~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ Publishing Guidelines: This article may be freely distributed so long as
copyright, author's information and an active link (where possible) are included. A complimentary copy of any newsletter or a link to website where article is posted would be greatly appreciated. ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~The Money Jar Trap By Jeffrey Strain
Hundreds of thousands of people place their extra change into a jar or bank every night when they return home thinking that they are saving money. In reality, dynamics of saving coins has changed over last 10 years so that by placing your extra coins in a jar, you may actually be losing money. This is new money jar trap.
The money jar has been a classic way for people to save money for generations. The concept was easy. After coming home for day, you simply empty out your pockets and put coins into a jar. When jar was full, you take it to your local bank, have coins counted and place money into your savings account. While this sounds simple enough, savings generated in coin jar may not be worth their face value depending on how you redeem coins.
The problem with money jar game is that banks and other enterprises have figured out that they can charge you for taking your change. If there is a way to make a buck, you can be sure that banks and others will try to take it.
Take convenience of changing your coins at a grocery store. CoinStar and other businesses will take your change and give you a receipt that you can use for your grocery shopping, but they'll also take a huge fee to do so. In effect, you are trading face value of your coins for something worth less than face value.
More and more banks are also beginning to charge you to count coins if they will accept them at all. With current rates that banks are paying on savings accounts, you'll likely have to leave money your received for your coins in bank several years just to break even with what you initially had.
What this all comes down to is that for many, keeping a coin jar is same as losing money. Where it once was a great way to add to your savings, it has become as wasteful as keeping a balance on your credit cards. We have come to a time where coin jar can actually cost you more money than you save.
