Step 4: The Secret of How to Keep Your Savings

Make It Very Hard to Access!

Believe it or not, money is purely a head game. The most important thing is how you think about yourself, how much you are willing to take care of yourself, and how much you are willing to strategize to have a better life for yourself. Trust me on this; no one is going to take care of you. Making a financial life is your responsibility. These are the steps that I followed, and the 10% rule is its foundation.

You Need a Strategy to Protect Your Savings

That gets us to our next question. How do you prevent yourself from taking the money back out?

(1) Make it so that you never see the money going out of your pay and

(2) make it hard to get to the money that you have saved.

First, open a savings account at a bank that is not close to where you live or work. Then do automatic deduction from your bank account for the percentage of your pay that will go straight into that savings account. Second, do not buy checks, do not get an ATM, or a debit card associated with that account. Make it hard to access to the money.

I started with the Holiday Club Account at a credit union. The Holiday Club locks the money into the account until November and then you have a stash of cash to blow for the Holidays. Once the money unlocks, you decide how much you want to take out, or your can leave the whole amount in as your savings. After a certain time, the account will lock again and then you have to wait another year to get the money. Or they penalize you if you take it out before the allotted time.

That little account started the whole game for me. I was always amazed by how much I saved. And of course, I felt so successful that I upped the amount to 2% until I was all the way up to 10%. This worked for me and it will work for you. Find a bank that has a Holiday club. Here is the link to the Cal Bear Holiday Club. https://www.calbearcu.org/savings-account

If there is no Holiday Club in your area, just open a regular savings account that is physically hard to get to and do not get anything attached to it; no checks, no ATM, no debit card, nothing. Just go for a good old fashioned skinny savings account that will grow surprisingly fat, don’t you worry.

It Helps to Have a Partner in Life

Two heads are better than one. Two incomes are better than one. One strategy for success in business is to have a partner. You want someone who has money goals similar to yours, who shares the same goals as you and is willing to work as hard as you do. You want a partner who will share the 10% savings goal.

The same is true for your personal life. If life has blessed you with a good partner, lucky you! But your partner must be on board with your 10% savings goal. If you are in a relationship, you must agree to do this program together. It is extremely difficult to become wealthy if one partner is a saver and the other partner is a spender.

Talk to your partner directly and tell them that you want to follow the 10% savings rule. If together, you commit to these principles on money, life’s other problems tend to become much smaller. It is absolutely essential that you and your life partner commit together to follow the steps of wealth. We are talking about the fundamental issue of life here – money. A lot happens after money shows up. Take the cruise together.

Don’t Reach for the Stars Just Yet! Just 10%!

In the beginning, when you are first setting up your savings habits, avoid huge savings goals. My first goal was saving 1% of my gross income! Then I pushed it up to 2%. It got much faster as the years went by. By year three, I was increasing the percentage every quarter, instead of every year. Within four years, I hit the 10% mark. If you set yourself a goal of $10 million dollars, you will be so daunted by the size of your task, it will be difficult to begin.

Money is earned in small sums first. Money earned and saved becomes larger and larger. Money builds on itself. If you start with and reach a small monetary goal, you will be encouraged when you meet your goal. That is why your first goal needs to be reaching 10% of your gross income. This is a reachable goal that you should strive for because, for your circumstances, you will be able to meet this goal.

Read the next article to find out the next Step of Wealth!

And read the book under Recommended Reading, “A Million Bucks by 30”. This book cracks me up. Alan Corey talks about the same stuff, and arrived at the same conclusions, that I did. (He just did it sooner, yes, indeed.) Ok, it is more geared toward the college student but it is short, funny, and accurate. And! he really ended up succeeding, no problem. This book cheers me up.