When to start SAVING?
There is no specified time for you to start saving but it's not to late either to start. Some of the principles of savings.
GENERAL SAVING PRINCIPLES
(A) Have a healthy balance between SAVING and CONSUMING
Brian did pose a question of "Why eat posho and beans for 365 days a year because your trying to save yet you do earn 5million per month? And to the other extreme Why eat breakfast, lunch, super at High rated hotel like Sheraton or Serena everyday because you earn 5million per month?" so therefore to know how much to save you need to strike a healthy balance.
(B) Put your SAVINGS where you can't reach it.
if you donot trust yourself keeping the money you have saved, then put it far from you say a fixed deposit account or SACCO.
(C) Close the leaking tap.
Some people fail to save just because many money taps are leaking. Find a way to close them as fast as possible.
(D) Save when it makes financial sense.
Loan interest might be lower than increase in cost of land over the period of saving. In such a case do not save for land, take a loan and buy the land and repay the loan.
(E) Save for a reason - when you save for nothing in particular, you spend the savings on nothing in particular: - one could save for many reasons; medical insurance, land, education, rent, investment or for retirement.
(F) Start Saving what you can afford.
Do not be over ambitious. You might start saving a huge amount and give up shortly. The discipline is better than the amount. Once you have learnt the discipline, increase the amount.
(G) If your dream is lifelong poverty, then generously pay the landlord, taxis, supermarket, schools, friends, but please DO NOT pay yourself.
With SAVING you do payback yourself. It is arguably the hardest discipline in personal financial management. Consider saving, a current "expense" that will meet your future expenses.
(H) We all need to know that is not what YOU earn but what you keep that determines your financial success in future.
6 personal Finance Management principles that you need to know about SAVING:-
1. Always LIVE within your means
2. Cut your coat according to the cloth's size.
3. As far as possible, do not make credit a part of your lives. Many people live at 130% - 150% of their earnings. Ie Borrowing, Salary Advance, Loan sharks to just consume.
4. Be content.
5. DONOT spend to please others - either they don't care or they will get jealous of what you have spent on.
6. The mark of adulthood is the ability to take full responsibility for one's actions - Take personal responsibility for your finances and stop "blame-mania"
Always remember the best way to SAVE is not to LOSE it. So start now by using energy saving bulbs, always shop with a list, avoid long time calls, reduce on transportation cost where possible, change your lifestyle.
Brian nicely summarized "There is no poverty as great as the poverty of the mind. This is always expressed as "I CAN'T" "IT IS IMPOSSIBLE"
No wonder the average person is recorded as using only 10% of their brain capacity. Cemeteries are filled with dead dreams and hopes of our natural tendencies towards pessimism. You can be financially successful, so start to dream again ............... Dream BIG .............. THEN ACT"
