Stress Less: How to Make Money by (Mostly) Ignoring It

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Delegate savings and making payments to bots. It takes minutes to set up. Read on for how doing so reduces stress. 

Stress is terrible for my wallet. All the money-management tips and tricks in the world don’t help me when I’m tired, anxious, and unable (or unwilling) to put them into practice. Spare me the effort. I’m a regular guy with a job and a busy schedule, not a full-time money manager.

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So how does the average person make money with low effort? To reduce my considerable stress, I’ve gone through a few strategies recommended by financial gurus like Ramit Sethi.

Here are two wealth-building strategies I’ve tried, how successful they were, and reasons they may (or may not) save you time, energy, and money — all at the same time.

Automate savings

Saving money is hard. Every time you manually wire money from a checking to a savings account, you face the major temptation to buy stuff. After failing to save for years — despite promising myself otherwise — I figured something had to change.

Ramit Sethi suggests the “set it and forget it” method to save money. You set up your direct deposits or checking accounts to automatically send 10% of your income to a savings account. But does it actually save you money?

My Chime Checking and Savings Account account lets me turn on “automatic savings,” which sends 10% of every paycheck to my savings account. Since enabling it, I’ve saved thousands of dollars with zero effort. I’ll be using those savings to pay taxes. It’s a big stress reducer.

Click here to open a Chime Checking and Savings account.

I’d like to open a high-yield savings account to earn more interest on deposits. Right now, I’m not making much money on my savings. I’ll automate deposits into that one, too.

Automate credit card payments

The more credit cards you have, the harder it is to keep track of payments. I have four. But even when I had only one, I forgot to make timely payments at least twice.

You can set up your credit card account to automatically withdraw money from your checking account to pay the bills. It makes paying credit card bills easier. But automating cards can disconnect you from big expenses, so it may be safer to only automate minimum payments.

I have the memory of a goldfish. To compensate, I’ve automated all my credit card minimum payments, and it’s saved me at least twice from making late payments. Just be sure to have a cash cushion in your bank account; otherwise, you could be charged overdraft fees.

How to set up automatic payments: Most banks let you set this feature up from your computer or the banking app on your smartphone. For example, to set up automatic credit card payments from the Chase app, log into your account, click a credit card, and navigate to “automatic payments.”

I’m less stressed

Automation reduced my stress. I no longer worry about saving money for taxes or paying my credit card bills on time. I’ve gone from checking my account balances daily to monthly. I spend less time managing money, and I’m more consistent at it than ever.

But I still manage money; it’s just simpler now. Instead of handling money transfers manually, I delegate what I can to bots. I spend most of my effort keeping a cash cushion in my checking account to cover automated expenses. Here’s what I still do manually:

Check account balances monthlyPay credit card bills in full

I try to pay off credit card balances 100% to avoid interest fees. Automating minimum payments just covers me in case I forget to do so. That would be bad — it could tank my credit score.

Tip: Keep a cash cushion in your linked checking accounts. That way, you aren’t charged overdraft fees. The best checking accounts charge zero overdraft fees, so you stress less.

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