A regular savings habit is “good housekeeping”

Making a regular habit of putting some money aside in a savings account each month is “just good housekeeping”, the chief executive of Moneynet.co.uk has said.

Richard Brown emphasised the importance of saving money, saying that it is a “brilliant habit”.

He pointed out that even a small amount can make a difference.

“We looked at several accounts and if, for example, you save £25 a month with Halifax, that’s £330 with your ten per cent…It gets you in a habit for when you are in a position of earning more money,” he explained.

Although three-quarters (74 per cent) of people recognise the importance of saving, only 50 per cent make an effort to save regularly, according to figures from Nationwide.

Furthermore, nearly 57 per cent of Brits said they are not saving as much as they think they should and just 41 per cent believe they will in a position to save what they think they should in six months’ time.

Tags: regular habit, Save (baseball), savings account, habit, Brits, Abraham Lincoln, finance, importance of saving money

Saving is sexy again, says expert

More people are putting aside money as saving is “becoming sexy again,” according to an expert.

Emma Byrne, a savings advisor, said that people aged between 18 to 34-years-old are increasingly seeing saving as a financial priority and are more concerned about it than 55-year-olds.

A study conducted by Opinium Research earlier this month revealed that men feel they need an average of £101,999 to be financially secure, compared to a figure of £82,193 for women, making the overall average £92,507.

Furthermore, one in 50 people said they would leave their partner if they were financially secure enough to do so.

Although Ms Byrne noted that a third of people regularly move any spare money they have left at the end of the moth into a savings account, she also voiced concerns about the remaining two-thirds of the population who do not have this habit.

Ms Byrne said: “We’d really encourage people, once they’ve sorted out their monthly incoming and outgoings, to go and put that money into a savings account.”

Tags: expert, GBP, population, home, average, Opinium, Ms Byrne

Many rely on credit in lead up to Christmas

People struggling to finance their purchases in the festive season will not think twice about relying on credit, AWD Chase de Vere said yesterday.

Susan Hannums, savings manager at the independent financial advisers, explained that it is the “norm” for a lot of people at this time of year.

She said: “The spending and the mortgage rates are going up … there’s a lot happening, and it’s a very worrying time. But the message really is that you’ve got to forward plan.

“We’ve got to get into the savings habit and get away from using credit cards day to day really.”

Furthermore, she said, people with young children will want to make it the “best Christmas possible”, but it is good to try to be “imaginative” and make savings on presents for friends and other members of the family without “splashing out”.

Research from Credit Action earlier this year showed that personal debt in the UK is rising by £1 million every four minutes. The average amount owed by every adult in Britain is a staggering £27,180 (including mortgages).

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Ex-smokers see financial benefit

For many people the New Year brought with it a resolution to give up smoking.

The health benefits of kicking the habit are well known and well publicised, but Sainsbury’s Bank says few people consider the financial advantages.

Aside from saving money by not buying cigarettes, ex-smokers could find that they save as much as 48 per cent when they take out a life insurance policy.

Sainsbury’s says that in order to benefit from the reduction when taking out a policy with the bank, a customer must have remained smoke-free for a minimum 12 months.

“If you gave up smoking last New Year and haven’t yet taken out life insurance, now is the time to shop around for a good deal on a policy. If you haven’t smoked for 12 months then you will qualify as a non-smoker,” said Claire Moyles, life insurance manager at Sainsbury’s Bank.

“Our research shows that when the ban on smoking in public places is introduced into England and Wales later this year, 1.44 million people plan to give up smoking.”

Sainsbury’s has calculated that around 740,000 Britons have managed to stick to their 2006 New Year’s resolution to quit smoking.

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