12 ways money can buy happiness

11. Money helps you enjoy all stages of life.

Ben Edwards aims to help people have a better life through the money tips he offers on his Money Smart Life blog. He has learned that the amount of happiness money can offer may vary throughout life.

“For example, right now we’re raising our three kids,” Edwards said. “It makes us happy to be able to afford to pay for the extracurricular things that help them develop and learn.”

Because he doesn’t know what will make him happy in the next phase of life, he said it’s important to save to have the money to pay for what will bring him joy then.

12. Money offers freedom.

Tiffany “The Budgetnista” Aliche is an award-winning teacher of financial empowerment and founder of the Live Richer Challenge. Yet, she doesn’t believe that money brings happiness.

“I believe that money brings options and greater freedom to choose,” she said. “It’s through those choices that happiness is found. Money has enabled me to travel the world, give back via donating, and to start my own business by doing my passion. It’s those choices that have made me happy, not the money itself.”