Episode 416: How To Find $500–$1,000 in Your Budget With Little To No Extra Work

Jamila Souffrant 0:02

It doesn't hurt to double check and to see to flex, I like to say flex, that saving muscle, but really important for the earlier stages, because in this stage, you are trying to dig yourself out of a hole or the shackles of a job that you don't love. And in order to do that, you need assets. You need cash. You need money. You need to be able to invest. And if you're struggling to pay down debt, to invest, you have to find money somewhere. T

minus 10 seconds, welcome to the journey. To launch podcast with your host Jamila Souffrant as a money expert who walks her talk, she helps brave journeyers like you get out of debt, save, invest and build real wealth. Join her on the journey to launch to financial freedom, 54321,

Jamila Souffrant 0:58

if you want the episode. Show Notes for this episode, go to journey to launch.com or click the description of wherever you're listening to this episode in the show notes, you'll get the transcribed version of the conversation, the links that we mentioned and so much more. Also, whether you are an OG journeyer or brand new to the podcast, I've created a free jump start guide to help you on your financial freedom journey. It includes the top episodes to listen to, stages to go through to reach financial freedom resources and so much more you can go to journey to launch.com/jump start to get your guide right now. Okay, let's hop into the episode.

Hey. Hey, journeyers, welcome to the journey to launch podcast. I'm your host, Jamila Souffrant. I'm also the author of the book your journey to financial freedom, and I'm excited to get this episode started. Now, what we will be talking about today, I hope, will save you and create hundreds of dollars immediately, or maybe in the next few days, in your budget. So I think this is going to be very valuable for you. If you want more money without necessarily having to work harder, but you want to find money in your already existing budget and cash flow, this is going to be perfect for you. So let's get started now. First, I want to explain, or just go back a little bit and talk about the goal here, the goal for your life, and what I believe you want for your life, is to have more time and energy control over your time and energy, meaning you're not being pulled and forced to do work you don't enjoy be around people you don't enjoy. You are controlling your life for the most part. Now with that, you need money. Money is the driving force. It is the fuel that can determine what our lives look like. And with that, learning how to manage money, how to grow money, how to keep money, knowing your enough points and how you earn money and what you're willing to sacrifice is going to be important on this journey. The concept of financial independence requires you to save and invest enough money that you'll be able to live off those savings and investments without having to actively work again. Now, in order to achieve that, you need to create money, or a gap in your income versus outflow. So let me explain, in my book your journey to financial freedom, I talk about the concept of the fi formula, and it's really just a matter of income. So money coming into your household minus your mandatory expenses. So these are things that you need to spend money on to survive, to live, like your rent, mortgage, gas, anything that involves you getting to work and being able to earn money the mandatory things you need, right? So your income minus those mandatory expenses equals this gap, this pot of money, hopefully, and with that from that gap, you're able to pay for discretionary expenses. So those are all the nice to have and fun things we typically enjoy spending our money on. Maybe that is going out to eat. That's the extras in life. What makes our life feel really good and worth working for? Right? Then there are the responsible things you need to spend money on if you want to achieve financial independence, which will look like paying off debt, so getting your liabilities down, and then also increasing your assets. So that looks like saving that looks like more money for investing. And oftentimes people don't have enough money to do all the things because of just life and our priorities are maybe not understanding how this formula works. Now I break this all down in my book your journey to financial freedom, so you can go pick that up or listen to more episodes of the podcast to understand what I bring that all up because. Because really, the goal of all of this is to find a gap, more of a gap in your budget so that you can do the things you want, whether that is paying for more discretionary expenses or doing things that will align you or get you to financial independence, like paying down debt, saving and investing. Now, there are different ways you can create a gap. You can earn more money and or spend less. So in this episode, I want to talk about finding more money in your gap, in your budget, by looking at the expenses portion of the equation. So looking at