1. Use the Capital One Venture rewards credit card (and get 2x miles on your donation)

If you are using a “regular” credit card for donations rather than this one you are throwing Money away.

That’s because this card is unique in that it provides 2x miles on donations and really all purchases.

You can then use all those miles to shop on Amazon, get cash back, or book hotels & flights.

Now, of course with ANY credit card, you NEVER want to carry a balance or the interest charges will eat away any rewards very quickly.

And it is also worth mentioning that when you use any credit card the organization you are donating to has to cover the transaction fees, so keep that in mind when donating with any credit card.

2. Use a FREE tool like Personal Capital to track your spending

We have found with our students who use a tool like this to track their spending that they often save $200-$400/month simply by doing this.

The reason is when you aren’t paying attention to where your money is going, you spend MORE. And a lot more.

So simply by signing up for a free tool like this, you are likely to save many hundreds (or even thousands) over the course of the year.

Which then allows you to pay off debt, save more, or be able to GIVE more.

Here is a quick tutorial of exactly how to do this with personal capital:

3. Fundrise – 100% passive (done for you) real estate investing.

I’ve been investing with these guys for years now and I have loved them.

The reason I invest is to be able to give MORE.

I am all for giving now, but I also invest to be able to grow my money to be able to give MORE later.

So if I have $500 now, $250 can be given now and $250 can be invested to grow into $1,000 later that can be given.

Fundrise is my favorite 100% passive income platform for doing that. They have some of the best real estate investors investing my money for me without me lifting a finger.

Over the last 5 years I have invested with them my average annual return has been 13.8% which is just fantastic in my book.

That means that my total investment of $18,500 has grown to $29,990.

Oh and if you are wondering you can start investing with them with as little as $10.

4. Acorns – grow your spare change

One of my favorite things about Acorns is that it invests your spare change – so you never even feel it.

So, they use the “round-up” concept to fill your investment account.

So if you are at the grocery store and spend $8.40 they will round it up to $9.00 and then invest the 60 cents for you.

And if you do that for every purchase you make each month it can start to add up to a significant amount.

And so you could make this retirement savings, savings for a vacation, or again if you want to give more, this is a painless way to grow that amount to be able to give more.

5. Read Simple Money, Rich Life if you want to HAVE more to give

This book teaches the 4-part framework I followed to go from a complete financial mess, stranded 1,000 miles from home with only $7 to my name to paying off over $400k of debt and being able to reach a personal goal of giving $1 mil by age 40.

It is both practical steps to actually have more money to give and practical tips for generous people that no one talks about.

It’s a Swiss Army knife that’ll help you earn more, manage it better, save more, and then have more fun giving than you dreamed possible

Or if you aren’t a reader, it is available on Audible as well.

Bonus Tip: Start tracking your giving with this sheet

Tracking your giving is a game-changer.

And no, not just for tax purposes, but actually tracking everything you give in life.

As in those times when you pay for that friend’s dinner, or when you leave that waitress a 50% tip just for the fun of it, or even birthday gifts you buy.

We have been doing this for over 15 years with this sheet and because that is what we are focused on, it gets us excited to give more.

A couple years ago we got to celebrate crossing the $1 million mark and the truth is we would have never known where we were had we not been tracking it.

I’ll bet you have given a lot more than you think.

So, I recommend grabbing this sheet and get started today.

The post Give more than 2% each year? Make these 5 moves ASAP appeared first on SeedTime.