For many, the concept of saving money is the New Year’s resolution they’d love to excel at. With our economy just making a comeback from one of the worst recessions in U.S. history, it may seem like saving is not only an option but a necessity. This may scare many, but there’s many solutions you can try to ensure your savings will grow substantially over the new year. Luckily, most of these tips won’t force you to change your lifestyle a lot, nor will they cause you to go without. In fact, saving may be a fun way to gain control over your finances, so you can get back to feeling secure with the money you have.

1. Swap Banks
It’s easy to stick with the same bank year in and year out without ever considering if the bank has your best interest in mind. There’s lots of great banks out there, which are willing to work with customers to help their savings grow. Before you begin your savings, you may want to consider shopping around to see which banks offer an interest rate that will help your savings grow bigger in the upcoming year. You may also want to check to see if your banks rates will be changing in the upcoming year too, so you’ll know how to handle the change in the best possible way. If you’re truly comfortable with the checking options of your bank, then you can always keep your spending money there. There’s absolutely nothing wrong with having more than one bank account. In fact, it may even help you forget about the money you put into savings. Simply move your savings into the account with greater interest and then let the money do the talking for you. If you can avoid touching the money over the period of a year, you should be able to rejoice over your success when 2017 rolls around.

2. Keep the Change
We live in a primarily digital world, which is tough when it comes to saving some items. In 2016, you might want to consider pulling out cash to do all of your shopping. Carrying around cash has many great benefits, but using it to save money is one of the best. When you shop with cash, there’s a pretty good chance you’re going to get coins back in return. When this happens when you shop with debit and credit, the coins remain in your account so you can spend them later on. However, if you want to save while using cash, then simply put all of your coins in a jar or a piggy bank. When the item is filled up then open it up and you’ll find a pretty good chunk of money that you never even missed in the first place. This is sure to help you will fundraisers for new items or even a vacation. Of course, you could continue on with the savings by taking the change straight to the bank.

3. Weekly Challenge
If it takes a competition to get you up and moving, then the weekly challenge may be your dream way to save. The most common weekly challenge is to add a $1 into savings for every week of the year. So, the most you will ever have to put back in a week is $52, which doesn’t seem like a whole lot to begin with! You can do this challenge by working forwards or backwards though, depending on your finances. For instance, if you’re still recovering from the holiday season then you might want to start the challenge from the beginning by adding your first dollar to savings on the first week of the year. If you’re worried about having to part with so much money during the next holiday season, then you could always start with $52 on the first week and countdown until the new year. The choice is entirely yours! Either way you plan to add, you will have over $1,000 in savings by the end of the year. You can also come up with your own weekly challenges though. This can be anything from putting back $5 a week to cutting back on a luxury item a week and adding that money into savings.

4. Direct Deposit
For some people, parting with hard earned money can be as tough as nails. So, one of the best solutions to this dilemma is to let your employer do the parting for you. Most employers allow you to direct deposit your pay check. So, you might want to plan a meeting where you ask your employer to set a certain amount of each check back to go into a different account. This savings account will then have the chance to grow each pay period, without you having to see the money that goes into it. With your employer sending the money to the account for you, you can sit back and forget all about the money until you check your balance at the end of the year. This will allow the money to grow and you’ll already have budgeted the money out of your check anyway, so you won’t be tempted to spend it.

5. 401K
If you haven’t already hopped on the 401K bandwagon then you are certainly missing out on something good. You’ve probably heard people brag about their 401Ks and how fantastic their retirement plan is. Of course, this might seem like a total scam if you’re not sure what the 401K is. Luckily, its not a scam! Basically, your 401K allows you to set aside a certain amount of money from each check. This money goes into a special account that you can’t really touch, unless you’re willing to jump through a lot of hurdles. A lot of employers will even match the amount of money that a person puts into their 401K, which will make your money double, triple and quadruple in no time at all. So, you can finally grow money simply by setting aside as low as $20 a pay period.

6. $5 Bill Rule
Carrying cash can truly be a financial blessing in more ways than one. The $5 Bill rule is one of the best ways though, especially if you don’t like saving money. Basically, when you go shopping and break your larger bills, you usually end up with smaller bills that don’t really go far on their own. So, instead of spending these bills, you should go through your change and pull out every $5 bill. Normally, you won’t get one, but on the off chance that you do, take this bill and put in a hiding place, jar or piggy bank. When the year is over, you can pull the money from wherever you were storing and see how much you saved. You may be surprised as to how much you have! So why a $5 bill? Basically, they’re the least likely bill you’ll miss. $1 bills are way too common to save, unless you’re ready to go broke and $10 bills would interfere with your budget substantially.

7. Swear Jar
You’ve probably seen the infamous swear jar on movies and TV. Although this is usually added in for a little comic relief, you’d be surprised as to how much a swear jar can do to change the way you save. Bad habits are pretty much inevitable, so using something like a swear jar to train ourselves to stop is like killing two birds with one stone. The swear jar can even be set up with a price tag on each word. You may find your bad habit is really doing you in financially, which will certainly help you cut out the problem. Best of all, when you kick your bad habit, you’ll have a pretty good amount in savings to help celebrate. Of course, the swear jar doesn’t have to be for just swearing. You can use it to help you keep on a workout schedule, cut other bad habits or even teach the children that not doing their chores will cost them money.

8. Bank the Bonuses
If you work in a place that offers bonuses, then you probably rejoice and do a whole lot of splurging when the money kicks in. Even if the bonus is only $50-$100, you can actually do a lot of good with the money, rather than spending it on fleeting things. Next time you get a bonus, send it to the savings account, rather than letting it sit in your checking account. This will feel like the money was never there to begin with, so you won’t be out anything. If your bonuses are more frequent then you’ll be set to enjoy some amazing benefits when the year ends and your savings account is flourishing. Of course, if you don’t get bonuses then you may consider doing the same thing for your tax return, as a big boost like that could really allow you to reduce financial burden in the upcoming years.

9. Consider Rewards
It would be pretty much impossible to not shop throughout the entire year, especially when special occasions come up. If you do need to spend money shopping or traveling, then use a credit card that offers you lots of rewards. Although you will have to spend money on the interest for the items you purchase, you won’t have to deal with the money disappearing from your account, which could burden your finances. Also, when you shop with a rewards card, you’ll quickly earn cash back, which could help cut down on the interest you pay. Also, many cards will give you travel miles, which is perfect for emergency trips or much needed getaways. If you travel a lot for business, then you may also want to use a hotel credit card to help you will free stays or even great discounts on the price of your room.

10. Be Patient
At the end of the day, one of the best things you can do to save money is to cut down on spending money. Sure, we all want to shop and buy nice things, but often we don’t need them. Sometimes, we don’t even really want them. So, next time you find yourself looking at a big ticket item, or even something you don’t really need then exercise a little financial patience. Try to wait 30 days before you make the final decision to buy an item. You should also do research on the item and look at reviews, so that you understand the item before you buy it. If you’re worried about it disappearing, then put in on layaway to buy yourself a bit of time. You may find that you don’t really want or need the item after the waiting period is over. Or, you may even find a better deal that blows the original deal out of the water. If you do choose to skip the purchase, then toss the money you would have spent into your savings account. It’ll add up in no time at all.

Adding to your savings account in the New Year doesn’t have to be a huge burden, nor does it have to see impossible. With these ten tips you should be able to keep your savings account thriving next year, without ever having to stress about saving money. Before you know it, you’ll be hooked on savings and leading an overall more frugal lifestyle.