Do you wish you can save more money? Sorry, trick question. Of course, you do. I don’t know anyone who’d say no to that question.

Saving money can be hard. But it doesn’t have to be complicated. The biggest hurdle to saving is that most people make it more complicated than it needs to be.

Contrary to what some people think, you don’t need to have your life completely together to start saving.

So here are some simple ways you can trick yourself in saving money without much thinking. Added bonus: You don’t even need to have a budget to do this.

You just have to start. So here are the 5 Simple Ways To Trick Yourself Into Saving Money.

1. Direct deposit money into 2 different accounts

The simplest and in my opinion most effective way of tricking yourself into saving money is by direct depositing your check automatically into separate accounts.

Most companies will allow you the option to split your check to be direct deposited into multiple accounts.

While most people will choose to put all their paychecks into one account, my favorite way to trick myself into saving money is by allocating a percentage of my paycheck into a separate saving account each month.

This way, you never actually get tempted by seeing the money come into your checking account.

This only works if you make sure not to touch the savings account with the exception of emergency. And if you follow through, you’ll be building up your savings in no time.

2. Automate bill payments

Late fees are the worst. And what makes them so bad is they’re completely avoidable!

In this day and age, I honestly cannot think of any reason why anyone wouldn’t automate their monthly bill payments such rent, phone, utilities, internet, credit card, and loan payments.

Automatically save money every month by not having to pay late fees for missed payments. Not only does it save you money, but it also saves you time from manually paying each bill.

Let the system do the work for you. Just don’t get forget to still check up on your bill every month to make sure you’re not charged for anything extra.

3. Search for discount before you buy

Of course the best way to save money is to not buy anything, but that’s simply impossible. The next best option is to always buy on a discount.

I rarely buy anything full price. Even when I go to in-store or check online that there is no discount, I always make sure to check retailmenot and simply type in the store I’m shopping at to search for other discounts.

As a last resort, you can sign up to be added to the store’s email list which most of the time grants you a 15% off discount.

You can easily unsubscribe after you use the discount so you won’t be receiving any junk email or be tempted with email offers in the future.

4. Meal-prep

While you can do the top 3 tricks with little to no effort, this one will take a little more work. But meal-prepping will be so worth it! By far, food expenses are what’s keeping most people’s spending high and is the easiest place to cut down and save.

Preparing your lunch in advance and bringing it to work will save you at least $5-10/day (and that’s on the conservative side). Multiply that by 5 days a week and you can be saving $25-$50/week or $100-$200/month! You see how that adds up?

Plus, be honest with yourself. Do you actually enjoy having to decide what to each for lunch each day, be in a time crunch to make it back to work only to buy a basic meal that you can prepare yourself at home and save money in the long run?

While it may take a couple weeks to get used to, you’ll find that like most things in life, once you make it a habit, it will be like second nature to you.

I have prepared and brought my own lunch to work for a year now, only buying lunch the couple of times I’ve forgotten to my lunch at home.

Make it a habit to meal prep in advance so you never have to think twice about whether to bring or buy lunch at work. Save your money so you can buy better meals on your time off so you can fully enjoy the experience.

5. Use only cash

There is no better way to cut spending and save money than to use cash. It’s so easy to see your spending total pop up on screen and swipe your credit card with much thinking. Using cash will take more effort but it has a magical way of making most people cut spending.

Having to actually pull out the cash and count your bills will make you more conscious of your spending. And the best part is, you can limit yourself!

Once you’re out of cash, you have nothing else to spend so there is zero risk of taking on debt to make your purchases.

Related posts:
How to Cut Spending: 3 Questions to Ask Before Every Purchase
6 Things You Should No Longer Buy to Save Money
Breaking Down the 50/30/20 Budget Rule

That’s it for the 5 Simple Ways To Trick Yourself Into Saving Money. Time for you to give it a try!