But the biggest reasons that many of us have trouble saving money, advisers say, are that we simply don't know much about money, we have no plan for saving it, and we aren't using simple, effective tools that help us do that.

Financial self-help author and Yahoo Finance columnist David Bach believes that the roots of many households' financial problems go to what he calls the 'latte factor,' or tiny splurges for luxuries that are packed onto credit cards and never go away.

"That amounts to several thousand dollars a year, and if you make only minimum payments, you'll never be out of debt. We are being microdollared to death."

"Everyone can get a little sloppy with cash and it's smart to notice," Quinn said. "But what's squeezing you is the big stuff you ladle onto your credit cards."

Being organized, exercising discipline and having a partner for moral support or additional income are all indicators of increased financial success, many industry studies show.

Many people battling money problems don't really understand the relationship between debt and savings, said Karen McCall, founder of the Financial Recovery Institute in San Rafael, Calif., which helps people find and deal with behaviors and attitudes that result in financial problems.

Without a plan, it's easy for someone who has the discipline to pay off credit card debt or other debt to forget that they need to be saving money too, she said. Then when an emergency hits, their only way to cover the costs is to borrow, wiping out progress they had been making.

"Partners can be great providers of mutual support for a team effort," McCall said. "Or they can be sources of stress and great pressure if someone is using money as a control."

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