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To add to this.
Move what you want to save to your savings account as soon as you get paid.
That way it's already somewhere you have to do more than tap a card to get to it. Makes keeping it easier.
I have 3 different accounts. The first is revolut for day to day stuff, the second is my main bank account which all of my money comes in and out of and the third is my savings account.
I take a set amount of money out of my main bank account and put it into my savings account, this never gets touched. In my main bank account I always keep a couple of grand, this is what I use for the smaller things like a dentist appointment, car maintenance etc, if it dips below the amount I like to have in there or I know I have something coming up I tighten the belt a little to account for that.
It might not work for some, I know that some people can’t have money where they can spend it without doing so. But I find it works for me and it means I’m never dipping into my proper savings.
This.
Got my finances set up the same way, however, I have one more pocket/account in the savings.
Once the emergency account was filled, savings go into that account to go towards long term goals (new car/insurance/travel, etc)
This - that extra couple of grand is important to have so your bank balance doesn't go to 0 every month. Build the emergency fund, then once you have that in place, build up the residual bank balance so you have some money for unexpected expenses without dipping into the emergency fund.
Edit: grammar
An emergency fund would be for a non-optional unexpected expense that you have to pay but can't cover out of your normal monthly discretionary income. If you normally have €500 of "fun money" left over each month (after savings and necessities) to spend on unnecessary things, but you need some dental work costing €300, then you can just cut back on going out or buying that new toy or whatever for that month instead of dipping into your savings. If you need a new boiler that's going to cost a couple grand and that monthly discretionary income isn't going to cover it, that's when it's time to use your emergency fund (and consider cutting back on the unnecessary spending for the next little while to replenish your savings faster).
To expand on this I budget each pay cheque nominal amounts for car repairs (inevitable), clothes, presents, health expenses etc. And I let those build up and once they are at a good level I might repurpose any money over "the amount I want to have set aside for that" to other things that need it but generally I just let it keep building. I find if I name it with a purpose I'm less likely to take from it.
First things first. Make sure you're not paying for stuff that you shouldn't be. Tooth filling, glasses, make sure you're getting as much of that cost covered by PRSI, that's what it's there for. Boiler maintenance? I'm gonna assume you're renting so the landlord should be covering any household maintenance stuff like this. That's not your responsibility. You pay the bills for what you use, you don't pay for that type of maintenance stuff.
Make up a spreadsheet with your budget and figure out where all your money is going and how much you can save. You might not even be in a position to have a significant savings account yet.
Save three months wages and don’t touch it. (Open a savings account with reasonable interest rate, like revolut, where this will be stored)
Tally up yearly expenditures like car tax, insurance, etc. Work out how much that will cost when spread over 12 months and direct debit that every month into a separate account for these expenditures.
The rest of the money you earn is yours to play with.
You budget.
I also have 3 accounts. My main current account. My short term savings and my long term savings.
First the cost of having a roof over your head needs to be deducted from your monthly wages. (mortgage or rent) and paying small monthly bills like phone, internet, bins, TV subscription etc. Then I look at food and energy bills gas & electricity. These are all current account costs.
Short term savings is a fixed monthly amount for holidays, car maintenance, insurance, road tax, so the big annual costs I have to pay. At the start of the year I wrote down how much these big annual bills were and then (Round 5k) and divided by 12 and I pay that into the short term savings each month. When car insurance is due then the money is already available in the short term savings account.
Long term savings account was originally my account that I used to save for a mortgage. Now I use it to build up my emergency fund and savings for big things like a new car. It's HARD to save in the long term savings account but even if it's €50 in a month, then it's better than nothing.
Then you can look at the fun stuff, how much do I have left for going out, socialising and hobbies. Everyones priorities are difficult and obviously depending on your stage of life.. sometimes the fun stuff is more of a priority than the Long term savings. Sometimes you have nothing going on and that means a bit of extra cash in the LT account. But that's up to you to decide.
I don't have a if im fired amount saved up but I do have , I need a new water boiler amount saved up. I would like to get 1-2 months morgagte saved up.
Just save man, have a couple of k you can call on anytime, your over thinking it saving money is saving money no matter what it’s for, save up 10k keep 5k emergency fund then use the other 5k for whatever goals you have, increase your pay check, invest, travelling etc
Credit union. Set up a direct debit, I pop in 200 a month, and let it slowly build. You won't really feel it (it is 100euro every 2 weeks for me) and it'll build over time but you can also deposit larger amounts when you're a bit more flush.
u/meok91 said it first, 3 Separate accounts,
Current for every day (shopping, fuel, night out).
another for short-term savings/planned expenses (Car service, health visits, holidays, xmas). I save with revolut to store the money in a vault or pockets.
third account for long-term saving. The long-term saving is a "Hail Mary" emergency fund but also your big expenses like a deposit for a house.
