Saving is a hard word for me. Saving means not spending money, which means not clicking on every link for clothes on TikTok. It means not scrolling through Amazon and hitting “add to cart” for every cute sweater I see, even though it’s still 90 degrees outside. It means walking past Kelly Commons and not going into the campus store for the new arrivals and not stopping by Starbucks. So, essentially, saving is really hard.
Recently, I was forced to learn how to actually take the hard step and start saving. During high school, I always wanted my own money in hopes of being able to spend it how I wanted to and it was summertime. I wanted to go out with my friends and do anything we wanted. But, the second I got my first job as a waitress and saw the paycheck attached, my mother came down pretty hard on me. “Not all of your money can be spent,” she told me as she crushed my dreams, “at least half needs to go into savings, or you have to quit your job”. As a freshly 16-year-old, this wrecked me.
I made a system where my paychecks, which ended up being smaller than my tips, would go into a savings account every two weeks when I got paid, but my tips from every night’s shift would go into my pocket. This system benefited my need to spend at first because my checking account was always larger than my savings, so I was spending more than I was saving. Anytime my friends asked me to spend money, I did. We went out to eat all the time, we spent too much at the beach, we bought too many smoothies, and we had the most money-driven summer of our lives. This seemed great, like a perfect harmony for my mother and me… until my first bank statement came.
This statement showed that I was spending pointless money on things I didn’t need. I wasn’t benefiting anyone (besides Amazon and Dunkin) in this system because I was racking up absurd products that I would use once and never touch again. I didn’t even need my mother to yell at me (but, don’t worry to all the parents out there, she did) because I knew that I was doing something wrong. I needed to adjust my system or become a hoarder with a shopping addiction.
I adjusted my system so that my entire paycheck and half of my tips each night went into savings and I did this the entire school year. I struggled at first because my checking account was so much smaller and I just wanted to transfer it all right back over. This changed when the school year started and all my paychecks and tips got smaller as I could not work as much as I could in the summer.
This is why summer savings are so important. I recently had to quit my job halfway through the summer and as college rolled around, I realized how important it is to save during the summer. Although you should enjoy summer and soak in the fun moments, the summer is the prime time to work as you have the most time to do so. If you dedicate time to working in the summer, you can grow your savings to help benefit you during the school year and stop you from having to time manage with working and school.
This school year is the first time I do not have much summer savings and I am seeing how much of a limit it has caused. Instead of focusing on school for the first three weeks and adjusting, I had to focus on finding a job in order to sustain a dorm life with buying my own groceries, my own textbooks, etc.
This isn’t to say that all your paychecks and all your time need to go towards summer savings, but as my mother said, “not all of your money can be spent”.
Here’s a few tips of mine:
- Start by looking at your schedule and what your income is.
- How much time do you want to devote to a job? How much money will this amount of time get you at the end of the summer?
- Create a budget for your money.
- A great way to do this is with envelopes. Separating money into named envelopes can help you separate your paychecks.
- For example, my envelopes were labeled with the titles “dorm needs,” “vacation,” “going out,” and “basic needs.”
- These titles will change based on what you want to save your money for and my titles always change based on the season.
- A great way to do this is with envelopes. Separating money into named envelopes can help you separate your paychecks.
- Try to stick to this budget, but don’t feel defeated if it is hard at first
- When I first started, I took way too much from my savings. It takes time to get used to it, but you got this. If you stick to it, it’ll start to feel like clockwork.
- Still, put money aside to treat yourself
- It’s still okay to make some pointless purchases, as long as you’re setting extra cash aside for it. You work to afford to have fun and to treat yourself, while also having a stable life.
Summer savings allow you to relax during the school year as a college student and they are now one of the most important things to me, as I learned the hard way what life is like without them. If you fail at saving, try, try, try again. One failure does not determine you and saving takes time. You got this.