How to enjoy saving?

[TrentonFulch]

DH & I are financially okay in that we can currently afford all of our bills, have under £2k credit card debt (interest free), no other debts bar student loans and money left over for some treats & luxuries. This isn't a stealth boast, we live in a cheaper part of the country and luxury to us is weekly takeaways rather than private jets, but I want to get better at money management. We're not in financial bother but I find it incredibly stressful to face up to money matters, always have. I want to understand pensions and how best to manage mine, to put regular money away for our DCs (two under 6), to actually make a budget without having a panic attack and stick to it. We're so fortunate we have more than we need to cover the basics, but i worry as we all do with the state of the world & economy, so how do i trick my (suspected ADHD) brain into enjoying saving & budgeting? Where do I get my dopamine from?

My parents grew up in poverty but thanks to the welfare state, graft, luck and canny choices they gave us a much more comfortable life, but were always understandably extremely cautious & thrifty about money. There was a lot of anxiety in the house about it but we were never in dire straits.

For the DC open bank accounts, most banks have accounts for children, and pay into them regularly. Class it as a bill, whatever you can afford, and set up a DD/standing order.

To save money on groceries start to meal plan and look for offers.

Same with birthday and Christmas presents. Make lists to help plan.

I’m sure someone else here can help re pensions.

Also, savings for yourself and DH, pay yourself first. Do that the same as saving for the DC.

Start to watch Dave Ramsey on YouTube. He has a great 7 step plan to follow and you hear some stories that really motivate you to make changes.

With pensions, if you have a work pension with employer contribution matching, I would put the maximum in that they will match as then you get the maximum benefit.
Then put a small amount away for the children, not necessarily in their names so that you get to choose later when they get it.
For budgeting, maybe your brain would like using budget pots in an app like you can do with Monzo/Starling.Then you allocate money to bills/food/birthdays and christmas/holidays/pets pots and then you can see how you go against your budget and its easy to make decisions on 'I could go out for drinks but I've spent my fun money this month so would have to take it out of my clothes budget'
Make the regular savings payments go out the day you are paid by standing order, then you never see it as real money. I like doing premium bonds for a bit of excitement in my savings but I also have a regular saver account linked to my current account which rounds up payments and swishes that in and plus a regular amount is my instant access savings for a dead washing machine or whatever.

Another vote for premium bonds. The more you save the more chance you have of winning. And when you win it's such a great feeling, even if I only win £25. It's quite addictive.

I've found the hardest part is just starting but if you stick with it, once it starts accumulating you get the bug for it, you start getting greedy, you want more, you start to feel more secure and that feeling gives you the incentive to keep going.

So just start, it doesn't have to be lots, just whatever you can afford. We have all our accounts with nationwide, you can set yourself goals and see how much you need to save each week to reach them. It's hard at first but we'll worth it. We're not loaded by any means but we now have a £4k nest egg, £10k for DS and £1k for car/house repairs.

My top tip is when you go to b&m, have a look what's in your trolley, put back everything you don't really need and then transfer the money you would have spent into your savings account. Same with any purchase.