The 52-week money challenge is a very effective savings plan. What I like most about it are the multiple ways you can do it. Each alternative can be modified to suit your preferences and circumstances.

A great time to start the 52-week money challenge is at the beginning of a calendar year. Another great time is the start of a financial year. However, any time is a really good time to start. 

When I first heard about the 52-week money challenge, I was intrigued. The idea is to save the corresponding amount of money each week with that week of the year. Typically, most people start small and build up but there are actually three ways in which you can do this. Here are the three options: 

Ascending 

$1 in week 1, $2 in week 2, $3 in week 3 … $52 in week 52

Descending

$52 in week 1, $51 in week 2, $50 in week 3 … $1 in week 52

Average

$26 each week

At the end of the challenge you will have saved $1,378.

When I say I was intrigued, I mean, I liked the idea. However, $1,378 after a year of saving didn’t really inspire me. I wondered what would happen if I added a 0 to the end of each number. That would be a saving of $13,780. Now that inspired me. 

The only problem with such big numbers was that I didn’t know how I would be able to afford to save $520 in a week, which would be the case at the end of the year. I had no idea how I would be able to stick with it as the year went on but I committed to taking it one week at a time. My circumstances dictated that I had to follow the ascending option, so I started the year putting away $10 in week 1, $20 in week 2 and so on. The first month was easy and the second month not too hard. Come the third month and things became a little tougher. Month four was a little tougher and month five, a little tougher again. As tough as it was growing to be, I realised after about three months that I hadn’t missed a week. As the weeks rolled on I continued to be amazed that I always found the money some how and never missed a week. 

Saving an ascending amount of money, which I found it increasingly difficult to find, taught me a major lesson in money and in life. I could stress about where the money was going to come from each week but it didn’t matter. All that mattered was that I found the money each week. I was amazed that for all my stress in the beginning, I still found the money when it counted. This created a valuable mindset going into the second half of the year, when the real challenge started. This mindset was transferrable into other areas of my life.

In the first six months of doing the challenge with a 0 on the end of each number, I had put away $3,510. Well worth it, even if I couldn’t afford to do the second six months. And this is what happened. I was hit with a couple of unexpected expenses and I needed to pay just over $2,000 in bills. I was determined not to spend my savings until the end of the year but my circumstances changed and I had to dip into these savings. Although I was disappointed that I had to spend my savings early, I felt extremely grateful that I had that money to pay those expenses. If I hadn’t have been committed to the plan for six months I wouldn’t have had the money to pay those expenses. 

I was telling a friend how disappointed I was about this and they said, ‘Well, mid year is probably the second best time to start this challenge again, isn’t it?’. It hit me. ‘Of course’, I thought. I was so rigid in my thinking that I was going to wait a whole other six months before I started again. All because they were the rules. I was going to waste six months and $3,510 worth of savings just because that’s how I believed the 52-week money challenge worked. 

The lesson here is, don’t be rigid in your thinking. Many times it’s ok to make up your own rules. And that’s exactly why this blog is being released just after one of these supposedly great times to start the challenge. I went back and forth repeatedly about whether to release this blog just prior to the start of the calendar or financial year so that you could start at one of those two times. In the end, I decided to release this blog at a time that most people would consider less than ideal. The purpose for that is to encourage you to think with flexibility. The challenge is called the 52-week challenge, not the calendar year challenge. 

So, if you would love some savings to pay your bills or go towards a holiday, commit to starting the 52-week money challenge THIS WEEK. Put away $1 or $10 right now. Create a savings account (it will only take five minutes on internet banking if you don’t already have a savings account). If you don’t have internet banking, get a tin and put the money in that for now. Don’t worry about next week or the final week, just do what you need to do each week. The money at the end will be great but the mindset you’ll create will be priceless. 

What would this extra money mean to you?

Share your response in the comments below.