What Are You Saving Money For?
Hey QUBER community - what are you saving money for these days?
Ah, September - summer is wrapping up and the kids are back in school. As much as many of us dread the impending change of season, this time of year provides an excellent opportunity to focus and get back on track when it comes to our financial goals. So, we’ll ask again, what are you saving for these days?
If you’re feeling unfocused about your saving goals lately, it helps to take a step back and think about what you’ve got coming up over the next few months. With the change in seasons often comes a new set of expenses: you may need to get your winter tires switched over soon, or might need some weather-proofing done to your home before temperatures drop. Fall will soon become winter, bringing the inevitably expensive holiday season with it. It’s estimated that the average American spends almost $1000 ($998) during the holidays on gifts, parties, travel expenses and more. Are you prepared for that cash outflow yet?
If not seasonal, your goals may be tied to a shorter-term timeline. As an example, if you’ve got some debt to pay off after a summer of fun activities and events, September provides a great time to hunker down at home and put the income you might otherwise spend on weekend fun towards your credit card bill. Or, you could think about boosting your emergency fund by trying out a new Saving Rule (for example, save an additional $10 each week on top of what you already have active in QUBER).
It could also be time to focus on larger-scale financial goals. This could include a foray into investing, obtaining protective insurance products or saving up for a down payment on a car or a home. Large goals can be tough to reach based on the discipline it takes to stay focused on saving for them, but you can make it easier by breaking down the goal into smaller, more achievable chunks (like focusing on saving $1000 first instead of trying for $10,000).
What are other QUBER users saving for?
We analyzed some macro-level data from our Canadian pool of users to see if there were any trends we could identify in people’s saving goals. This graph shows the split in percentages (for a total of 100%) in current user enrolment between each of our Saving Challenges to see if there were any clear favourites amongst the crowd, and found the following:
Active QUBER Saving Challenges in September 2022 (Canadian Users)
It’s interesting to see that of all our goal-specific Challenges, the Travel Challenge is the most popular. This makes total sense to us though - whatever your idea of a dream vacation is, we can only imagine you’re dying to finally get there post-pandemic! We were also interested to see that our $10 a Week Challenge was the most popular of all our non-targeted Challenges. We think it’s because $10 is an amount of money that most people feel they can comfortably save week after week. Don’t underestimate the effect of saving small amounts though - completing this Challenge will net you an extra $520 in savings in a year!
We also looked back on the answers of a few of our Save to Win winners to find some more specific examples. When a user wins a Save to Win prize, we ask them if their prize will be going towards a specific goal (answering is optional). Here are a few answers from some of our winners over the last two months of draws:
Practical decisions like adding the prize to their emergency savings has been a popular choice among winners, but there were still plenty who planned to put their prize towards a more luxurious purchase, like an upcoming vacation. Remember to keep saving in The Vault for your chance to win our 2022 grand prize in January - one American user and one Canadian user will each win $1000 for growing their savings through the back half of this year!
If you feel like you’re having a difficult time saving, it’s important to remember that you can approach the problem from more than one angle: you can spend less, or you can find ways to earn more income. There are so many different ways to bring in additional income outside of your full-time job that can make paying the bills easier or allow you to buy more of the things you want. Check out our list of 6 Ways You Could Be Earning Extra Income (though as a note to our American user base, some of these options were originally written with only our Canadian users in mind).
As a final note, it’s always important to remember that your saving journey is highly personal. All of us can think of money as grease for the wheels of our lives: you need it to make the major life moves you want to, and for those of us with limited financial resources, saving is an essential part of the process. Beyond the base-level need for money, everything else is up to you. We can suggest a million different saving goals for you to pursue, but only you will be able to decide which goals really deserve your attention. Happy saving!
Related Posts:
→ How to Vacation on a Budget
→ 7 Tips To Help You Save For A Home Down Payment Faster
→ I’m Not On Track To Reach My Financial Goals. Help!
→ 10 Tips To Help You Eliminate Your Debt