facebookCan any NSFs here share how you allocate your NS allowance? - Seedly

Anonymous

07 Jun 2019

Saving Hacks

Can any NSFs here share how you allocate your NS allowance?

My allowance is $580. I’m a stay-out ASA. STI etf $100, Stashaway $100. UOB stash acc $100. Transport concession cards $85. The rest for fixed and variable expenses. How about yours?

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Kenneth Lou

07 Jun 2019

Co-founder at Seedly

You are really disciplined man! And starting way earlier than many of us here :) Which is great! For me, when I was an NSF, I earned around $1k, saved about $500, spent the other half, I was stay in. While learning to invest via books and audiobooks.

After I ORD, I immediately went to learn a new language (french), and scuba diving, using my saved up money. Something which I would recommend you to do also :)

Don't just save up for the sake of it, but try to upgrade yourself and experience new stuff along the way!

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Really good that u can save $300 out of the $580 as a stay-out personnel. You are way ahead of most nsfs!

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It's hard to allocate it per month based for me cos my spending monthly are pretty diverse!

I've got about $1k a month as I'm a signal spec.

But well $200 will go to STI ETF/BOND ABF (half half).
About $500 goes into POSB SAYE.
About $200 goes to my parents

Once in a while I'd put $1000 in SSB if it looks good!
Once in a while I'd also take a look at the stock market and get certain undervalued stocks which have pretty good returns.

I've got an amount of money parked in FS which I don't touch.. returns are re'invested' so guess that's great as well!

Some are placed in robo early on.

2 months to ORD and there goes my allowance hahahaha

Gabriel

18 Sep 2018

Undergraduate at National University of Singapore

Hey, I'm currently an NSF too. Didn't indicate interest to go for command school and I just got posted to become a Signal Operator as I'm not one of those who love military activities, outfield etc. But my commander told me that since this 2 years is compulsory, so why not give it my all? So it depends on oneself. Currently I believe that it'll go up slightly with the combat allowance and as I get promoted in the near future.

Basically, I opened a POSB Save As You Serve (SAYE) account and allocated $400 of my monthly salary into that account where it'll be automatically GIRO-ed on the 11th of every month. This account will give me 2% interest on the amount inside after I ORD, assuming that I do not make any withdrawals which I don't foresee I would. You can consider it since it forces you to save and offers an attractive interest rate. You can check it out here - https://www.posb.com.sg/personal/deposits/savin...

I also invest $100 monthly into Stashaway, adopting the dollar cost averaging method. With limited salary, I chose to invest in US ETFs over the Singapore STI ETF due to better diversification and historic performance. You can choose to DCA on both as well.

My remaining money goes to other expenses such as food, transport and telco bills. I have emergency funds and my life savings parked in CIMB Fastsaver to earn 1% interest instead of 0.05% with the old POSBkids account or my DBS Remix savings account which I use to receive my salary through. Within the CIMB Fastsaver, I opened a Fixed Deposit account and parked quite a sum for 12 months to get 1.84% interest as CIMB is currently offering that promotional rate due to their 9th birthday. I do not foresee that I'll need these funds that are parked in the SAYE and FD account as I'm a stay in NSF and am just saving for further studies as I'll be pursuing a degree in Computer Science at Nanyang Technological University after I ORD in 2020. Even should I need those funds urgently, I can easily make a withdrawal, just that I'll lose the additional interest that I could have potentially earned.

All the best in your NS journey and look forward to ORD!

Jay Liu

18 Sep 2018

Accounting and Finance at ACCA

I'm a stay out driver. $80 on transport. Calculated from the website and found that I actually can s...

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