How To Save $10,000 In A Year (12 Realistic & Awesome Tips)

If you’re on a mission to save more money, it’s important to set a measurable goal.

Additionally, it’s also fun to create saving goals that look nice; after all, chasing a nice, round figure is a great way to get excited about your new saving goal.

Now, it doesn’t matter if you’re building up an awesome emergency fund, saving for a downpayment, or want to buy a car: saving $10,000 in a year is a great goal to work towards.

However, if you want to save $10,000 in 1 year, you need a gameplan.

This isn’t the sort of figure that just magically appears in your bank account.

So, if you’re wondering how to save $10,000 in a year, this is absolutely the post for you.

Time to break down the exact math you need to follow to accomplish this goal, as well as some tips for how you can stay on track.

Saving $10,000 In A Year – The Math

Saving five figures in a year might sound tough, but that’s why it’s great to break any large saving goal into chunks.

I mean, think about it like this.

Saving $10,000 in a year means:

• Monthly. Saving $833 extra per month
• Weekly. Saving $192 extra per week.
• Daily. Saving $27.40 extra per day.

When you think about it from this perspective, the entire goal seems much more realistic.

If you’re still not convinced, let’s also look at why this is an awesome savings goal.

Consider for a second if you put the $10,000 you saved into the stock market.

And let’s say you then put an extra $500 per month away and saw an average annual return of 7%.

Here’s what would happen:

Yup, you’d have almost $700,000 after 30 years with this starting nest egg and some diligence.

Ultimately, the point is that if you can save $10,000 in a year, you have a lot of options.

You can kickstart your investing journey, pay off a massive amount of debt, or work towards a downpayment.

So, get excited, because it’s time to tackle the best ways to save $10,000 in a year.

Tips For Getting Started

If you want to save $10,000, here are some simple tips you can use to stay on track over the next 12 months.

1. Create A Budget & Follow It!

If you don’t have a budget, it’s nearly impossible to save any amount of money, let alone five figures.

Your budget really doesn’t have to be complicated.

However, it has to be something that works for you.

Personally, I list all of my set monthly expenses in an Excel sheet. I also keep all my receipts and record my expenses at the end of each month:

Things like rent, utilities, and internet are fixed costs.

Everything else is variable, so you need to track your spending over the month and then figure out if you’re hitting that goal of saving $833 per month.

In this example, I was falling short of that goal, but you get the idea.

Now, if spreadsheets aren’t your style, you can consider free budgeting apps like Mint or Twine.

Both apps make it easy to track your spending and to create spending categories to easily spot problem areas.

If you want to get a bit more serious, you can also checkout PocketSmith.

PocketSmith has free and paid plans, and this finance software makes it incredibly easy to build flexible budgets, track spending, forecast your net worth, and even factor in different income streams.

Learn more about saving with PocketSmith!

2. Start A Side Hustle

If you don’t know how to save $10,000 even if you’ve stuck to a budget and become more frugal, starting a side hustle could be the answer.

In reality, building wealth requires playing offense and defence; or making money and learning how to save it.

So, if you can increase your monthly income with a side hustle and bank the extra money, that makes it much easier to reach $10,000 in a year.

One common side hustle route is to turn to gig apps.

The gig economy is flexible, and many jobs pay above minimum wage, meaning a few days of work per month could amount to a couple extra hundred dollars.

For example, my friend used DoorDash and Uber Eats when he lived in Toronto to boost his income, and his hourly wage was pretty decent.

Other delivery jobs are also a great idea.

For example, you could deliver groceries with Instacart or Shipt or just look into apps that pay you for driving in general.

You can also try methods of making money online as well.

For me, starting a blog and freelance writing were my main college side hustles, and both these income sources have grown into my full-time job now.

The downside of online income is that is usually takes longer to get started, which isn’t always ideal for saving your first $10,000.

However, things like blogging have a lot of long-term potential, especially if you grow your traffic and get into advertising networks like Mediavine.

You get the idea.

If you want to save $10,000 over the next year, boosting your income is going to make the whole process easier!

3. Automate Savings

An easy way to derail your budgeting plans is to never put the money aside in the first place.

To prevent this, setup automatic deposits from your checking account into a savings account that you absolutely don’t touch until you need the money for your goal.

Pretty much every modern bank should let you do this, and it’s a great way to keep fewer responsibilities on your mind.

Just make sure you park your savings somewhere that earns a decent interest rate to mititgate inflation as much as possible.

One option you can try is the CIT Savings Builder.

You only need a $100 minimum to start, and the interest rate you’ll find is definitely better than most basic saving accounts.

4. Put Your Money To Work

While this is a bit trickier to do if you need your $10,000 soon, investing your money is one of the best ways to put it to work for you.

Again, if you’re saving $10,000 for a car, downpayment, or a purchase that’s coming up soon, you probably don’t want to invest that money.

The reason for this is that a bad year in the market would actually see you losing money rather than gaining it, which could derail your plans.

However, if you’re just saving for the sake of saving and $10,000 is your goal, you might as well put your money to work over the years.

If you’re extremely risk averse, you can always look at things fixed income investments like:

• Corporate and government bonds.
• CDs.
• Money market funds.

These won’t have an incredible return, but hey, it’s also better (on average) than having your money sit in a basic savings account that barely earns anything.

If you’re feeling more adventerous, you can also consider investing in dividend paying stocks or ETFs.

