my grandfather shared this saving strategy with my sister who shared it with me. it’s super simple, mike and i have done it before, and its cool to see how quickly the money adds up. we’re now employing this strategy to save for our trip to chicago at the end of october. so what’s this quick, easy saving strategy that’s going to have us eating our fill of yummy chicago pizza?

save $5 bills.

i’m telling you this works.  the last time we did this we saved $150 to put towards my credit card bill. and i read in real simple about a women that took her family on vacation to cape cod by saving $5s. it’s a small enough amount that you don’t feel the pinch but it’s sizable enough to add up relatively quickly. like if you go to starbucks and pay with a $20 and get three $5s back.

granted you have to carry around cash to make this work.  you won’t get very far if your wallet only sees a $20 bill once a month. it’s all about how committed you are to this saving plan.  i get cash once a week from tutoring and my rate of saving is quite a bit higher than mike’s who only has cash if he makes an effort to go to the atm. maybe you start to take out your weekly or monthly spending money in cash. and you have to be disciplined about it. i put $5s in a different place in my wallet so that i don’t spend them accidentally.

i’m not going to lie there are times when i’m getting a burrito at chipotle and secretly hope i don’t get $5s back. and maybe yesterday i paid for my $2 coffee with my debit card so that i could keep my $20 bill in tact. [do as i say, not as i do.] wow, now i feel really guilty about that. but now that i have that little confession out in the open, i’ll be more accountable.

i’ll keep you posted on how much we’re able to save using this method before we take off for chicago.