spending less income is a driving force, so meaning, the higher the income, the faster you'll be able to reach your goals, depending on what your expenses look like. But I think it's worthwhile to look at our expenses. And I think no matter what level you are, where you are on the journey or stage, it's important. This is what I did when I first started to understand how powerful knowing the cash flow, knowing our household cash flow, would be, so that I could one day quit my job, so that I can one day be talking to you on this podcast and reach this level of freedom that I have. And so what I'm going to walk you through is how to find money in your budget, money in your cash flow, more of a gap without hopefully having to do too much. So this is also something I talk about in the book, is finding money. So there's a way to create money by doing, like, a lot of extra effort, which is not necessarily a bad thing, but then there's a way to just not really even have to change much, but just maybe there are some obvious changes we'll talk about that. But it's more about finding money in your budget. It's more of small changes, more internal changes, because you have to be a little bit more disciplined, and you can, like, literally find hundreds of dollars right now. So that's what I hope we'll be able to do right now. I actually have a downloadable spreadsheet for free that you can download to help keep track of your savings. If you want to go check that out, you can go to journey to launch com slash saving. I'll also include that in the episode show notes. If you're on my email list, you'll also get a link to download this when this episode comes out. Now this was actually originally when I first started journey to launch. I actually made this a challenge for people. So if you've been following me for a while, you may be aware of this, but I actually had a five day sequence an email and challenge that if you did these steps over five days, I basically said you probably can find 200 to $500 in your budget that you can use for your gap, for the things you want to do, paying down debt or whatever it is, investing, paying for more things you like. But I'm going to give you the gist of the steps to take right now. And of course, if you want the spreadsheet, like I said, before go to journey to launch com, slash saving. So let's get into it. So step one, this is going to, again, involve your expenses, and the one thing that you'll need to start and do is a spending freeze. Spending freeze. So what does that mean? What does a spending freeze mean? It means, if it is not a basic need and something you don't need to spend money on, I want you to stop. That's right, stop. What does that look like? If you don't need it for survival and it's a want, then I want you to stop paying for it, actively paying for it. So just to give you some examples, things that you can still spend on, and if you want to do this over a five day period, or a week or two weeks, it's up to you. I recommend actually doing this in five days. The downloadable spreadsheet tracks it for five days, because I actually want you to, like, get it going, but for five days, I want you to only consciously spend on things like your mortgage or rent groceries, but not excessive, like getting things you don't need, but groceries to eat, of course, insurance. So you have some car insurance payments, car insurance, gas, anything that actually comes up that is necessary. Yes, pay for but when it comes to eating out, eating out lunch, going into maybe a store, I want you to stop it. So this is a spending freeze, and you're only spending on things you need. You got that. And so with that, that includes lunch. I know that for me, when I was really, really focused on our expenses, when I was working, I would bring lunch to work every day, and that would save me hundreds of dollars a month. But in this five day spending freeze, remember, this is not permanent. This is just to see how much money you can save in a short period of time you are going to prepare breakfast and lunch or whatever you need to so you are not buying food outside. Now that might temporarily increase, maybe a grocery bill because you're buying some things, maybe more things, or you just have to take more leftovers. But the idea here is you are going to track how much you save by not ordering or eating out. All right, so that's your first thing that you should do, spending freeze, which includes not buying any lunch out. Do. Next thing you can do so step two is switch, or look into switching your cell phone provider. Now I know a lot of us, when I was younger, there was like, these legacy, big cell phone providers that we just would just stick with. But nowadays, there's so many other low budget, budget providers that you can use. My family and I, we are on a budget provider. It still uses the same network as one of the old reliables, but our cell phone bill is half of what it used to be, and so thinking about what cell phone providers you can switch to to save you maybe $50 $100 whatever that looks like depending on your cell