It’s almost the New Year, and that means it’s a great time to take on a 52 week savings plan! Here are the ins and outs, and some great ways to make a 52 week savings plan work for you.
What is a 52 week savings challenge?
Many of you may have heard of the 52 week savings challenge. It’s really a pretty good idea because it creates a habit of saving. If you create a habit of saving, you also create momentum for your financial future. What the 52 week savings challenge does is challenge you to save one dollar in week one, and an additional dollar for each succeeding week of the year. So in week four you’ll save four dollars, at week 27 you’ll save 27 dollars, and so on. By the time you reach week 52, you add 52 dollars to your savings to top it off at $1378 for the year. That’s not a bad deal!
How to make the 52 week savings plan work for you.
With the plan the way it is, you’re saving about $50 each week in December, and that’s a pretty expensive month for both of us. It that seems a little daunting, then it’s time to hack the plan to make it work for you. There are some interesting ways to do this!
One way to hack the 52 week savings plan is to print out a chart of the weeks in the year and cross them off out of order. For example, if in June you have a lighter month on your expenses, save the December amounts then, and Christmas time will be easier.
You don’t necessarily have to save weekly. Set up an automatic monthly deposit to savings. If you start with $100 and then up it every month by just $5, you’ll have a savings of $1530 by the end of December.
If you manage to accomplish the 52 week savings plan and save $1378 over the year, why stop there? Keep it going! At the end of 104 weeks, still adding an additional dollar per week, you’ll have saved an additional $4082. That’s a total of about $5500 in just two years.
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