4 Easy Ways to Find Some Extra Cash Every Month
Wavebreak Media
Isn’t it awesome when you are doing laundry and you find a $20 bill in your clothes? It’s like a gift from you — to you.
Are you always looking for new ways to save each month? You’d be surprised how much a quick phone call can get you. See if one of these ways can help you find that extra cash.
1. Lower your interest rates.
When was the last time you reviewed the finance charge section on your credit card bill? If you use services like automatic payment or online bill pay, chances are you rarely look at the bill.
Get your latest statement or simply call your credit card company and ask them what your Annual Percentage Rate (APR) is. Find out if you are paying too much by using websites like Bankrate or CreditCards.com to compare your rate to national average.
If you find out that you are overpaying, you can confidently call your credit card company and use your recently acquired knowledge to negotiate your rate. If this option doesn’t work, you can shop for a lower rate. Make sure you do extensive research on the terms and conditions before committing to another card. And look for one that gives you an introductory APR of 0% on balance transfers. There are plenty of them out there.
2. Stop unnecessary subscriptions.
Take out your last three bank and credit card statements and inspect every transaction. Yep, there it is. A trial subscription that you only used for the first couple of months but kept paying for it year after year without even being aware of it. Or perhaps you are aware but you are dreading the call where you have to explain why you are no longer interested in the service/product and they will try to convince you otherwise. After all, it’s only $9.99 a month.
There’s your extra cash, pick up the phone and get it over with.
3. Keep your money in check.
It might be painful to watch. But keeping an eye on every dollar you spend will help you realize where you are overspending and where you need to cut back.
You can utilize bill and account management tools like Manilla.com to get a clear picture of your bills and balances. You can also keep track of your spending with mobile banking apps like Refundo, which helps you better manage your finances by giving you a detailed view of your transactions with automatic categorization.
4. Lower your auto insurance.
If you have been paying the same car insurance rate for a while, there’s a possibility you are overpaying. There are factors that influence your insurance rate that are out of your hand, but there are some things you can do to score a lower rate.
You can research what types of discounts are available to you that you might not be aware of, such as low-mileage and safety features discounts. Other factors like credit scores can also affect your insurance rate. If you’ve recently had an increase on your score, chances are you could be paying less than what you pay today.
If none of these apply to you, you can always shop around other companies for lower rates. As with the credit card companies, be sure to get more than one rate quote before you commit.
Daphne Veras is the community director at Refundo.com, a national provider of affordable financial products and services tailored to meet the unique needs of the financially underserved. After expanding her career in retail banking for 6+ years, she decided to join the Refundo team and combine her banking and marketing capabilities. At Refundo, Daphne and the team hope to help solve real-world problems with technology. They recently introduced a revolutionary mobile banking solution that combines “local community bank service” with “awesome” technology. Follow Refundo on Twitter @refundo and connect on Google+ and Facebook.
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