Reducing Costs: The Everyday Household Essentials
Key Points Build Continuous Savings: This challenge isn’t just about immediate savings; it’s designed to establish sustainable, mindful spending habits.
November 11, 2024
Day Two: The Passive Penny Challenge
Today's Action
Find the low-hanging fruit for a savings boost.
Key Points
- Continue the Dollar Per Day Commitment: Start by setting aside one dollar as a steady foundation, reinforcing the habit of saving consistently.
- Find Easy Wins: Look for low-effort ways to boost savings each week, such as loose change, unclaimed money, unused gift cards, and items you can sell.
- Weekly Savings Boost: Make it a routine to find accessible, small savings boosts weekly, building both momentum and confidence in your saving journey.
Start with a Dollar
As you did yesterday, set aside another dollar. This simple act reinforces your daily commitment and builds a steady foundation. Saving is all about consistency and continuous improvement, and this dollar-a-day habit is designed to keep you moving forward.
See Opportunities not Roadblocks
Don’t wait for the perfect moment. Instead, take small, steady steps that bring your dreams closer to reality each day.
Saving money is challenging when we fail to recognize the potential hiding in plain sight. Often, we underestimate the value of what surrounds us, overlooking treasures within arm’s reach. From overlooked loose change to unused gift cards stashed in drawers, and even the value in items we no longer use, opportunities for saving money surround us everyday.
This challenge is not just about finding spare change or gift cards; it’s about recognizing that even the simplest untapped resources within our lives can be transformed into financial opportunities.
Look for Low-Hanging Fruit for a Savings Boost
The most effective ways to jumpstart your savings is by going after the “low-hanging fruit”—the funds you already have on hand but may have overlooked. Finding this money can give your savings a quick boost.
Start by focusing on five simple areas – money owed to you, loose change, unused gift cards, forgotten funds and unclaimed assets. It may seem obvious to start here, but you’d be surprised at what you’ll find.
- Loose Change and Cash Around the House: Believe it or not, the average U.S. household has about $113 in loose change lying around. Check your car’s cup holders, your couch cushions, and those small jars or drawers where spare coins often end up. This quick search could easily yield a small but valuable boost for your savings.
- Unused Gift Cards: Almost half of all Americans have unused gift cards tucked away, with an average value of around $128 per household. A quick check of your wallet, kitchen drawers, or junk drawer could reveal a few unspent gift cards waiting to be put to work. You can either use them to offset your expenses or sell them for cash, giving your savings an immediate lift.
- Money Owed to You: More than half of Americans have extended financial help to friends and family members. On average, outstanding debts from these loans amount to $400 per person. Moreover, many individuals may have unclaimed earnings from work or services they’ve provided but haven’t received compensation.
- Forgotten Funds: Take a moment to check if you have any cash sitting idle in mobile apps, dormant bank accounts, credit card rewards programs, or unclaimed rebates waiting to be redeemed.
- Unclaimed Assets: There is over $70 billion dollars in unclaimed assets and 1 in 7 Americans have unclaimed property held by state governments, ranging from forgotten bank accounts to uncashed payroll checks. While most unclaimed assets are small amounts, some claims can reach figures in the six and seven digits.
Finding low-hanging fruit for your first savings boost is about more than just adding dollars to your savings—it’s a mindset shift. You’re training yourself to recognize opportunities in the resources you already have, breaking away from the belief that savings must come solely from income or heavy cuts to your spending.
By tackling these easy sources of additional funds, you’re proving to yourself that saving money doesn’t have to start with money itself, but with creativity and initiative. You’re building momentum, setting the stage for more strategic savings efforts down the road, and reinforcing that savings isn’t just about cutting costs—it’s about maximizing the value of what’s already within reach.
The Passive Penny Savings Challenge
What if saving money could be simple, automatic, and effortless? What if, instead of constantly worrying about how much you can set aside, you build a system that quietly grows your savings in the background—day after day, year after year? That’s the idea behind the Passive Penny Challenge.
Next Read
Day Three: The Passive Penny Challenge – Supercharge your savings with a high-yield savings account. With this account, not only will you be setting up an emergency savings fund, but you’ll also be establishing your first source of passive income as interest begins to grow your money with time.
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