Giving up the daily coffee before work, cutting out a takeaway each week and lowering your alcohol intake could slash the time it takes to save for a deposit by as much as five years.
According to new analysis, kicking ‘bad’ spending habits could offer a way to free up cash to put towards the deposit on a house.
Thomas Sanderson, a window furnishings firm, has created an online calculator which helps potential first-time buyers determine how long it might take them to save up for their deposit based on their current saving and spending habits.
It then offers guidance on which spending habits to ‘ditch’ in order to slash the saving time.
Slash the time spent saving
Currently it can take first-time buyers between eight and 10 years to save enough money for a 20% deposit.
Indeed, someone who currently saves £200 per month towards their first home but also buys five coffees a week, four alcoholic drinks, one weekly takeaway and spends £50 on leisure and entertainment would take eight years and four months to stash enough cash for the deposit.
However, cutting out these spends would reduce this time to just two years and 10 months.
Richard Petrie, marketing director of Thomas Sanderson, said: “Saving for anything can be a hard task, and in this current climate it may feel like you’ll be saving forever to make up your deposit.
“With this tool you can easily see what you can cut back on in order to save more efficiently, and how faster you can reach your target by making these cuts.”
