In this day and age, you can never have enough money. Due to how our society operates, you need to keep your finances healthy to be ready for whatever life may throw your way. Things like a broken car or serious illness often result in high costs that you’ll have to pay or suffer the disruptive consequences. Unfortunately, it’s not always possible to quickly change your workplace for a better one. There is, however, a much more reliable way to improve your personal budget. What you need to do is get rid of any harmful habits to save your money.
It doesn’t mean that you should completely stop doing what you like. Instead, you might want to switch to less damaging alternatives or, in other cases, do it less frequently.
Stop Smoking: It Kills People
At this point in time, it’s common knowledge that smoking tobacco is a very irresponsible habit to have. According to the data provided by the National Health Service, smoking is behind the deaths of 78 thousand UK citizens every year. This is more than the entire population of Canary Wharf, London! Of course, there are many more people who continue to suffer from the dangerous side effects of smoking but still have a chance to change their lives for the better.
And Their Finances
However, smoking tobacco can be deadly in an entirely different manner. Gone are the days when a pack of cigarettes was cheaper than food. Now, inhaling this addictive poison is also remarkably expensive. Currently, you have to pay well over £12 for a pack of normal quality cigarettes, a 5-pound increase over the prices 10 years ago. Smokers who prefer premium brands have it even worse. If you smoke 20 cigarettes a day, then a good quality pack costing £13.30 will turn into almost a hundred quid per week. Assuming you don’t quit this habit, you’re looking at a loss of almost 5000 pounds per year on something that’s actively harming your body.
Get Alternatives To Quit and Save Money
Obviously, the best solution would be to outright say no to tobacco and stop using it immediately to save your health and wallet. Unfortunately, such a direct approach is not always possible. It’s much easier to find an alternative nicotine delivery mechanism to help yourself lower your dependency on this substance. Enter vaping. E-cigarettes are significantly less harmful to your body than traditional cigarettes and have the additional benefit of being more efficient – meaning your nicotine expenses will get much lower. Most are easily available in both local stores and online from trusted providers like Vapekit. You might also want to try out nicotine patches or gum if you want to stop the habit of inhaling.
Curb Your Harmful Shopping Habits
When unchecked, even your shopping habits can be destructive to your budget. There are two practices that you should try to avoid here.
Impulse Buying
Impulse buying can be defined as a purchase of a product or service that was entirely unplanned, but you just couldn’t let this opportunity pass. Perhaps it was a one-time offer. Maybe it was a typical springtime sale. No matter the reason, the result is that you just left dozens if not hundreds of pounds in a shop by buying things you most likely don’t need. Now, doing it from time to time is not necessarily harmful per se – everyone needs a method to unwind, and for some, visiting your local shopping centre is what does the trick.
However, it’s important that you recognise when such action happens on a regular basis and limit your sprees either in frequency or in the amount of money you leave at various shops. When looking at a product, try to think if you really need it and if your personal finances won’t be jeopardised by a careless purchase.
Ignoring Sales
There are still many people who prefer to buy things right when they debut. It’s fresh, it’s brand new, and you absolutely want it right now. But wouldn’t it be better to simply wait when the store starts having major sales and discounts?
This way, you will easily get the things you need for a much lower price, without any compromise in quality – after all, it’s the same product, but more affordable to get. With a little bit of long-term planning, you can even account for seemingly “sudden” events like birthdays or family visits and get the necessary gifts out of season for much lower than the MSRP.
Using Credit Card
Few things brought as much convenience to shopping culture as credit cards did. This small piece of plastic allows you to easily access your money, making it trivially easy to buy anything you want without any issues. Unfortunately, in this case, it’s a big disadvantage.
If you’re unable to stop yourself from going on a shopping spree, at least try to withdraw a certain sum before you enter the centre. The idea here is that it’s much harder to judge your spending when using a credit card – it just works so well. Instead, bringing in cash allows you to easily take a look inside your wallet and see how much you have left. This way, you may be able to put an end to your shopping adventure well before it starts to strain your finances.
Don’t Gamble Using Real Money
Casinos, both traditional and online, can be a lot of fun and just what you’re looking for to unwind after a hard day at work. Unfortunately, as the name suggests, it all works on a gamble. Most games you see in a casino could be defined as pure games of chance – meaning that the outcome of your bet is totally random. Even poker, a game requiring some real skill, is still often down to your luck. Do you really want to risk your hard-earned money in this way?
If gambling for you is all about the thrill and real cash is only an unimportant side element of it, consider choosing free online games. These can give you as much adrenaline and fun without having a damaging effect on the state of your wallet. But even if you are in for the cash, try to set strict daily gambling limits and stick to it. Otherwise, you might risk blowing through all of your savings in a desperate attempt to beat the game or a player.
As you can see, financially destructive habits can take many different forms. Smoking is an expensive and extremely unhealthy habit that can have grave consequences one day. Shopping without planning ahead and taking advantage of sales is a sure-fire way of wasting all your money. And gambling your cash away is not just highly risky, but also a big disruption to your life when you lose it all.
If you want to save more money, it’s best if you stop doing these things altogether. However, in some cases, like smoking, it might be easier to find less harmful substitutes. No matter what way you take, it’s important to recognise when you have harmful behaviour and take steps to correct it without hurting yourself or the people you care about! Good luck!