How to stay motivated when you're saving for a house deposit

There is no getting around the fact that buying a house and saving the money you need for a deposit is hard work. It can take a long time and requires a lot of discipline. So here are my tips to help keep you motivated during the long hard slog of money saving.

1. Make yourself a progress chart. You know like the ones people make when they’re raising money for charity. Each month when you get paid and you’ve transferred money to your savings, colour in another square. It can really help to actually watch yourself get closer and closer to your target. Make it pretty, make it colourful and it keep it somewhere obvious so that you can use it to motivate yourself. I’m an extremely visual person and I needed constant reminding that my hard work was paying off. When it’s just numbers in a savings account it can hard to realise that you’re steadily making any progress at all when actually each month you chip away at your total a bit more.

2. Reward yourself every time you hit a milestone. Reached 20% of your target? Go to the cinema! Reached 25%? Time for a nice dinner to celebrate! Being strict with yourself when you’re saving is really hard and requires a lot of self control. It’s far easier to stop yourself splurging if you reward your hard work with a treat. In the mean time you can plan and look forward to your next treat ready for when you hit your next goal. The one thing I found really hard to cut back on was going out for dinner so by using this to reward myself it meant I always had something fun coming up.

3. It always helps to keep the end goal in mind. Fancy a cheeky ASOS order? Work out how much it will set you back in your savings goal and then decide if it’s worth it. By actually doing the maths and factoring in how your impulse splurges will affect your overall goal it becomes easier to remind yourself it's just a top that you don't really need. Keep in mind that fashion comes and goes but you will be glad everyday when you come home to your house that you put in the hard work instead of buying an outfit you wore three times.

4. When we were in the last final struggle of buying our house my Nan went and bought us lots of little useful things ready for when we got the keys. I remember holding the rolling pin she bought me and having a really strong image of myself stood at the kitchen counter, in a house that was now mine, rolling out pastry. There was a huge amount of pride and contentment wrapped up in the little flash of the future I had dreamt up. It represented us triumphing and finally getting what we had worked so hard for and a glimpse of what it would be like to be living our own grown up life together. The emotion that it conjured up was so strong I felt like crying every time I thought about it for weeks after. I know it sounds silly but I focused on that strength of feeling when it seemed like it would all fall through and I just wanted to give up. Psychologists call this visualisation and it can really help with working towards your goals. Picture yourself being handed the keys to your own house that you bought with your own hard work.

5. It can always help if you can talk to other people going through the same thing. It can be harder to stay disciplined when you’re watching all of your friends blow their money on exciting nights out and holidays and you’re sat at home being boring. Not only can you feel cut off and isolated but you’re friends will probably find it hard to understand why it’s so important to you to save for your deposit. Reach out to other people going through the same thing (either in real life or online) so that you can chat to people who are struggling with the same things you are. When I was saving to buy a house a lot of my friends were either still in education, unemployed or were of the opinion that it was impossible for anyone our age to buy their own house. I desperately wanted to find my own tribe of people who wanted to try and do it by themselves and sadly I couldn't find any so I just got through it on my own. Since buying our house I have discovered lots of other people online who are also buying their own house who I wish I had found months ago, so reach out!

6. Spend more time with close friends and family who can offer support and help to boost your morale. There will be times when you are feeling low about saving so much money and it can feel like an impossible task. Surround yourself with people who believe in you and can lift your spirits.

7. Try to build in regular fun things on the cheap and plan your budget accordingly. It’s important to strike the balance between planning ahead for the future while also living for the here and now. Fun things don’t always have to mean expensive and saving for a deposit does not mean you have to live in purgatory. In fact dreaming up ways of enjoying yourself on a budget can be a fun task in itself and by being more creative it can help you discover new and exciting things.

8. It can take a long time to save for a deposit and I felt impossibly restless during the time. I was aware of months passing me by and I felt no closer to achieving my dream (despite inching a little closer each month but it’s hard to have that level of perspective when you’re living through it). In order to try and use the time productively I researched every aspect of buying a house I could think of. I learnt a huge amount about the legal processes because I decided knowledge was power.  I wanted to know and understand what the professionals were telling me rather than just blindly trusting their opinion because not everyone is great at their job! It also felt like something useful to do in the meantime while we were saving and it certainly came in useful when we actually came to buy our house. The fact I was prepared to call people out when they were wrong was one of the reasons that we ultimately ended up successfully buying our house. Turned out to have been time well spent in the end.So if you're feeling like you're not getting anywhere use the time to become an expert in house buying, it will definitely be time well spent. 

First time buyer blog post series

1. We bought our first house
2. Our house buying story
3. The guide to saving for a house deposit