Common Excuses Why You Can’t Save Money and How to Overcome Them

We all work hard to earn money. The question is, are we working hard enough to ensure that we never run out of it?

Saving is a very basic habit that every professional must learn. But more often than not, we’d rather spend our hard-earned money instead of putting it aside for the rainy days. This inability to save is a serious problem from a financial standpoint and can be attributed to a lot of obstacles a.k.a. excuses which are all too familiar to a lot of professionals out there.

Here are some of the most common excuses by people who can’t save or are saving very little:

1. “I’m not making enough money to be able to save.”

This is a common excuse among young professionals who have just recently started their career. While it is really difficult to save when you’re earning very little, that doesn’t give you an excuse not to save at all. Remember, there will always be room for improvement and if that means tightening your belt some more, then do it.

It may be high time for you to look at your expenses and see if there are any opportunities for you to be able to save. You can also re-evaluate your job. If the pay is really that big of a problem, maybe it’s high time for you to start looking for another, higher-paying job.

2. “I’m still settling some debts.”

Owing a certain amount of money can really get in the way of saving. But in a way, paying off debt is still saving as you are attempting to put yourself in a better financial footing. The faster you get yourself out of debt, the sooner you’ll be able to start a savings account for yourself or your family.

But if your finances allows you to pay off debt and save money at the same time, then what’s stopping you from doing so? Saving doesn’t entail you to put aside a huge chunk of your monthly salary at the expense of your debt payments and your own living costs. You simply need to allocate a small amount for your savings. And as your debts become smaller, you can gradually start increasing the amount of money you save.

3. “I don’t know where my money is going.”

A lot of people use this excuse as if their money makes some sudden disappearing act after receiving their salary. If you’re one of those people, then you must have some serious trouble tracking your expenses. You probably have never even worked with a monthly budget in your life which explains why you do not know where you are spending your money.

Remember that losing control of your expenses is a serious problem and you need to keep it under control as soon as possible. Start by tracking your income and expenses (templates here). It doesn’t need to be an elaborate scheme. You just need to be able to create a realistic budget that you can use and live by.

Once you’re able to track your expenses, you’ll also be able to determine areas where you can start cutting some costs and allocate it towards a savings account.

4. “I’ll start saving later.”

Nothing like good old procrastination to endanger your financial future. This excuse may also run along the lines of “I’m still too young to save” or “I want to be able to spend my hard-earned money while I still can”. But guess what? There’s no such things as “saving too early” or being “too young to save”.

There’s absolutely no reason to spend all your money just because you can or just because you think you’ll still have plenty of time in the future to save. The sad truth that you need to realize is that you will never know what will happen later. If you have the ability to save money now, then start saving!

Conclusion

These are just some of the most common excuses why a lot of working professionals are not able to save. And while these obstacles may seem formidable for most of us, we should stop using them as an excuse. More importantly, we should strive our hardest to overcome them in order to secure our financial future.