phones and your plans. Look into that, because most times these major cell phone providers have these discount brands that you can use. So start checking that out. That is what I would say, is your step two to find more money in your budget. And so let's if you are adding this up cumulatively, if you're saving money by doing a spending freeze and not buying lunch out or food out and not spending on things you don't need, and you're able to switch a cell phone provider to something cheaper, I that's about a couple $100 right there for the week. If you're doing this over a week period, step three or the next thing you can do, maybe you've been putting it off. Because I definitely put these things off is canceling unused subscriptions and any recurring expenses that you don't care for. This requires a little digging, because you may not even know what you're paying for. You might have some things, little things like $5 expenses that come out a month $10.20 and it's just slipping away. Money is just, it's like a leaky faucet. Money is dripping away and you don't realize it. But really, you have to understand your expenses. You have to go through your, I'm gonna say the word budget, so looking at if you don't have a complete budget or something that's already tracking your expenses, you're going to have to open up those credit card statements. You're going to have to look at your online checking account and see what is coming out over the last four to eight weeks that you didn't realize or that you don't care about, and you can have just cancel, although the process might feel a little annoying or daunting, you literally might be spending 50, even $25 on something you do not care about or wouldn't miss. And just just a tip, if you have been avoiding canceling something because you think you may use it, just cancel it. If you have not used it, or you're not checking it, it's probably likely you won't use it in the future. And if you do, how about you? Do you join it again? Or if you realize you are missing this thing, then you can rejoin. But that can save you some money. There are definitely some dollars if you're able to cancel any unused subscriptions or things you really don't care about. That actually can be cable too, right? There are so many more options to watch TV. Now, I know it's so funny, because we have all these streaming services, and if you add them all up based on all the different shows you like to see or watch, it still is like a cable bill, but there are things probably when it comes to canceling a whether cable bill or something that you can do and get a lower rate with the same entertainment value, all right, Tip four or the four thing that you need to do that will definitely save you money. It will require a bit of patience and willpower. It always does for me, but because it does involve calling service providers. So that means getting the numbers out. You know, you have to deal with customer service and make time to call your service providers to get your bill reduced or to switch service providers. Now, I'll tell you about a recent experience which saved my family probably over $3,000 for the year, and that was switching our car insurance. Now, over the last few years, we've been with the same car insurance, and you know, when we first got with them, they were pretty seemed reasonable based on when I shopped around, but I noticed as the years went on that the bill just kept increasing and increasing. And I remember I got this last bill, and I was like, Oh, hell no. It was like, double what I originally started at. And so I called them, and I said, you know, do we have all the discounts, by the way? Let me back up. I had been avoiding calling them because of life. So I just want to say, I feel you, if you just feel overwhelmed with having to call these service providers and think about spending the time to do that, because I definitely put this off for longer than I should have. But I got so fed up when I saw this recent bill that I said, I Oh, I'm calling them. And so I called them, and they just said, Hey, you know, like our premiums in New York have gone up, and so there's really nothing we can do. You. Do have all the discounts so, you know? And I was like, Okay, thanks. And I literally just googled, so in my head, I'm thinking, this is going to take too much time to find someone else. I have to call around. But I Googled, you know, car insurance. I had something pop up, and I was able to actually purchase car insurance online in a matter of 15 minutes, and it verified. And maybe things have gotten easier and more streamlined and technology, because it literally just when I put in our information, pulled in all our existing our existing car insurance, compared the prices, and had everything there, so I didn't really have to do anything. It literally took 15 minutes, and my bill, what would have been that I had to pay almost $3,200 for a six month premium. I was able to switch to $1,500 for a six month premium, same coverages. And so if you look at that, in the span of a year, that's saving us over $3,000

