★ Money Challenge #5: Leave a Tip, Take a Tip!

This is part of our Weekly Money Challenges. Be sure to check off any you’ve missed!

So our forums now have over 500 members! Of course it's not the number that matters, but the quality of the conversations. And wow, are the conversations awesome! This week's challenge will really release and showcase the power of our community here. It will also be really helpful to everyone who participates :)

This Week’s Challenge: Leave a Money Tip, Take a Money Tip

Give us your three best money tips. From getting out of debt to saving more money, budgeting better, investing smarter, and growing your overall net worth. Anything and everything money-related is welcomed! Dollars and sense or mindset and behavior, let's hear it. Here's your marching orders this week:

Think about your favorite three tips
Leave them here in our forum thread
Check back throughout the week to take a tip you find most helpful!

If you're a blogger, make sure to drop your link next to your tips too for a special feature here on the site as we round up our favorites to share ;) Go! – Derek, Master of Challenges ****** PS: To check out the results of last week's challenge, click here and scroll to the bottom! [Photo Credit: rankingfuuta]

UPDATE!

Some great tips from the Rockstar Finance community over in the forums. (Naturally.) Here's some of our favs... Don't just have an emergency fund - have an emergency plan. Create and write down your emergency plan so if disaster strikes you'll have one less worry. No one wants to worry about money when they're sitting in the ICU next to their spouse on a ventilator (trust me on this one). -Chief Mom Officer Take advantage of your local library. We're loyal patrons of our local library. I use the library to check out cookbooks for free so we always have fresh menu ideas. We also use the library to check out the hottest DVDs so we don't need to go to the movies or buy films online. -Mrs Picky Pincher Track your net worth! You will automatically start saving more when you know you'll be checking up on yourself every month. And it'll help you make decisions faster too knowing exactly where you stand! - J. Money Pay yourself a car payment. If you had a car loan (gasp) and pay it off, keep saving 1/2 (or more) of the payment you were making in a car savings fund for eventual repairs and/or replacement costs. You'll never take another car loan! It also helps to buy used and take good car of your vehicles to make them last longer. -Mrs_Need2save Learn to respect small amounts of money! We lowered our heat from 72 degrees at night to 62 degrees with no loss in comfort (all thanks to these amazing blankets!). Saving 3% on our bill for every degree we lower our heat means we dropped our bill by about thirty percent. And this applies for every month of the winter. Every year. On a $200 heating bill (it’s cold where we live) that is $60 bucks each month that can be sent to the school to pay for tuition. -GRuga Work a monthly budget that includes tracking your spending. If you don't know where your money is actually going, a budget won't work correctly. You need to track your spending for a budget to help. -Derek Olsen Start Young Take advantage of compounding, the most powerful force in the universe! -RetirementManifesto Spend less than you earn! (and keep working on both sides of the coin). We usually work hard on one part of it, but you can really boost things by finding ways to earn more while being smarter with your spending. -Elle Automate savings When I worked a 9-5, setting up 3 different direct deposit accounts made saving money easy! Aside from a quarterly look at the savings account, this kept the money out of sight and out of mind. Tai Stewart Automate your investments It's SO much easier to invest when you don't have to actively make the payment. -Shin