We all know we should do it, but sometimes life gets in the way, bills are required to be paid and saving 5% or so of our income becomes lower down on the priority list.
Not being able to save is not always down to poor money management. We looked at some of the other reasons why (sometimes) we don’t save as much money as we should.
The Fear Of Missing Out On Life
The simple pleasure of a cup of coffee is sometimes too much to give up, and truth be told you don’t have to cut it out completely – it’s all about being sensible with HOW you save. You don’t have to go cold turkey on coffee, perhaps limiting the amount you purchase per week or buying from a cheaper coffee shop will allow you to save money without saying goodbye to the luxuries in your life.
Opportunity Cost
The opportunity cost is defined as the ‘next best alternative forgone’ (shout out to all the economists out there). In a recent post we broke down this stuffy finance language to understand what it actually means. In basic terms, if you part with money, you can’t do anything else with that specific sum of money. So, saving £250 a month means not spending that £250 on your friends birthday weekend, or a trip abroad.
It can be disheartening
We are forever seeing headlines like, ‘£750,000 isn’t enough to enjoy your retirement’. £750,000 is a lot of money. And when you’re early on in life and saving the pennies for the future, the thought of reaching a goal so large can be disheartening and feel never ending.
Uncertainty
Some things we’ll just never know, and a lot of those have financial impacts. When will you die? At what age will you retire? Will your flat get flooded next month? You just can’t plan everything in life and savings might have to be forgone in the event of an emergency. Life is unpredictable and so is saving.
Fempire Finance