Money Management

Love dollar stores? Read on to see what pitfalls you’ll want to steer clear of when shopping at one. 

No matter which part of the country you live in, chances are, there’s a dollar store nearby. Dollar General alone has close to 20,000 stores across the U.S.

If your goal is to boost your savings account this year, then it could pay to shop at dollar stores regularly for the discounts involved. But you should also make a point to steer clear of these traps when shopping at dollar stores.

1. Assuming you’ll get the lowest price

Dollar stores, as their name suggests, commonly price items around the $1 mark. But that doesn’t mean you can’t find a lower price elsewhere.

Let’s say you’re buying party favors for an upcoming event. You might score a set of four party bag stuffers for $1 at a dollar store. But Amazon might have a bulk pack of 30 of them for $4.99, which is actually a better deal.

Before you scoop up items from your nearby dollar store, spend a little time comparing prices, especially if you’re buying a lot of the same item. You may find that another retailer has a better deal on a bulk pack of the item you’re interested in.

2. Not checking expiration dates on food items

It’s a big myth that dollar store food is low quality. Often, the food products you’ll see on dollar store shelves are made by the same companies whose products you consume regularly.

That said, one pitfall you might encounter when buying groceries at your local dollar store is having a more narrow expiration window. So before you add food items to your shopping cart, check to see when they expire. If you’re looking at buying three boxes of cereal, all of which have an expiration date within a week, you may want to either pass or only pick up one box.

Keep in mind, though, that there can be some wiggle room with expiration dates for packaged goods. Let’s say your child’s favorite cookies, which normally result in a $2.99 credit card tab at the supermarket, are available for around $1 but expire in five days. Chances are, they’ll still be okay a few weeks after the date printed on the box (or worst case, you could always help yourself to a few cookies to ensure that they don’t go to waste).

3. Assuming you’ll find everything on your list

There’s nothing wrong with shopping at the dollar store when you need packaged food, cleaning products, or crafting supplies. But you can’t assume you’ll find everything you need in one fell swoop.

The inventory you’ll find at your local dollar store may not be nearly as consistent as it is at your local grocery or big-box store. So if you’re on a tight deadline, you may want to budget extra time to stop at another store after you’ve hit the dollar store.

Shopping at dollar stores can easily save you money, especially if you do so frequently. But make sure to avoid these traps as best as you can so you don’t waste money or wind up without the products you really need.

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We’re firm believers in the Golden Rule, which is why editorial opinions are ours alone and have not been previously reviewed, approved, or endorsed by included advertisers.
The Ascent does not cover all offers on the market. Editorial content from The Ascent is separate from The Motley Fool editorial content and is created by a different analyst team.John Mackey, former CEO of Whole Foods Market, an Amazon subsidiary, is a member of The Motley Fool’s board of directors. Maurie Backman has positions in Amazon.com. The Motley Fool has positions in and recommends Amazon.com. The Motley Fool has a disclosure policy.

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I’m using a buyer’s agent because I don’t have to pay the commission directly and they offer me services I can’t easily do myself. Find out more. 

I recently listed my home for sale and I’m on the hunt for a new one. When I listed my property, I did not use a seller’s agent. Instead, I used a flat-fee MLS service and listed the home myself. I’ve sold homes like this several times before.

When I’m looking for a new property to buy, though, I will use a buyer’s agent. Here’s why I’ll hire a real estate agent after I get a mortgage pre-approval and I’m ready to start shopping for a home.

There are different payment structures for buyer’s vs. seller’s agents

The main reason why I’ll hire a buyer’s agent instead of a seller’s agent is because of the way the payment of real estate agents works.

When a home is sold, the seller generally pays the commission for both the seller’s agent and the buyer’s agent. The standard is 3% per agent for a total of 6%, although there are some discounted services where seller’s agents accept 2.5% or even 2%.

Since the seller pays the commission, I can save money by not hiring a seller’s agent. I will still have to pay commission to the agent representing the buyers of my property, but I can save the 3% I would have had to pay if I hired my own seller’s agent to help me.

When I hire a buyer’s agent, though, I do not have to pay their commission directly. Of course, the seller does price their house knowing they will owe these fees. But, when I’ve tried to buy houses without real estate agents in the past with the hope I could get a 2% or 3% discount since the sellers wouldn’t have to pay my agent, it hasn’t worked out that way. Most sellers haven’t really been receptive to discounting the property because this is just not the standard — they expect to pay an agent, but not to accept a lower price.

Since I wouldn’t likely save much by not using a buyer’s agent — and I absolutely do save by not using a seller’s agent — it makes sense for me to hire one but not the other.

I use the services my buyer’s agent offers

Another big reason why I hire a buyer’s agent is because I feel like the services they offer are more worth it to me.

I’m comfortable selling myself since I know how to do the tasks required of me and can handle them easily. I hire a professional photographer, easily research comparable listings to set a price, and have a flat-fee MLS service I have used many times before to help me get my property into the database people use to search for homes.

The flat-fee MLS service makes it easy for people to set up showings with me (I just have to accept or reject their requests from my phone). And I am comfortable reviewing their offers.

