Back to Basics: Start doing the little money-saving things again
November 2nd, 2008 | by mbhunter |
I’ll admit that when I get a little bit of breathing room in our budget, I get lazy. I’ll go out with friends to lunch, or head to the vending machine for a snack. I don’t plan finances as much as I should. And it costs me more than if I did plan and went the cheaper route.
Doing these little money-saving things takes time. Time that might have been “free” or at least discretionary. It’s always a good time to be frugal and to save money, but with the economy officially in recession now — unofficially in recession for months now — it’s crucial to save for a rainy day, because if it’s not raining now, storms clouds are just over the horizon. It’s time to revive the (possibly) lost art of frugality.
Since we’re coming fresh off of Halloween, here are thirteen of those little money-saving things that you can do to lessen the pain during these trying times:
- Pack your lunch and snacks. This is a tried-and-true money-saver. It needn’t be a huge time commitment: five to ten minutes in the morning or the night before to put together a good lunch to take. A half-hour a week to save, say, $4 per weekday by not heading out to the sub shop, or over to the vending machine, works out to $20 per week, or $40 per hour.
- Brew your own coffee. I drink a lot of coffee, so this is a big money-saver for me. I don’t save even as much as I could. At work we have a coffee club that’s $2 per month for as much as I can drink. Besides that, though, I can fill up Green Stanley about four or five times for what one cup of coffee would cost from a coffee shop.
- Clip coupons. As in with a pair or scissors and the weekend paper. Or you can join MyPoints or CoolSavings.com to print out coupons online. The tricks here: 1) Check to see that the item with the coupon is less than a comparable generic brand; 2) use the coupon on the size that minimizes the unit cost unless you need a lot of the item; 3) use coupons only for things that you’d buy anyway!
- Eat in rather than dine out. It’s fun to troll Restaurant.com for restaurants that use their coupons but even with this discount it’s far more frugal to prepare dinner at home. Expenses for dining out add up quickly.
- Combine errands to save gas. Using a good gas credit card can shave off a dime or more per gallon, but combining little trips into one big one makes that tankful of gas go further. Pulling this off requires planning.
- Weigh the cost of a wholesale club. Buying more at a lower per-unit cost isn’t a bargain by itself; you have to use what you buy before it goes bad. Wholesale clubs like Costco, BJ’s, and Sam’s Club let you buy in larger quantities than are typically available in retail stores. Be sure to compare prices, as there isn’t one store that always has the lowest price on a particular item.
- Repair and make do rather than discard and buy new. Over the few years we’ve lived in our current house I’ve revived some of our appliances when it made sense; www.RepairClinic.com
is a favorite site for tracking down tough replacement parts. Electronics are a bit harder to repair, unfortunately.
- Buy larger quantities and make your own snack sizes. Most of the cost in “100-calorie” sizes is in the packaging. The bigger packages of trail mix, pretzels, peanuts, whatever, are required to have calories per serving on the label, so you can make your own. This requires only a small amount of planning.
- Substitute less expensive foods. You can get more carrot for your buck by buying the full-size ones as opposed to the baby carrots. The right combination of vegetables can deliver the same proteins as meat. And don’t forget to try out the generic brands to see if they’re comparable to the name brands.
- Entertain low-cost or free. A trip to the library or a walk around the park are free (aside from time and gas). A potluck (or “pot blessing” as our church calls them) are cheaper than a catered get-together.
- Buy used whenever it makes sense. This is my very, very best money-saving tip. Especially with vehicles. We haven’t bought a new vehicle yet. We bought a scratch and dent dryer and just got a used dishwasher from a friend who was cleaning out his garage for things to sell. (Ours is intermittent now.)
- Spend time at yard sales, thrift stores, and flea markets. Place a little more weight on “new to your children” rather than “new” when buying toys or other things.
- Substitute reusable for disposable. We just let a colleague try out some of the cloth diapers we used with our daughter, and she likes them a lot. Cloth diapers are cheaper in the long run, and getting used to cleaning them isn’t horrible. Their resale value, surprisingly, is quite good! Handkerchiefs are another money-saver; Trent embraces this one so it’s probably not something to just blow off. Sturdier plastic containers are better than plastic bags in this regard, too.
I just know there are lots more little money-saving things that can make a big difference. Have you got any?
12 Responses to “Back to Basics: Start doing the little money-saving things again”
By Andy @ Retire at 40 on Nov 2, 2008 | Reply
Go by bicycle when taking short trips. This saves not only on petrol (gas) but those short trips are the worst efficiency and worse for the engine.
When making dinner, make enough for 2 or 3 meals, or a lunchtime or two. Putting an extra meal into the freezer generally saves money but also saves time. Leftovers can also be used for lunchtimes which again saves time as well as money.
Take books out of the library, as opposed to buying them. Libraries usually have DVDs and CDs too (though they may come at a small cost).
