Shave Your Budget, Not Your Moustache

November 12, 2014

A recent Wells Fargo study found that 31% of survey respondents do not think they will have enough money to “survive” on in retirement, yet more than half say they plan to save later for retirement in order to “make up for not saving enough now.” If we have learned anything from Aesop’s fable regarding the ant and the grasshopper, it’s that waiting until later is NOT a good strategy. This is especially true when it comes to saving for retirement.

Our recent research on retirement preparedness reveals that only 20% of employees that took a financial wellness assessment in 2013 are confident they are on track for retirement. Of the 80% that are not on track, many simply don’t know because they have not used a retirement planning calculator to estimate where they are. Much more needs to be done in order to get employees ready for retirement, but perhaps most of all is increasing savings.

So, in the spirit of Movember, I would like to challenge my male readers to leave their beautiful upper-lip hair alone and instead put the razor to their spending so that they can increase how much they are saving for retirement. (Note: Non-male readers are welcome to participate in the challenge as well.) Here are some of the top money-saving tips our planners at Financial Finesse have come up with to help:

  • Bruce Young, captain of the Financial Finesse beach volleyball team, likes to shave his budget by utilizing a subscription service via Amazon for certain items that he and his wife purchase consistently, e.g. razors! Bruce estimates that they save anywhere from $25-$30 a month this way.
  • Linda Robertson, our Finance Geek, suggests not taking a haircut at the deli counter but instead buying your own pre-cooked turkey breast or ham and shaving off your lunch meat at home. Packing your own lunch instead of ordering sandwiches at the deli could save you anywhere from $5 to $10 a day.
  • Michael Smith, The Communicator, sees no point in maintaining a cell phone AND a home phone, so his suggestion: cut the cord and drop the home phone. Depending on where you live, this could save you as much as $30 or more a month.
  • Tania Brown, one of the newest members of the team, suggests cutting the cable cord and instead buying an antenna and using services like Netflix, Hulu or Amazon to stream movies and TV shows. Antennas can cost about $50-$75 per TV, and the combo of Netflix and Hulu is right around $16 per month, so it will take about 6 months to be ahead of the cost.  If eliminating cable is too painful, Tania suggests calling the cable company and asking for any special promotions to reduce the current bill. Either way, you shouldn’t have to spend all of your entertainment dollars BEFORE you retire.
  • Paul Wannemacher, Toledo’s finest, believes in doing things yourself, so he likes to save money on lawn care by cutting his own grass. Other DIY projects Paul likes to do include minor plumbing repairs, interior painting, and refinishing his deck. If you do need to call in a professional, Paul suggests asking what you can do to offset the cost. For example, if you plan to have your floors redone, plan to pull up the old flooring yourself.
  • Daphne Winston, our Maiden on the Midway, likes to trim her energy bill by turning off lights and keeping the thermostat higher in the summer and lower in the winter. As the temperatures dropped this past weekend, she opted to add a blanket at night and to wear a sweater during the day. Instead of heating the whole house, she only heats up the rooms she is in. The result was a drop in her heating bill from about $120 a month to $85 a month.
  • Scott Spann, our Money Doc, saves about $10 a month by avoiding the barber and letting his wife cut his hair. If you ever met Scott in person, you’d never know the difference.
  • Personally, I think it would be best if everyone stopped paying interest on debt and simply cut up their credit cards. Avoiding plastic and using cash to pay for items such as groceries, gas, entertainment and dining can save thousands in finance charges over a lifetime.

These are just a handful of ideas. By themselves, they don’t seem like much, but combine a few and you could save $300 or more a month. Over 20 years that could add up to over $120,000 in additional retirement savings! Imagine the sweet moustache that’ll grow ya’?