When I am a buyer, though, I ask my agent to do a lot — like drive us around to look at houses, coordinate a bunch of home showings on appropriate days, and help me draft and submit an offer and arrange inspections. These are all things that would take me a lot more time and be harder to do without an agent.

If you are buying or selling a home and trying to decide if you need an agent, consider the costs and the services provided so you can decide if it makes sense for you to hire a buyer’s agent, seller’s agent, or both. Don’t just do what’s common — do what’s right for you.

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Love Aldi? Read on to see how you can save even more by shopping there. 

If your goal this year is to limit your spending and boost your savings, then you may want to make a point to shop at Aldi more frequently. You may not find every single grocery store item on your list at Aldi, since selection can vary by store and can sometimes be limited. But you’re likely to find that when it comes to actual prices, Aldi’s are hard to beat.

That said, there are steps you can take to eke out even more savings in the course of shopping at Aldi. Here are a few worth employing.

1. See what’s on sale every week

Aldi is known for its generally low prices. But like many other supermarkets, it tends to put specific items on sale week after week. Spend a few minutes looking through your Aldi circular each week before hitting the store. And if that circular doesn’t show up in the mail, you can access it online instead.

2. Forgo those brand names

Although Aldi carries some brand-name products in its stores, more than 90% of Aldi products are private-label ones from brands you’ve probably never heard of. If you want to save more money when shopping at Aldi, give those unknown brands a chance. In many cases, you’ll find that they’re comparable taste-wise to the brands you’re more familiar with, only you might rack up a fraction of the credit card tab in the course of buying them.

3. Buy your groceries at the store instead of having them delivered

Like many supermarkets, Aldi allows you to order your groceries online and have them delivered to your door. But if you buy groceries online, you might pay more for them. Aldi expressly says on its website that online food prices may vary a bit from in-store prices. Plus, you’ll have to pay delivery fees, not to mention factor in extra money to tip your delivery person (which isn’t a requirement, but it’s certainly a nice thing to do).

If you don’t have a car or an Aldi near your home, then ordering your groceries online might make sense. But if you have the option to get over to an actual Aldi store and do your shopping in person, you might end up saving a lot more money.

Prepare to save even more

Shopping at Aldi can sometimes be a mixed bag because you never know if you’ll be able to check every item off of your grocery list. But if you have an Aldi nearby and it’s easy to stop in on a regular basis, then it pays to do so. It also pays to follow these tips so you can enjoy even more savings during your shopping.

As of March, food costs were up 8.4% on an annual basis, per the Consumer Price Index. So it definitely pays to see if shopping at Aldi helps ease the burden of higher grocery prices, especially if you happen to have a larger family to feed.

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Ramit Sethi says many people admit to struggling to spend money, but they rarely fix this problem. Read on to find out why. 

Some money problems have pretty easy fixes (like not earning enough interest on your savings account or having the wrong credit card). Others require a lot more dedicated effort, though.

There’s one money problem that many people share which finance expert Ramit Sethi says rarely gets solved. It’s not lack of effort that interferes with addressing this issue, though. According to Sethi, there’s a very different reason why this one specific financial issue is rarely solved.

The money problem Sethi says most people don’t fix

One of the most common issues people have with money is that they sometimes don’t feel comfortable actually using it.

Sethi tweeted out a quote from someone who indicated they were “hesitant to spend money,” despite living within their means, having plenty of savings, and actually budgeting for an amount of their take-home pay to be used for enjoyable expenses. This reluctance to use money for entertainment or enjoyable expenses is actually shared by many, explains Sethi.

“This is a common problem, but one that rarely changes, because deep down, most people don’t actually consider it a genuine problem,” Sethi said.

As Sethi points out with this example, there are many people who are doing all the right things, who are on track to financial success, and simply can’t enjoy their money — but they don’t do anything to fix this issue because — despite what they may say — in reality very few people view being overly frugal as a real concern they need to actually take concrete steps to solve.

Here’s how you can overcome this issue — and why you should

A reluctance to spend your money on things you enjoy may not feel like a problem — especially when there are many people out there living paycheck to paycheck and genuinely struggling to pay the bills who would love to have that issue.

The reality, though, is that the purpose of money is to create an enjoyable life — not just to end up with the biggest bank account balance while depriving yourself of everything that makes living fun and meaningful. And if you have plenty of money and are doing the right things to build up your net worth but you aren’t able to enjoy spending some on things that matter to you, you’re missing out.

Identifying why this is a real issue is the easy part, though. Finding a fix is harder. You can budget for your spending money which helps some people to incur expenses guilt-free, but this doesn’t solve the problem for everyone, as the quote Sethi sent out shows.

If creating a line item in your budget that includes money for fun spending doesn’t help you to actually enjoy using it, Sethi recommends creating a conscious spending plan. This basically involves focusing on identifying and defining the things you really love and purposefully allocating some percentage of your income to them.

The bottom line is, you have to change your money philosophy, as Sethi explains. This means rethinking how you view the purpose of your funds and focusing on the fact that the money you’re making isn’t there to just help you get rich — it’s there to help you live a richer life.

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It’s nice to want to help out your adult kids with financial support. But read on to see why that might backfire on you. 

