I’ve paid off £17k debt & have £20k in the bank by using a three pot saving method & cutting my food bill in half
A PRO money-saver has revealed the simple method that helped her pay off her debt and bank more than £20k in savings.
Sarah, known online as @youneedabudget, suggested that rather than saving one lump sum, we should be paying into pots dedicated to individual goals and bills.
This, the money coach claims will help keep you motivated and help you keep track of how close you are to achieving your targets.
In a new TikTok reel, she said: “So I built my savings to over $30,000 without using a savings account, and now I’m going to show you exactly how I did it.
“So I divide my savings into three different groups in my budget.
“The first group is non-monthly expenses which are those larger, less frequent expenses that used to surprise me, like car insurance or holidays.
“The second group I just call savings. These are mostly categories that I want to grow over time.”
In this group, Sarah has a pot for vacations, emergencies, a ‘one month buffer’ and a university fund for her kids.
She continued: “And the third group is my ‘wish farm’.
“These are things that I want that I’d like to save for, and I put extra money towards them when I can.
“For bills where I know exactly how much is coming up, I just tell my budget how much I need to save and when I need to save it by.
“My budget does the math for me and tells me how much to set aside every month to stay on track.
“When you’re setting this up for yourself just ask, ‘what am I saving for?’”
Fans loves her saving method, with the video gaining more than 620 likes and 16,500 views.
In another video, Sarah explained how she paid off her £17k debt in just 18 months – and that cutting the cost of her weekly grocery shop helped her do that.
She said: “A lot of you have been asking me how I went from spending $1300 on groceries to under $700, so here are some of my best tips.
“Number one is to delay shopping trips as long as you can.
“Any time I start to feel like I need to go grocery shopping, I clean out my fridge and pantry first and do a food inventory.
“Then I make as many meals as I can with the food I have on hand. Sometimes I have to get pretty creative with what I make.
“Tip number two is to make what I call, ‘three-purpose meals’.
“To do this I cook a huge batch of food and eat some for dinner that night, save some for lunch the next day, and freeze some for the future.
“It’s kind of like a gift for my future self, and cooking in large quantities helps me use up the ingredients I have in the fridge.”
Fans loved her thrifty tips, with the video gaining more than 5,190 likes and 68,400 views.