\u201cSaving more money might feel unrealistic for many people right now … but taking some time to review your overall spending and making small savings commitments can have a big impact over time.\u201d<\/p>\n
Hearn said while some people will be channelling any extra funds into paying off their mortgage rather than saving, the data showed 81% of Westpac home loan customers do also have a savings account, with 36% of them having set up a monthly automatic payment.<\/p>\n
\u201cGood savings habits can make a big difference in the long run. Simply establishing the behaviour is a great start,\u201d she said.<\/p>\n
Tom Hartmann, personal finance lead at Sorted, said the statistics were concerning. <\/p>\n
\u201cWhen we start people out in lifting their financial capability \u2026 it always starts with emergency savings.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe\u2019re all running risks with life. Lots of things can happen and if we\u2019re not prepared for those then we end up running to crisis borrowing.\u201d<\/p>\n
Hartmann said it wasn\u2019t hard to see why people didn\u2019t have $500 in savings when there were lots of different places to park your money these days.<\/p>\n
\u201cBut really to not have [your money] at the ready is always a concern,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n
Hartmann said the priority of emergency savings is not going away.<\/p>\n
\u201cThis is one of the essential things that people need to stay focused on.\u201d<\/p>\n
Southern regions top list of best savers<\/p>\n
Kiwis in Canterbury and Otago are the best savers in the country, according to the data.<\/p>\n
The median savings balance of Westpac customers in both regions was $4200, while 32% of people in both regions had a savings balance of more than $15,000.<\/p>\n
Canterbury and Otago also led the way in saving, with 28% of Westpac everyday banking customers making monthly payments into their savings accounts.<\/p>\n
At the other end of the table, those in Auckland had the lowest median savings balances ($1200).<\/p>\n
Aucklanders were the most likely to have a savings balance of less than $500 \u2013 which was the case for 43% of people.<\/p>\n
Hearn said it can be tough to get ahead in the country\u2019s biggest city, where only 19% have an automatic savings payment set up.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe know costs are typically higher in Auckland than in other regions and that\u2019s reflected in this savings data.\u201d<\/p>\n
Northland had the second-lowest median savings balances among Westpac customers ($1400), while 42% of people in the region had a savings balance of less than $500.<\/p>\n
Wellingtonians had the North Island\u2019s highest median savings balance at $3600, while 31% had more than $15,000 in savings.<\/p>\n
Wellington and Southland tied for first place in KiwiSaver, with 42% of Westpac customers having Westpac KiwiSaver balances of more than $40,000.<\/p>\n
Overall, 38% of the country had a Westpac KiwiSaver balance of more than $40,000.<\/p>\n
\u201cIt\u2019s important to make sure you\u2019re in the right KiwiSaver fund for your stage of life,\u201d Hearn said.<\/p>\n
\u201cThere are numerous simple and free online resources available to help you to work that out.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"\u201cSaving more money might feel unrealistic for many people right now … but taking some time to review…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":499962,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[11],"tags":[86766,25235,10960,64,63,75890,99,32445,2458,164,5587,93595,1899,579,4717,15499,8292,12536,1861,1781,8293,106553,8420,3605,114367],"class_list":{"0":"post-499961","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-economy","8":"tag-86766","9":"tag-according","10":"tag-as","11":"tag-au","12":"tag-australia","13":"tag-balance","14":"tag-business","15":"tag-costs","16":"tag-data","17":"tag-economy","18":"tag-from","19":"tag-grapple","20":"tag-have","21":"tag-high","22":"tag-in","23":"tag-kiwis","24":"tag-less","25":"tag-more","26":"tag-people","27":"tag-savings","28":"tag-than","29":"tag-third","30":"tag-westpac","31":"tag-with","32":"tag-zealanders"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/499961","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=499961"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/499961\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/499962"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=499961"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=499961"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=499961"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}