{"id":7048489,"date":"2026-08-26T23:03:58","date_gmt":"2026-08-26T23:03:58","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/peraltafinancing.com\/business\/finance\/7-ways-to-tighten-up-your-finances\/"},"modified":"2026-08-26T23:03:58","modified_gmt":"2026-08-26T23:03:58","slug":"7-ways-to-tighten-up-your-finances","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/fivemor.com\/?p=7048489","title":{"rendered":"7 Ways to Tighten Up Your Finances"},"content":{"rendered":"


\n<\/p>\n

\n

When times are good, you don\u2019t feel the impact of being a bit loose with your finances.<\/p>\n

The Chicago Fed released their Advance Retail Trade Summary in June and it showed that consumer spending fell 1.3% in May, when adjusted for inflation. Americans are spending less. We\u2019re tightening our belts.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/figure>\n

This is a pretty big deal. You\u2019ll see some months with negative values but 1.3% is a sizable drop. February 2023 showed a -1.16% fall while we were dealing with inflation in the 5-6% range and two banks failed (Silicon Valley Bank, Signature Bank). No other month exceeded -1%.<\/p>\n

It doesn\u2019t predict a recession but now\u2019s a good time to review your finances and ensure you aren\u2019t letting money leave your wallet for no reason.<\/p>\n

Here are seven ways you can tighten up your finances:<\/p>\n

\nTable of Contents<\/summary>\n
    \n
  1. 1. Make Your Savings High Yield<\/a><\/li>\n
  2. 2. Simplify Your Accounts<\/a><\/li>\n
  3. 3. Check MissingMoney.com<\/a><\/li>\n
  4. 4. Audit Your Subscriptions<\/a><\/li>\n
  5. 5. Comparison Shop Your Insurance<\/a><\/li>\n
  6. 6. Lock Down Your Identity <\/a><\/li>\n
  7. 7. Review Your Retirement Accounts<\/a><\/li>\n<\/ol>\n<\/details>\n

    1. Make Your Savings High Yield<\/h2>\n

    If your bank has physical locations, your savings account probably pays you 0.01% APY. And they probably require you to have a minimum balance of $500 \u2013 $1,500 that earns that insultingly low interest rate. That\u2019s money not earning interest.<\/p>\n

    High yield savings accounts will pay 3-4% APY right now. It won\u2019t change your life but that\u2019s interest you get to put into your pocket. This helps your money grow faster than inflation and changing won\u2019t make your life any harder, riskier, or time consuming.<\/p>\n

    \ud83d\udc49 Check out these high yield savings accounts<\/a><\/strong><\/p>\n

    Once you do this, make sure you aren\u2019t keeping too much cash in your checking. Ideally, find a bank with a high yield savings account and free overdraft protection into a good checking account too. This way you can keep the minimum in your checking and the bank will transfer funds as needed.<\/p>\n

    2. Simplify Your Accounts<\/h2>\n

    Draw a financial map of your finances<\/a> and start removing accounts that no longer serve a clear purpose. My simplifying your finances, you make it easier to manage and it helps you avoid careless fees.<\/p>\n

    If you\u2019re short on time, prioritize clear duplicates and bank accounts with minimum balance requirements. Unlike credit cards, closing a bank account has no potential negative impact whatsoever. If you haven\u2019t had a transaction in months, chances are you won\u2019t.<\/p>\n

    As you close those accounts, transfer those funds into a high yield savings account.<\/p>\n

    If you want a checklist, here\u2019s a list of financial spring cleaning moves<\/a> you can knock out.<\/p>\n

    3. Check MissingMoney.com<\/h2>\n

    If you haven\u2019t done this in the last year, go to MissingMoney.com<\/a> and see if your state (or any state you\u2019ve lived in) has unclaimed funds in your name. These pop up every once and a while when a company tries to pay you but can\u2019t.<\/p>\n

    I\u2019ve had people find thousands of dollars<\/a>. It takes a few minutes.<\/p>\n

