When people celebrate New Year you will often hear the phrase “Have a prosperous New Year”.  This is because it is indeed the time for looking for new ways to prosper and make the most of your finances.

If you are lucky enough to have spare money then it is essential that you take some time out to sit down and thoroughly think through the best way to put that money to work for you and to keep yourself in financial control.  The New Year offers the best time of the year to do such a thing and allows you to set up your next 12 months of finances with focus and intention.

Save! Save! Save!

It is easy to get carried away with spare money left over and actually get spending it instead of saving it.  Especially at New Year!  Your intentions may be good but the temptation of January sales, New Year discounts and Winter bargains may be too much to fight against. Get any bargains that you may need but do not spend any additional money on items that you would not have purchased or be lured into “buy now pay later” schemes that you will regret later in the year.

Get The Very Best Interest Rate

When it comes to put savings aside make sure that you really shop around for the very best interest rate.  It is said that people are more loyal to their banks than they are to their partners because so few people switch their bank accounts.  The truth of the matter is that people aren’t necessarily loyal, just lazy.  It can seem a lot of hassle to open a new bank account but nowadays it can be done very quickly and easily online and can make you literally hundreds or even thousands of dollars in additional interest over your lifetime.  That has to be worth taking a few hours out to shop around.

Use Credit To Your Advantage

It may seem strange to advise you use credit when you already have cash, but used wisely credit can be your best friend.

The longer cash is in your bank account, the longer it is accruing interest which is effectively free money. Some credit cards will offer you several weeks before interest actually starts to be charged on the account.  This means that as long as you pay off your account each month you will not pay a penny in interest.  This makes it a preferential way of paying for items, especially more expensive items as it allows you to pay for an item but leave your money in the bank earning you more interest.   Then simply pay it off at the end of the month and you haven’t paid a penny of interest to the credit card company but you have earned a month of interest by leaving your money in the bank.  It’s a win-win situation, but you need to shop around.

You may even want to look into getting a credit card that has a cash back scheme that then actually pays you to use it.  Again, as long as you pay the balance back in time you won’t be charged any interest but you will have earned interest by leaving your money in the bank longer and then you will get an additional bonus in the form of cash back from the credit card company. 

Happy New Year

So, to really enjoy your New Year and make it more financially rewarding than ever, simply avoid the sales and discounts on anything other than the items you would need to have purchased anyway.  Then get yourself the very best interest-paying bank account you can find and then do everything you can to leave as much as you can in there as long as possible by using credit to your advantage.