Being a parent doesn’t end when your children grow up and move out of the house. Granted, at that point, you may not need to look out for them the same way you did when they were toddlers and you were worried about them getting into the cutlery drawer or touching a hot oven.

But the concern parents have for their kids tends to remain intact throughout their lives. And so even if your kids are full-fledged adults who fled the nest years ago, you may be inclined to do what you can to support them financially, whether by helping them pay their mortgage or by handing out money when you can.

If you’re in the habit of providing financial support to your grown kids, you’re not alone. In a recent survey by Retirement Investments, 55% of respondents say they still help their adult children financially. But whether that’s the right move depends on your financial situation.

You don’t want to put your retirement at risk

If you’re doing very well financially, are maxing out your IRA or 401(k) each year, and have plenty of money saved for retirement, then you may be just fine to write your grown kids a $200 check every month to help give them some breathing room. After all, you may be at a point in your career where you’re enjoying higher earnings and fewer expenses. So if you can easily afford to share the wealth, why not do so?

The problem, however, is that some parents help support their grown kids financially at the expense of their retirements. So if you’re in a position where you’re not happy with the nest egg you’ve built, then you absolutely should not be financially supporting your grown children when you need to play catch up on retirement savings.

Imagine you give your children $200 a month to help with their bills instead of putting that cash into your own IRA or 401(k). Do that for many years, and you might end up with a serious financial shortfall on your hands once your career wraps up and your paycheck goes away for good.

Other ways to help your adult children

It’s natural to want to make life as easy on your kids as possible. And one way to do that may be to provide financial support. But if money is tight or if you need all of your money to save for retirement, then you should aim to offer your kids help in ways that don’t involve you writing them a monthly check.

One option, for example, is to try to help out with childcare if your schedule allows for that. That could help your kids reduce their costs. Another option may be to allow a grown child of yours to move back home for a period of time, especially if they’re single and won’t take up that much space. This way, they can boost their own savings, and you won’t have to spend money of your own on their bills.

Not providing financial support to your grown kids when you can’t afford it doesn’t make you a bad parent. And you shouldn’t compromise your retirement to write those checks.

If you retire without having saved enough, you might end up having to be a burden on your kids later in life. And that’s probably the last thing you’d ever want.

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You need to have a decent amount of savings for retirement. Read on to see if saving 10% of your income will suffice. 

You’ll need savings of your own to enjoy retirement the way you want to. Even if you get a nice benefit out of Social Security, as a general rule, the money you get there will only replace about 40% of your pre-retirement wages, and that assumes you’re an average earner. If you’re an above-average earner, you might get even less replacement income from Social Security.

Now, imagine living on 40% of your salary (or less). That doesn’t exactly paint a rosy picture. And so if you want to make sure you’ll have enough money as a retiree to do the things you’ve always dreamed of, then you’ll need to make an effort to consistently sock money away in your IRA or 401(k) plan.

But how much of your salary should you be parting with for retirement savings purposes? You might assume that 10% is a nice amount to contribute. But is it really enough?

You may want to aim higher

You’d think saving 10% of your income for retirement would yield really great results. But a lot of financial experts will tell you that saving just 10% of your earnings will leave you with a shortfall during your senior years.

Suze Orman, for example, says that saving 10% of your salary for retirement is really just the minimum. She says that 15% is a smarter target.

Of course, the amount of money you decide to save for retirement should hinge on a few different factors. These include:

What you’re reasonably able to saveWhat your retirement savings goals areHow you’ll be investing your savings

If you’re a lower earner barely scraping by, then saving 15% to 20% of your income for retirement may not be feasible. Heck, saving 10% may not be doable if you can barely cover your rent or mortgage on your current income.

Meanwhile, you may have lofty goals for retirement, like extensive travel. Or you may be content to stay close to home and pursue hobbies nearby. In the latter scenario, you might need less savings than in the former. So that, too, should help determine how much of your income you part with.

Finally, think about how you’re going to invest your savings. If you’ll be investing somewhat aggressively, such as buying stocks, then you may be able to get away with saving a smaller percentage of your income. But if you plan to stick to safer investments like bonds that commonly generate a lower return, then you may need to compensate by saving more of your salary.

Your savings rate can change over time

If you’re fairly new to funding a retirement plan, you may not be able to part with more than 10% of your income. You may not even be able to save 10% of what you earn. And that’s okay. Your best bet is to save as much as you can, and then aim to ramp up your savings rate over time.

One tactic for accomplishing this that tends to work well is saving your raise each year on top of what you’ve already been saving. Another tactic is to stick extra money that comes your way into your IRA or 401(k) as you can, such as when you get a tax refund. These strategies can have a big impact over time — and, ideally, leave you with enough money to enjoy retirement to the fullest.

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We’re firm believers in the Golden Rule, which is why editorial opinions are ours alone and have not been previously reviewed, approved, or endorsed by included advertisers.
The Ascent does not cover all offers on the market. Editorial content from The Ascent is separate from The Motley Fool editorial content and is created by a different analyst team.Maurie Backman has positions in Target. The Motley Fool has positions in and recommends Target. The Motley Fool has a disclosure policy.

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