    Click here to set up an annual Google Calendar event.<\/a><\/p>\n

    4. Audit Your Subscriptions<\/h2>\n

    Make sure you\u2019re using all of your subscriptions and cancel the ones where you aren\u2019t getting maximum value. You can always sign up again later!<\/p>\n

    You can manually review your credit card statements or use a tool like Rocket Money<\/a> to do it for you. For the subscriptions where I\u2019m on the fence as to its value, I keep a log for a month to see how much I\u2019m truly using it. Then you can calculate your \u201cper use\u201d cost as a quantitative way of comparison.<\/p>\n

    Or just cut them, see if you actually miss it, and sign back up if you do!<\/p>\n

    5. Comparison Shop Your Insurance<\/h2>\n

    You should comparison shop all of your recurring expenses but insurance is the best example of this because it\u2019s expensive, you\u2019re billed once a year, and there are a ton of competitors with very similar products.<\/p>\n

    You want to shop this around at least every 2-3 years.<\/p>\n

    If you own a home and a car, those two policies should be shopped around at a bare minimum. And when you comparison shop, make sure you bundle policies as well as those result in massive savings.<\/p>\n

    \ud83d\udc49 Use this free tool to comparison shop your car insurance<\/strong><\/a><\/p>\n

    In addition to shopping around, contact your current insurance company and see if there are discounts you could qualify for but aren\u2019t getting. A simple call could lower your rates, I was able to secure a lower rate simply sending an email:<\/p>\n

    \"\"\"\"<\/figure>\n

    It can\u2019t hurt!<\/p>\n

    6. Lock Down Your Identity <\/h2>\n

    With all the data breaches and disclosures, so much of your personal identifying information is available online. You can go to HaveIBeenPwned.com<\/a> right now, enter your email addresses, and see when they were revealed in a breach.<\/p>\n

    Review our identity protection guide<\/a> for what you can do to mitigate the damage from these breaches. If you are short on time, start with this:<\/p>\n

      \n
    1. Freeze your credit reports at Experian<\/a>, Equifax<\/a>, and TransUnion<\/a>. <\/strong>When you freeze your report, creditors can\u2019t pull it to determine your creditworthiness so thieves can\u2019t open new lines of credit even if they have all of your information. You can freeze and unfreeze entirely online.<\/li>\n
    2. Register and sign up for mySocialSecurity<\/a>.<\/strong> If you do it first, someone else can\u2019t do it before you and see even more information about you.<\/li>\n<\/ol>\n

      7. Review Your Retirement Accounts<\/h2>\n

      There are two big jobs here:<\/p>\n

      Ensure your asset allocation right now is in line with your targets.<\/strong> If you want 80% stocks, 20% bonds, double check your allocation matches it. If not, adjust your contributions or rebalance.<\/p>\n

      The stock market has been very volatile lately and it\u2019s a good time to make sure your investments are actually in the places you want them to be. <\/p>\n

      I\u2019m not advocating that you react emotionally to the market, just making sure it matches your intent.<\/p>\n

      Find old accounts and consolidate them.<\/strong> If you have a 401(k) from an old employer, roll it over into your brokerage account. You want to be able to manage them from one place, now is a good time to clean that up and pull them together. A rollover is simple and has no tax implications.<\/p>\n

      And while you\u2019re at it, review and verify your beneficiaries too.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

      When times are good, you don\u2019t feel the impact of being a bit loose with your finances. The Chicago Fed released their Advance Retail Trade Summary in June and it showed that consumer spending fell 1.3% in May, when adjusted for inflation. Americans are spending less. We\u2019re tightening our belts. This is a pretty big […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":7048490,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[93],"tags":[10934,37286,8023],"dealstore":[],"offerexpiration":[],"class_list":["post-7048489","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-finance","tag-finances","tag-tighten","tag-ways"],"yoast_head":"\n7 Ways to Tighten Up Your Finances - Som2ny Network<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/fivemor.com\/?p=7048489\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"7 Ways to Tighten Up Your Finances - Som2ny Network\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"When times are good, you don\u2019t feel the impact of being a bit loose with your finances. 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