Saving with purpose: intentional financial planning with less stress

This blog post may contain affiliate links. As an Amazon Associate, I earn from qualifying purchases.

This post is brought to you by The Huntington National Bank and The Motherhood. All opinions are completely my own.

When it comes to finances, we haven’t always been perfect at it. But like I’ve said before, Jamie and I learned really early on in our marriage about the value of saving for emergencies, financial planning for the future and minimizing our debt. Now that we’re not the young newlyweds on the block, it’s been pretty cool to be able to share what we’ve learned with other couples. Money and finances are one of the biggest causes of divorce. Whether you have enough, how to spend it, how to save it, how to talk about it…all that can build up to become a major issue between two people.

For us, building up an emergency fund was a two-part deal. Our first starter emergency fund was $1,000 and it’s the first thing we did as newlyweds. Having this small cushion immediately gave us some breathing room while we figured out what we wanted to do as far as paying off school loans and saving was concerned. Our second emergency fund came later. We’ve been married for 13 years, so this is something that didn’t just happen overnight. Sometimes it was easy enough as adding a tax refund to the account, but a lot of it came from extra income and spending less than we brought home each month. 

It’s important to sit down and decide exactly what your fully-funded emergency fund should be. For our family, it’s 6-8 months of expenses. So that’s keeping a roof over our heads, the lights on, the a/c and heat working, gas in our cars and food on the table. Obviously, going through our emergency fund for those reasons is a worst-case scenario. But there are other reasons why we’ve had to dip into the fund at times. 

We used to do this all between our bank account and a couple of Excel spreadsheets, but now we’re slowly moving all that information over to our new Huntington Bank savings account. The Hub is their new digital banking experience full of tools to help you and your financial future. The Savings Goal Getter℠ tool is one of my favorites and you can use it to help you build your emergency fund or for whatever your savings goals are. 

Tip: This article from Huntington.com is really helpful if you find yourself experiencing a financial emergency. 

There was a period of two years early on in our marriage where we experienced several personal losses. Three of Jamie’s grandparents passed away and then my dad lost his battle with brain cancer. It was a really hard couple of years for us and we had to make several trips back home to be with our families. I had just spent some time in Wisconsin with my parents helping my mom care for my dad. A few weeks later, we got a call that he probably didn’t have much time left. We immediately packed up and got on the road. I distinctly remember a moment we had at a gas station when I told Jamie: 

I am so thankful that we have this emergency fund. I can’t imagine not being able to say goodbye because we couldn’t afford to go. Or knowing that we’ll eventually come home and then figure out how to pay for it all. Or having to limit the time we’ll spend at home because we didn’t have enough money.

It was one of the hardest things I’ve ever experienced, but I’m so grateful that we were able to be there without any added financial stress. Other reasons why our family has had to use our emergency fund over the years include unexpected car repairs, household repairs – including damage to a flooded basement, a period of unemployment, medical expenses, and paying for our mortgage for our Tennessee house when we couldn’t sell it right away after our move to Ohio. 

This is why we believe so strongly in the importance of having an emergency fund. Hopefully it’s something you won’t have to use or use often, but that little safety net is so necessary when you need it. 

So how do you build one? 

Well, the easiest (and first) thing to do would be to create a monthly budget and see what your expenses are compared to the income you bring in each month.  If you’re consistently spending less than you make, it’s easy enough to start putting that surplus away in your Huntington Bank savings account and tracking it with the Savings Goal Getter tool.

Tip: Putting together a budget will show you what your necessary expenses are. You can use Huntington’s Spend Analysis tool on The Hub to help you figure this out. Multiply this by how many months’ worth of expenses you want covered by your emergency fund and then you’ll have the amount for your emergency fund goal.

If you don’t have a surplus (or find that you’re overspending), look at your budget and see where you can cut down on expenses. Think about cutting cable, decreasing your spending on eating out, pausing your gym membership in lieu of a cheaper online option, or trading your car in for a cheaper one in order to decrease your car payment.

Still having trouble finding wiggle room or just want a way to work towards your goal faster? Here are some other suggestions – and full disclosure, we’ve actually done most of these ourselves:

• Sell all the things – I bet most people can take a quick look around their house and name at least 10 items that they don’t use or need. Selling what you already own is a really easy way to make some extra money with minimal effort. Facebook marketplace, b/s/t pages and Craigslist are all great ways to list items you want to get rid of.
• Work overtime shifts at your current job – Not all jobs provide overtime or holiday pay opportunities, but many do. I’ll be honest, it’s not always convenient when Jamie picks up an overtime shift at the fire department, but the money is worth it when we need some extra cash flow.
• Get a part-time job – part-time, temporary jobs are generally pretty easy to find. Some ideas include delivering pizzas, working as a barista for your favorite coffee place, driving for a ride-share company, or becoming a personal shopper for different companies.
• Turn your hobby into a side hustle – this is one of the reasons I opened up an online shop for my fiber art. It was something I loved to do and I saw that it could bring in a little extra money here and there. 
• This article from Huntington may also give you a few more ideas. 

Whether you’re able to contribute $10 a week or hundreds of dollars a month, every little bit helps and makes it possible for you to reach your emergency fund goal. What I love about our Huntington Bank savings account is that we’re able to track it all through The Hub tools. You can also set up an automatic contribution so that your money immediately goes towards your goal. You can also use these methods to work towards your other financial goals.

The Savings Goal Getter tool on The Hub is my favorite. You can set up an emergency fund and up to 10 savings goals per account. So while our emergency fund is already done, we’re able to track our progress towards our other goals, like travel, minivan, adoption and anything else we dream up along the way. The Savings Goal Getter tool will suggest how much to save each month to reach your goal by the date you want to hit it, but you can always update this as you go. You’ll also get notifications (if you sign up for them, Message and data rates may apply) when you’re behind schedule. I love that it helps keep us on track.

Are you working towards building up an emergency fund or saving for a financial goal? I’d love to hear if you think having a tool like the Savings Goal Getter would be helpful in helping you meet your goals. If you have a Huntington bank account already but need help setting up your Savings Goal Getter, you can find more information or contact Huntington Bank here. Or if you want to chat more about creating your emergency fund, budgeting or ways to boost your income for more cash flow, I’m always available to answer your questions!

Don’t forget you can check out Huntington Bank here to learn more about The Hub and follow them on Facebook, Instagram and Twitter.