Budget Archives - Making Sense Of Cents

12 Money Hacks That Will Help You Save More Money

Last Updated: September 8, 2020 BY Michelle Schroeder-Gardner - 7 Comments

Disclosure: This post may contain affiliate links, meaning I get a commission if you decide to make a purchase through my links, at no cost to you. Please read my disclosure for more info.

Are you looking for some money hacks so you can start saving more money? Are you looking for tricks to make it easier to save money?

First, what is a money hack? According to Merriam-Webster, a life hack is “a usually simple and clever tip or technique for accomplishing some familiar task more easily and efficiently.”

And, a money hack is something similar but related to money.

A money hack is a simple and clever way to save money. It could be something that quickly stops you from spending money, something that makes saving money more mindless, etc.

The purpose of using money hacks is to make it easier to save money. This can help you pay off debt, stop living paycheck to paycheck, or even retire early.

However, most people say that saving money is easier said than done, though. That’s exactly why I’m sharing these tips with you today.

Learning how to save money doesn’t have to be hard. [Read more…]

How My Wife and I Lived on $2,000 Per Month for 3 Years During a Financial Hardship

Last Updated: September 4, 2020 BY Michelle Schroeder-Gardner - 26 Comments

Disclosure: This post may contain affiliate links, meaning I get a commission if you decide to make a purchase through my links, at no cost to you. Please read my disclosure for more info.

Hello! Today, I have a guest post from Dave at The Dollar Blogger. Dave lost his job, and then 2 weeks later his wife was laid off. This is their story of how they got by, their sacrifices, strategies, and more.

I’ll be honest – I’m not one for excessive frugality. I wouldn’t consider myself frivolous, at least, not anymore, but my wife Mary and I were hit with a solid dose of reality when we lost all of our income over the course of two weeks in 2012. One wrong turn and a layoff two weeks later took Mary and me from making over $100,000 in a year to zero income.

In this post, I’m going to share with you this scary financial hardship that rocked our world, and how the two of us got through it successfully and back on our feet.

We also learned some life-changing lessons about money, which is excellent for anyone who suffers a sudden and total income loss.

In the end, we lived on $2,000 a month, for just over three years.

What You Need To Know About Renting A Room In Your House

Last Updated: August 31, 2020 BY Michelle Schroeder-Gardner - 5 Comments

Disclosure: This post may contain affiliate links, meaning I get a commission if you decide to make a purchase through my links, at no cost to you. Please read my disclosure for more info.

Are you thinking about renting out a room in your house to make extra money?

We owned a house before we started traveling full-time, and over the years we had four different roommates.

We were able to rent out an extra bedroom and the finished basement to our roommates, and it was a good way to make extra money.

While having roommates is not always perfect, the extra money we made over the years was really appreciated. It helped me pay off my debt and save some money.

And, I have experienced renting a room in a house on both ends.

Before I bought my house, I rented a spare room from someone else, and the roles were flipped.

While renting out a room involves some work, it is a somewhat passive source of income that can help you bring in some extra money without too much effort. [Read more…]

Yotta Savings App Review – Win up to $10 million weekly by saving in an FDIC insured account

Last Updated: September 18, 2020 BY Michelle Schroeder-Gardner - 10 Comments

Disclosure: This post may contain affiliate links, meaning I get a commission if you decide to make a purchase through my links, at no cost to you. Please read my disclosure for more info.

Welcome to my Yotta Savings review.

I recently came across an interesting new savings account, and I am excited to share it with you all today.

I think you’ll want to hear about this as it’s such an interesting and new concept.

Here’s a quick overview of the new savings app that gives you the opportunity to win $10,000,000 every single week.

Yotta Savings uses the psychology that drives Americans to play the lottery to instead motivate Americans to save money.

For every $25 that you save with Yotta, you have the chance to win $0.10 all the way up to $10,000,000, every week.

And, if you don’t win, your cash that you’ve saved still has a 0.20% savings rate, which is twice as high as the national average.

