As I always say, savings is the key to destroying debt, achieving financial freedom and breaking through to a prosperous lifestyle. In other words, your savings can help you accomplish and maintain the life you really want to live. So, let’s challenge ourselves to start a savings habit or improve our savings habit. I first introduced this 100 Envelope Savings Challenge in 2018 and I am still getting comments from people who are still deciding to start their own 100 Envelope Savings Challenge! Since, we have started a New Year, 2023, I thought I would reintroduce this Savings Challenge and invite you to do this 100 Envelope Savings Challenge with me.
In this 100 Envelope Savings Challenge, you will decide how much you want to challenge yourself. My hope is that you will decide to do all 100 Envelopes but if you are not up to that challenge, you can select your own challenge by deciding how many envelopes you will commit to fill. You can challenge yourself to do 10 envelopes, 25 envelopes, 50 envelopes, 75 envelopes, 100 envelopes or anywhere in between. Whether it is the first 10 envelopes or all 100 envelopes, it is totally up to you. I encourage you to save a portion of your income no matter how small. This 100 Envelope Savings Challenge is meant to help you either develop a savings habit or improve and increase your savings. Who wouldn’t want that? I think this challenge will be fun and it will give you great results according to your own expectations.
I plan to do all 100 envelopes and I invite you to join me and let me know how you decided to challenge yourself and your progress in the comments to this blog. Please let me know when you reach your goal so that I can celebrate with you. If you really want to successfully meet this challenge, I recommend you share your intentions with someone who can keep you accountable. There is no set timeline, so you can go as fast or as slow as you wish. But setting a timeline makes it more interesting and more challenging. I personally prefer a timeline, so I plan to get as many envelopes done in three months.
Here is how it will work. You decide how many envelopes you want to challenge yourself to complete in this challenge. Assuming, you decide to do all 100 envelopes this is what you need to do. Purchase a box of 100 count envelopes. I went with the cheapest envelopes I could find because I figured every dollar I don’t spend on envelopes I can put in an envelope. I purchased #6-3/4, 100 count envelopes at Walmart for 97 cents. I put labels on each envelope. For example: The first 10 envelopes would be labeled in order #1 through #10; 20 envelopes would be labeled in order #1 through #20. 100 envelopes would be labeled in order #1 through #100.
Your challenge is to fill each envelope with money in numerical order with the dollar amount equal to the number on the envelope. For example: Envelope #1 = $1.00; Envelope #2 = $2.00; Envelope #50 = $50.00; Envelope # 100 = $100.
Be creative and place your completed envelopes in a bank, a jar a box or any savings container you choose. When you have filled all the envelopes that you have challenged yourself to complete, the Challenge is Over!
Wherever, you start in this challenge you should celebrate because you have increased your savings. You can use your savings however you choose (vacation, down payment, investments, emergency fund, etc.).
Here is a chart to help you decide on your savings challenge level:
THE ENVELOPE SAVINGS CHALLENGE LEVEL
NUMBER OF ENVELOPES TOTAL AMOUNT SAVED
(Saved in Numerical Order)
10 (#1 thru #10) $ 55.00
20 (#1 thru #20) $ 210.00
30 (#1 thru #30) $ 465.00
40 (#1 thru #40) $ 820.00
50 (#1 thru #50) $ 1,275.00
60 (#1 thru #60) $ 1,830.00
70 (#1 thru #70) $ 2,485.00
80 (#1 thru #80) $ 3,240.00
90 (#1 thru #90) $ 4,095.00
100 (#1 thru 100) $ 5,050.00
My hope is that you commit to one of the savings challenge levels above and see it through. This is a good way to shift your money mindset around money so that you can live in financial freedom.
After completing this challenge, you may want to look into my course: “Unlock Your Money Mindset” at: Unlock Your Money Mindset (thinkific.com)