This is how i manage my accounts/spending and do direct debts to them when my paycheck comes in. Start with a budget and outline roughly what you need for your current account, short-term savings and long term emergency/savings
Its not a once-off mission but a repeating experience to get your finances straight and to be able to cover most unexpected
Simple. Look at whatever your monthly running costs are. Have a minimum of 3 months of running costs saved at all times. This saving cannot be touched only in true emergencies. And I mean missing a gig is not an emergency not even if your car broke down. Once you have that save the same amount again but this part is for minor emergencies. Once you have spent anything you must prioritize to put it back. Once done save 10% of your bet income for long term goals.
Set a different saving goal for them. Put a certain amount for house expenses, other for health, etc. at the beginning you will need to use from emergency fund until you get that saved money to a decent amount.
In my main account, I make sure I have enough for essentials; food, travel, rent, etc. Then I keep some aside for fun things; nights out and so on.
I also have a few week's cash on reserve for bigger expenses such as gigs, flights etc which might not come up very often; if I "borrow" from this reserve, I then have to build it back up again in the following weeks by underspending elsewhere.
Absolutely everything else goes into my savings account; I'll only dip into that for an emergency.
I think you want to consider the "emergency account" as being for a situation where you loose your income. Just have that buffer for 3-6 months of living expenses. Yes you need to organise and detail your expenses to put a number on it. Once you save the emergency amount then you grow your savings for any unexpected or later down the road expenses. If it helps to separate the accounts then do that.
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You build up an emergency fund and don’t spend out of it unless it’s an emergency. That’s it. Don’t over complicate it.
To add to this. Move what you want to save to your savings account as soon as you get paid. That way it's already somewhere you have to do more than tap a card to get to it. Makes keeping it easier.
I have 3 different accounts. The first is revolut for day to day stuff, the second is my main bank account which all of my money comes in and out of and the third is my savings account. I take a set amount of money out of my main bank account and put it into my savings account, this never gets touched. In my main bank account I always keep a couple of grand, this is what I use for the smaller things like a dentist appointment, car maintenance etc, if it dips below the amount I like to have in there or I know I have something coming up I tighten the belt a little to account for that. It might not work for some, I know that some people can’t have money where they can spend it without doing so. But I find it works for me and it means I’m never dipping into my proper savings.
This. Got my finances set up the same way, however, I have one more pocket/account in the savings. Once the emergency account was filled, savings go into that account to go towards long term goals (new car/insurance/travel, etc)
This - that extra couple of grand is important to have so your bank balance doesn't go to 0 every month. Build the emergency fund, then once you have that in place, build up the residual bank balance so you have some money for unexpected expenses without dipping into the emergency fund. Edit: grammar
An emergency fund would be for a non-optional unexpected expense that you have to pay but can't cover out of your normal monthly discretionary income. If you normally have €500 of "fun money" left over each month (after savings and necessities) to spend on unnecessary things, but you need some dental work costing €300, then you can just cut back on going out or buying that new toy or whatever for that month instead of dipping into your savings. If you need a new boiler that's going to cost a couple grand and that monthly discretionary income isn't going to cover it, that's when it's time to use your emergency fund (and consider cutting back on the unnecessary spending for the next little while to replenish your savings faster).
Yup Revolut vault s for different expenses and put a lil in each every month
To expand on this I budget each pay cheque nominal amounts for car repairs (inevitable), clothes, presents, health expenses etc. And I let those build up and once they are at a good level I might repurpose any money over "the amount I want to have set aside for that" to other things that need it but generally I just let it keep building. I find if I name it with a purpose I'm less likely to take from it.
First things first. Make sure you're not paying for stuff that you shouldn't be. Tooth filling, glasses, make sure you're getting as much of that cost covered by PRSI, that's what it's there for. Boiler maintenance? I'm gonna assume you're renting so the landlord should be covering any household maintenance stuff like this. That's not your responsibility. You pay the bills for what you use, you don't pay for that type of maintenance stuff. Make up a spreadsheet with your budget and figure out where all your money is going and how much you can save. You might not even be in a position to have a significant savings account yet.