The creators of Yotta built this savings app to help Americans meet their savings goals. This is especially important because according to the Federal Reserve, 40% of Americans do not have $400 for an emergency. However, even though that is a crazy statistic, Americans still spend $80 billion on the lottery every year, which averages out to $640 per U.S. household. [Read more…]

Pay off our mortgage or not? A glimpse into a couple’s final decision

Last Updated: July 26, 2020 BY Michelle Schroeder-Gardner - 18 Comments

Disclosure: This post may contain affiliate links, meaning I get a commission if you decide to make a purchase through my links, at no cost to you. Please read my disclosure for more info.

Hello! Here is a guest post from Melissa Brock about her decision on whether or not to pay off her mortgage. Melissa is the Money editor at Benzinga and founder of Collegemoneytips.com. Enjoy!

My husband and I like to make excellent financial decisions. He says I’m obsessed with our finances — which is kind of true. I mean, I listen to the “Afford Anything” podcast and read every personal finance related piece of content I can get my scroll-happy finger on. I’m also the Money editor at Benzinga for my full-time job. (Okay, okay, he’s right.)

Our mortgage is a source of well… pain, for me, if you want to know the truth. All the reading I do probably contributes to that. One day, I’ll read an expert post about how so-and-so plans to invest like crazy, pay the minimum on his mortgage, then run, giggling, toward retirement (early!) and revel in the spoils of compound interest.

This person might say, “Why would you pump money into a non-liquid asset?”

And so my mind goes, “Yeah! That makes sense.” [Read more…]

A 31 Year Old’s Journey to $5,000,000 in Rental Property Value

Last Updated: July 19, 2020 BY Michelle Schroeder-Gardner - 5 Comments

Disclosure: This post may contain affiliate links, meaning I get a commission if you decide to make a purchase through my links, at no cost to you. Please read my disclosure for more info.

Today, I have a great article to share with you from Kyle Kroeger on how to invest in real estate. He has a goal of reaching $5,000,000 in rental property value, and is sharing his plan today.

The prospect of retiring early on real estate is highly intriguing to me. It should be for a number of people and I’ll highlight a bit more below.

For millennials, like me, we don’t have it easy. Despite the mainstream media’s thoughts, millennials have faced a Great Recession, massive student loans and a global pandemic already at a young age.

We’ve seen a lot but that can be used to our advantage for financial planning and life goals.

That’s okay if things are a bit harder for millennials financially. It’s a bit more fun when things are hard.

Here I’m ready to show you why real estate investing can be a great asset class.

Related content:

[Read more…]

Is it cheaper to buy eggs or raise chickens?

Last Updated: July 3, 2020 BY Michelle Schroeder-Gardner - 4 Comments

Disclosure: This post may contain affiliate links, meaning I get a commission if you decide to make a purchase through my links, at no cost to you. Please read my disclosure for more info.

Hello! Today, I have a great article to share about raising backyard chickens for eggs, and how much it will cost you to raise chickens. I have several different family members who raise chickens for eggs, so I am familiar with the topic. When Chris approached me with the guest post idea, I had to say yes because I thought it would be interesting to learn more about the money side of it. Enjoy!

Like many, I didn’t decide to start raising chickens with a spreadsheet in front of me.

I had just returned from visiting my parents’ new retirement project, a hobby farm in northern Vermont that was bustling with chickens and ducks and all sorts of wonderful, useful livestock I had never considered keeping for myself until that moment.

After all, I grew up in the suburbs, full of cats, dogs, and the snake the “weird kid” in middle school loved to talk about, and the only “livestock” were the cows that were shipped in every summer to picturesquely dot the fields behind the local ice cream place – carefully kept too far away from customers to smell.

I was thinking about delicious, farm-fresh eggs; endless access to high-quality fertilizer and pest controls; taking control of where my food came from and developing a healthier, organic diet; and of course, just the joys of animal ownership. [Read more…]

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