by taking, let's say, maybe, 15 minutes calling the existing company to see if there was something they could do, 15 minutes of working or finding the new company, which, by the way, I never had to speak to someone. This was all done online with a reputable car insurance company, and I saved my family $3,000 so that's why this one is actually a big one. It's calling your car insurance, home insurance, even the cable bill in internet companies to see like, hey, this bill is becoming too much. What can you do for me? Because they love giving new customers breaks, and so they don't necessarily appreciate the existing customers as much, and we may need to switch, which seems daunting, but may not be as bad if you think about saving 1000s of dollars in your family's budget. Okay, those were four things I believe you can do over the next five days to save to find hundreds of dollars in your budget, maybe even 1000s. If you want to break this up again and like do this, here's my suggestions to get it done, because we do need accountability. This is why I actually originally created this as a challenge, where I would send emails out and challenge the Community Challenge journeyers to do this. But I want to share this with you, because I just realized, you know, there is a cost of living. The cost of living is going up. That price of eggs. Oh, my goodness, up. And while I understand and know there is just a cost of living issue and a income issue for a lot of people that on the expenses side of things, there are some things we can change on our own, if they are not things that are mandatory and that we need right to survive. And so I am challenging you, no matter where you are in your journey, whether you are a beginner, which I do believe this is even more more important for you to do, if you are at a journey or stage of maybe a explorer or cadet. So on my journey or stages, there are five. The five stages, they progress as you progress towards financial independence. The earlier stages are the Explorer stage, meaning you're just trying to get to be able to pay for your life without going more into debt. The cadet stage is paying off consumer debt. The Aviator stage, at Stage three is being able to invest and save more. So this is your your accumulating assets stage. The fourth stage is the commander stage. This is where you have a healthy level of investment, no debt that you don't wish to keep purposefully, and where you have work flexibility. This is the stage where I'm in. And then you have stage five, which is the captain stage. You reach complete financial independence. I do believe that this challenge is useful. No matter what stage you're on. It's good to just reset, even if you're at a later stage, the commander or Captain stage, and you maybe feel like you've got it. You know you like where you're at. Doesn't hurt to double check and to see into flex, I like to say flex that saving muscle, but really important for the earlier stages, because in this stage, you are trying to dig yourself out of a hole or the shackles of a job that you don't love, and in order to do that, you need assets. You need cash, you need money. You need to be able to invest. And if you're struggling to pay down debt, to invest, you have to find money somewhere, and while there is a definitely a push. And you'll hear this from me, and my content that income earning more money, if that's where you need to be, that's really important, but really looking at your expenses. And so I hope that this has allowed you to think about how you can save money in your budget, how you can find money, right? Like some of this was literally putting some time on your calendar to just get it done and find money. And then this is really important, any money that you do save, which is why I have the tracker. So go to journey to launch.com/ Saving S, A, V, I N, G, s, I want you to write down, because what can happen too, is when you start saving money, or you cut something out, the money just essentially floats around somewhere. It goes away. So you might say, All right, I'm canceling something for $30 you don't specify what you're now going to do with that $30 and before you know it, it's almost like you never saved anything. So whatever you saved during this five day or whatever period of time that you are doing this challenge for yourself, write the number down and then intentionally say and use that money for something else. So if you have found during this exercise, you have saved $300 I want you to intentionally say what you're doing with that $300 that might look like putting money, that $300 into your savings account, that may look like putting that money into a Roth IRA. Maybe your goal was investing. It may look like, Okay, I'm gonna put that money towards debt. Maybe you're splitting it. Whatever it is, you need to intentionally say what you're doing with that money so it doesn't disappear. Okay. I hope this episode has saved you, or will save you a couple $100 and if you do make some of these changes, which help you do? Let me know I'm at journey to launch at Jamila Souffrant on Instagram, and so take a screenshot. Tell me what you completed, which step you've done that you've taken the challenge. Download the worksheet to help you keep yourself accountable. Go to journey to launch com, slash saving. And if you want even more help, you can find that all in my book, Your journey to financial freedom, a step by step guide to achieving wealth and happiness. You can go to your journey to financial freedom.com Okay, until next week. Keep on journeying. Journeyers. Don't forget, you can get the episode show notes for this episode by going to journey to launch.com or click the description of wherever you're listening to this and you can still grab your jumpstart guide for free to help you on your journey to financial freedom by going to journey to launch.com/jump start. If you want to support me and the podcast and love the free content and information that you get here, here are four ways that you can support me in the show. One, make sure you're subscribed to the podcast wherever you listen, whether that's Apple podcast, that purple app on your phone, your Android device, YouTube, Spotify, wherever it is that you happen to listen, just subscribe so you are not missing an episode. And if you're happening to listen to this in Apple podcasts, rate review and subscribe there. I appreciate and read every single review. Number two, follow me on my social media accounts. I'm at journey to launch on Facebook, Instagram and Twitter. And I love, love, love interacting with journeyers. There three, support and check out the sponsors of this show. If you hear something that interests you, sponsors are the main ways we keep the podcast lights on here, so show them some love for supporting your girl. Four, and last but not least, share this episode, this podcast with a friend or family member or co worker so that we can spread the message of Journey to launch. All right, that's it until next week. Keep on journeying. Journeyers. You.