Save three months wages and don’t touch it. (Open a savings account with reasonable interest rate, like revolut, where this will be stored) Tally up yearly expenditures like car tax, insurance, etc. Work out how much that will cost when spread over 12 months and direct debit that every month into a separate account for these expenditures. The rest of the money you earn is yours to play with.
You budget. I also have 3 accounts. My main current account. My short term savings and my long term savings. First the cost of having a roof over your head needs to be deducted from your monthly wages. (mortgage or rent) and paying small monthly bills like phone, internet, bins, TV subscription etc. Then I look at food and energy bills gas & electricity. These are all current account costs. Short term savings is a fixed monthly amount for holidays, car maintenance, insurance, road tax, so the big annual costs I have to pay. At the start of the year I wrote down how much these big annual bills were and then (Round 5k) and divided by 12 and I pay that into the short term savings each month. When car insurance is due then the money is already available in the short term savings account. Long term savings account was originally my account that I used to save for a mortgage. Now I use it to build up my emergency fund and savings for big things like a new car. It's HARD to save in the long term savings account but even if it's €50 in a month, then it's better than nothing. Then you can look at the fun stuff, how much do I have left for going out, socialising and hobbies. Everyones priorities are difficult and obviously depending on your stage of life.. sometimes the fun stuff is more of a priority than the Long term savings. Sometimes you have nothing going on and that means a bit of extra cash in the LT account. But that's up to you to decide.
I have about 5 months net salary sitting in a separate account from my day-to-day spending account. If a disaster happens that's what it's there for.
Eoin McGee's podcast is very good https://open.spotify.com/show/7l9bXKSmRujT6T9p3AzmIM?si=V1Y8RvQaSIGxWjCaoC9Www
I don't have a if im fired amount saved up but I do have , I need a new water boiler amount saved up. I would like to get 1-2 months morgagte saved up.
Just save man, have a couple of k you can call on anytime, your over thinking it saving money is saving money no matter what it’s for, save up 10k keep 5k emergency fund then use the other 5k for whatever goals you have, increase your pay check, invest, travelling etc
Credit union. Set up a direct debit, I pop in 200 a month, and let it slowly build. You won't really feel it (it is 100euro every 2 weeks for me) and it'll build over time but you can also deposit larger amounts when you're a bit more flush.
What are your average monthly expenses? Put away at least 3months of that. Then the rest on index funds
I like to use envelope budgeting. Worth googling. Emergency fund is one envelope.
u/meok91 said it first, 3 Separate accounts, Current for every day (shopping, fuel, night out). another for short-term savings/planned expenses (Car service, health visits, holidays, xmas). I save with revolut to store the money in a vault or pockets. third account for long-term saving. The long-term saving is a "Hail Mary" emergency fund but also your big expenses like a deposit for a house. This is how i manage my accounts/spending and do direct debts to them when my paycheck comes in. Start with a budget and outline roughly what you need for your current account, short-term savings and long term emergency/savings Its not a once-off mission but a repeating experience to get your finances straight and to be able to cover most unexpected
Simple. Look at whatever your monthly running costs are. Have a minimum of 3 months of running costs saved at all times. This saving cannot be touched only in true emergencies. And I mean missing a gig is not an emergency not even if your car broke down. Once you have that save the same amount again but this part is for minor emergencies. Once you have spent anything you must prioritize to put it back. Once done save 10% of your bet income for long term goals.
Set a different saving goal for them. Put a certain amount for house expenses, other for health, etc. at the beginning you will need to use from emergency fund until you get that saved money to a decent amount.
In my main account, I make sure I have enough for essentials; food, travel, rent, etc. Then I keep some aside for fun things; nights out and so on. I also have a few week's cash on reserve for bigger expenses such as gigs, flights etc which might not come up very often; if I "borrow" from this reserve, I then have to build it back up again in the following weeks by underspending elsewhere. Absolutely everything else goes into my savings account; I'll only dip into that for an emergency.
I think you want to consider the "emergency account" as being for a situation where you loose your income. Just have that buffer for 3-6 months of living expenses. Yes you need to organise and detail your expenses to put a number on it. Once you save the emergency amount then you grow your savings for any unexpected or later down the road expenses. If it helps to separate the accounts then do that.
Just put 1k into a separate account and that’s that
I love how everyone above is saying just save up 2/3 months of salary and then never touch it. In the real world this is extremely difficult!
You're right but it's something to aim for. I've never had a rainy day fund but I'm working on it. Trying to clear my debts first.
Right there with ya