Are you a direct deposit-er, do you pay yourself first or do you pay yourself last?

I have three different accounts that are set up for auto deposit. I also tend to save at the end of the month after I know all bills have been paid, etc. Whatever's left over goes into the miscellaneous fund for house/living/fun.

I have it auto drafted on schedule each month. My husband gets paid once a month, so I typically have all bills paid within the first week and my large grocery shopping occurs right after payday. It makes for a lean rest of the month, but it sure has made a difference in our family financial mindset. When you only have so much money left in your checking account and so much in your wallet, it is a reality check for what you want to do.

I also have been increasing the auto draft savings amount each month if I am able to reduce any of our itemized expenses, i.e. just saved $74 per month on monthly auto insurance premiums so have increased the savings draft accordingly.

While six months ago we didn't have any savings and were not able to find anything at the end of the month to put in savings, we are now up to $1500 and climbing!!!

Plus, a personal note we prioritized our tithing and have committed to our first check after being paid to be 10% off the top, never thought in a million years that would work.

It's amazing that we are also able to save as well when we could never get that accomplished no matter how hard we worked on it.

Have direct deposit to the saving acct. of 10%, and have 401K 15% taken out, then pay the bills with the leftover money. Works for us

Our 401K is automatic every paycheck, all our savings accounts are automatically transferred a certain day each month, and we also have the keep the change account that transfers over automatically.

I don't think we'd get any savings if I didn't have it set up that way! It's easy, quick and requires no thinking on my part!

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I am only one, but I am one. I can not do everything, but I can do something. I must not fail to do the something that I can do. -Edward Hale

when i get paid every other friday...
i pay the bills due for those 2 wks following payday,
i take out my cash for gas, food and misc (fun $$)
and the rest...the whole thing goes in my savings!

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Thanks,
Bestmommysaver!

I am definitly a direct depositor. Unfortunalty things are so close money wise that I cannot pay myself that much. Every check I have $15.00 deposited into a missouri college savings plan. Besides that we are so tight on money that I can not save any extra besides our keep the change program that we have with Bank Of America. One thing that we have found that works well for us is my check goes into a seperate account in which our mortgage payment and car payment is automatically drafted out of each month.

We have just 2 accounts that are growing the rest is staying steady as we concentrait on debt. So DDs Savings gets $5 transvered every month we started doing this when she was born as well as adding birthday money to it. DD has $333 and just turned 2. Retirement saving is taken out dirrectly from our paycheck

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Kimberly Proud Mommy to Bethany Rose April 2006