still use their cars through BlendPH’s Auto-Sangla (ORCR) Loan. According to one of car loan Philippines’ most straightforward and fastest lending companies, even if a car ORCR is turned into cash and used for things like paying tuition, making repairs to a house, or growing a business, the owner can still use the car. The creditor doesn’t have to take the car, which should be a newer model if possible.
It may be a viable option to get cash quickly through car loan Philippines. But if you can, you may want to save this alternative for emergencies where you need a lot of money.
Even though it’s easy to apply and you get the money quickly, repaying the loan can be a bit of a shock because the interest is so high, especially for other companies that offer car loan Philippines. So, the best way is to consider other options before deciding this.