The 3 Questions to Increase Your Savings

A penny saved is a penny earned. But if you are jobless, a penny saved is two penny earned.

The lockdown due to Covid19 slumped Indian economy 24% last quarter. There are reports that as many as 10 crore people have lost their employment in the last six months. Such adversity has taught us many lessons including saving money by cutting down unnecessary expenses. Nevertheless we end up falling pray to the business tactics of the corporates by extracting money from our wallets on the goods and services we rather don't need.

Spending only on necessary things and living a life with a bare minimum is getting momentum. This is helping in mindless race of consumerism. To spend wisely and only on the necessary things, the following questions will help us to a great deal:

1. Do I really need this?

When we used to go for shopping, we used to make a list of items to be bought. This list used to mention the quantity, brand, and other features. We would go to the shop and buy only what was there in the list.

But the mall culture has changed our buying behavior. We have stopped making buying list. This has created a scope for organized retailer to influence our buying behavior by many tactics including attractive displays, smart price displays, discounts, etc. Many times we end up buying things that we do not need due to the tactics of retailer. Asking 'Do I really need to buy this?' will nullify the impact of the selling tactics of sellers.

If you really need the thing or service, ask the next question.

2. Can I buy it later?

If the answer to the first question is affirmative, the second question will help in buying the things only when we need them. There are many things that we buy but they go unused. This is because we think that the item is required in general and there is no harm in stocking at home for future use. However, we should also analyze the cost of buying it later, how much later we have to buy it. If we have to buy it in near future we may decide to buy it. There are other factors that we should keep in mind like the expected price of the things and the trade off between the cost of buying it later and the cost of saving money for that period. If you defer buying of something worth Rs. 1000 for a month, you alternatively could have invested the amount in some other things.

If you cannot defer buying it, ask next question.

3. Can I buy it less expensive?

We often need a thing. Companies make it costly by making it a brand. A generic drug and a branded drug are different not in quality, but in price. Bangladesh exports 90% shirts to India. Often, many brands buy from the same manufacturer. The material is same is but there is massive difference in the prices of such fashion garments. Of course, when we buy branded items the trust and esteem value is high which has to be sacrificed in buying unbranded items.

A penny saved is a penny earned. But if you are jobless, a penny saved is two penny earned.