The Power of Spare Change

One of the perhaps most iconic hallmarks of the saver of money is the image of the piggy bank. After all, what is the purpose of a piggy bank? Well, it is a coin container used to store coins. Why would anyone store coins? Well, because people want to save them. Thus the piggy bank and saving money go hand and hand with each other both symbolically and literally.

Perhaps one of the best things you can do for young children (other than start a dividend investment account for them) is getting them a piggy bank. This way the art and power of saving money is instilled and learned at a young age, even if it is in its most basic sense. I did not have a “piggy” bank growing up per say, as it was not literally a pig. I was a fan of DuckTales as a child so I had a ceramic figure of Uncle Scrooge holding a large money bag with a coin slot on it. That is what I used that to store any coins I received or found. It functioned the same way and I watched my coins add up over time.

So I had a great experience as a child saving little amounts of money. This experience carried over into adulthood. I save all my spare change from the pennies to the quarters. Except today, I use a digital coin jar (pictured above) to hold all my spare change. I forget just when I started placing my spare change into the jar, but as of publishing this post the total monetary value of the jar is approximately $154.00.

My coin jar is pretty full now and it is time for me to cash those coins in. Plus or minus one or two dollars, I have managed to save over $154 in spare change over the past five to six months. All that small change added up to some huge dollars! So sometime this month (when I have the time to cash in) it will almost feel like getting a $154 bonus for the month.

So what to do with your accumulated spare change? There are numerous possibilities depending on how much you saved. Heck, you saved it and it’s yours to do with as you see fit.  You can spend it on a nice dinner with family or friends. Or you can go out and buy new clothes or shoes. You can spend it on food or supplies for your residence. Or you can pay down your debt whether on credit card or loans. You can continue to save it as part of an emergency fund should the need arise.

You can use your accumulated spare change to pay your monthly bills. The $154 that I managed to save would actually cover my phone bill, internet bill, and utilities bill for the entire month. And I would still have a few dollars left over. You can also put that saved money to work for you by investing it in quality dividend paying stocks. That way your one time spare change continuously generates even more money for you while you sleep.

I have yet to decide what to do with the extra $154 I have saved up. But as you can see, the more you save the more options you have. I am divided between two options for using this saved money.  The first is investing in dividend stocks and the second is buying a bookshelf for all my history books current sitting inside cardboard boxes in the corner. I am leaning towards the bookshelf just to get those boxes out of the way.

Is there a lesson here? Yes. Don’t underestimate the power (and value) of pocket change. What seems like a small amount, when saved, really does add up to large amounts over time. So it is best to save your spare change. You will be grateful when the time comes to cash in and you have extra cash to use as you see fit. How about you guys? Do you save up your spare change?

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