Again, if you’re holding onto your savings for a decent time frame, this isn’t necessarily risky (assuming you buy quality).

If you want to get started with investing, two zero-fee online brokerages you can consider are:

• Webull – An awesome way to invest for free. Plus, new Webull accounts can earn free stocks as a signup bonus!
• M1 Finance – Another great way to start investing without worrying about fees and membership costs.

Either way, if you can put your money to work in some form, reaching that $10,000 will be much easier.

5. Try A No-Spend Challenge

There’s no exact forumla for taking on a no-spend challenge, but this is what it sounds like.

Essentially, pick a specific period of time where you won’t spend any money.

Ideally, this is at least a weekend, week, or even entire month if you’re feeling especially motiavated.

Now, a no-spend challenge doesn’t mean you starve or destroy your life. You’re still allowed to spend money on:

• Groceries.
• Utilities.
• Regular bills.
• Gas.

The idea of a no-spend challenge is to cut out frills like eating out, expensive attractions, clothing shopping, and other budget drainers.

If you get creative, you can also find plenty of fun and free date ideas or activities to stay entertained.

6. Trim Your Bills

If you’re still wondering how to save $10,000 in a year, another simple hack is to trim down some of your regular bills.

After all, if you can eliminate or reduce all of your monthly bills by even $10 to $20 per month, that’s hundreds in annualized savings.

One way to start lowering your bills is to just call your main service providers and to try and negotiate better rates.

If you’ve been a loyal customer, chances are, they can knock your bill down a tad every few years to keep you from switching.

You can also try various bill negotiation services that will do the negotiation for you in exchange for splitting the savings.

Popular bill negotiation services include:

• Billshark. Negotiate your internet, cable, phone, home security and satellite radio bills. Billshark takes 40% of your savings but you keep the rest!
• Trim. Like Billshark, Trim negotiates bills and cancels unused subscriptions on your behalf. Trim even works for medical bills, and according to Trim, you can save up to $645 by using their platform. Trim charges 33% of yearly savings.

A bill negotiation service is only useful if you have a few bills that you want to cut down on, but they definitely save time and energy.

You can also consider cutting out services altogether to be even more frugal!

7. Focus On Impactful Savings

A common mistake people make when trying to save more money is to focus on things that aren’t impactful.

I’ll give you an example.

If you eat out everyday for lunch but make it your god-given mission to find the cheapest gas station in town no matter what, you’re barking up the wrong tree.

Sure, saving a few pennies per gallon is nice, but focus on what matters most.

What parts of your budget give you the most trouble? What areas look like a waste of money?

Start there, and then worry about minor improvements.

8. Don’t Burn Out

Another important aspect of saving $10,000 in a year is to avoid burning out.

If cutting back to save this much puts you under a lot of stress, you need to reevaluate your strategy.

Additionally, it’s a good idea to break this goal into chunks and to celebrate your mini-wins when they happen.

So, have a beer or a nice dinner at home when you hit that first $1,000, or $5,000, and don’t lose sleep if you have a slightly more expensive weekend than you wanted.

Saving $10,000 is a marathon, not a sprint, so focus on the bigger picture.

9. Take Easy Wins

If you want easy strategies to boost your savings rate, you’re in luck!

There are two simple tips you can use to earn some free money each year without much effort.

The first is to open a solid cashback credit card so you earn whenever you shop.

Of course, you need to understand how to responsibly use a credit card and to avoid bad debt, but this is a skill if you ask me.

Besides, the right credit card can let you earn at least 1% to 2% cashback on pretty much anything you buy. Not bad!

Another simple idea is to try out reward apps that pay you for shopping.

Some popular options include:

• Drop. Earn free gift cards for shopping through the Drop app at dozens of your favorite stores! Read our Drop app review for all the details.
• Rakuten. Earn cashback rewards for shopping online at thousands of stores. Checkout our Rakuten review for more info.
• Checkout 51. Save money on groceries and gas with this leading rebate app.

These tips won’t make you rich, but hey, every little bit counts.

10. Travel For Cheap

Another simple way to save $10,000 is to cut down on your travel plans for the year.

This could mean taking a stay-cation, roadtrip, or cheaper camping adventure.

While it might suck to scrap any international travel plans, the sacrifice could be worth it for the year.

11. Downsize

If you’re currently living somewhere that’s too expensive, downsizing to a smaller, more affordable living arrangement is a must.

Similarly, if you’re a two-car family but are desparate to save, you can always try being a single-car family if the arrangement can work.

These type of changes aren’t always fun, but if money is tight, they’re an easy way to save more money each month.

12. Pickup A Second Job

If you can’t boost your income with a side hustle, picking up a second job could be another option to save $10,000 within one year.

Ideally, this would be a night job or weekend side gig that doesn’t interfere with your regular job.

Of course, if you’re already working nights or another shift, you’ll need to find something that doesn’t conflict with your schedule.

Even if it’s a few extra shifts per month, this is a reliable way to boost your annual income.

Extra Reading – Is A Second Job Worth It?

Final Thoughts

Saving $10,000 in a year might seem like an impossible task.

However, when you break it down into monthly chunks, it suddenly seems less intimidating.

In reality, you can use this strategy for any monetary amount. As long as your income can support it and you live frugally, it’s possible to save an impressive amount of money each year.

Hopefully, these tips help you save $10,000 in a year or even faster!

If you have a tip you’d like to add to the list, please let us know down in the comments!

Catch you guys in the next one.