Buy on the internet. If you are buying something, many internet shops are cheaper due to not having the high cost of retail outlets.
Drink water (from the tap) rather than fizzy pop, juice or milk. It’s not only good for you but costs a fraction of other sugary drinks.
By ChristianPF on Nov 3, 2008 | Reply
This seems to be the hot topic recently – I know Ramit is doing a save $1000 challenge starting this month and a lot of others have been talking about it as well…
And for my tip, well I love to eat out – so in addition to restaurant.com I use the entertainment books to basically cut my eating out bill in half. It also gives me some reason to try out new restaurants as well!
By danielle on Nov 3, 2008 | Reply
cancel your cable tv and see what you can get for free online. hulu.com has programming from most major networks, and cable networks, and a lot of network websites host their own programs on their sites also. as for hbo/showtime, wait for it to come out on dvd and rent it from the library.
if your library has a poor selection of dvds, netflix may be worth it if you watch a lot of movies, especially with the watch instantly feature.
to add on to the “drink tap water” idea, i would invest in a high-quality reusable water bottle, just to make sure no nasty chemicals leech into your water. plus they tend to hold more.
in addition to buying used, sell used too when you’re done with it. i buy video games online on half.com and sell them back again when i’m done. you usually end up breaking even at least.
By Rich on Nov 5, 2008 | Reply
Something that I’ve been thinking about doing, but have not implimented yet is after grocery shopping look at he receipt and see how much you saved, both through store sales and coupons. Most stores will print this on the bottom of the receipt. Take that amount you saved and transfer that money from your regular checking account into an online savings account and if you don’t touch this money it’ll grow very fast if you’re a good shopper. I use ING and I like the fact that I can open multiple savings accounts for differnt things. Emergency account, Savings account and maybe I’ll open a new one, Grocery Savings account…
By David on Nov 5, 2008 | Reply
Two easy ways to save money throughout the year -
1) Turn down your water heater by 5-10 degrees. You probably won’t notice a difference.
2) Replace some regular light bulbs with energy efficient instead. The payoff period may be longer, but they’ll last longer and cost less in the long run.
And another tip for movie lovers – use Netflix instead of buying DVDs. My wife and I have only bought one DVD since we started using Netflix about a year ago. This was compared to probably 10-25 the year before that. Not only are we saving money, but we have less stuff (junk) taking up space around the house.
By Bill Cahill on Nov 6, 2008 | Reply
Tried the water heater trick. I did notice a difference — I had to set the water hotter in the shower to gain the same temperature (mix in less cold water), and then, since I had to use more of the hot water, I would run out sooner… probably because I take a 20 minute shower though…
Also tried the energy efficient bulbs. I will say that they have come a long way in terms of light quality but they are incompatible with the dimmer switches I have throughout my home. I tried a few dimmable ones but they haven’t come all that far yet.
By Jay on Nov 6, 2008 | Reply
Make a game of it. How little do you have to spend to stay alive? Cut your spending to the bone. If it is absolutely not required to live, don’t buy it. He who spends the least wins.
By Jeff on Nov 6, 2008 | Reply
A friend of mine tops of list of saving money. For 4 years my friend has spend nearly zero.
He lives rent/utilities free in a studio apartment located above the building he works at. He uses the company bathroom. He uses the company gym. He has no car. Once in a while he uses a company car to get away. He usually walks or rides a bike everywhere. He hasn’t bought any clothes in 3 years. The company caters free lunch 5 times per week for all employees. He takes the leftovers and puts them in the apartment fridge for breakfast and dinner and weekend food. He has zero fixed expenses. Nothing. He told me he has went as long as 4 months without spending any money. Nothing. Not a very exciting life. But he is the ultimate money saver.
By Bay Area Financial Planner on Nov 7, 2008 | Reply
These are some great tips for saving money. Here are some of the easy savings wins I just accomplished:
Cancelled HBO, which we hardly watch anymore ($10 month / $120 year)
Switched our phone and Internet to Comcast ($40 month / $480 year!)
Reduced our childcare by 3 hours per week ($150 month / $1,800 year!)
And don’t be shy away from the little things that only seem to save a few pennies. I always like to show my clients how small savings can add up to big money over time:
Save $1 per day = $30 per month = $365 per year
Save $50 week = $200 per month = $2,400 per year
By Anne on Nov 7, 2008 | Reply
I’ll chime in on the combining errands thing. My parents decided they wanted to go to one car and I was the lucky recipient of their older Toyota.
My mom and I decided to start combining errands, using my little car, when gas shot up. It required a lot of planning the first few weeks but after a while we put the basics on auto-pilot and have a nice routine going. I average about a tank of gas a month (live v. close to my office).
It’s nice, it’s social, it keeps us on a schedule, and we can both ask each other “that’s not on your list, do you really need it?” It tends to also build in an impulse purchase buffer – “eh, I’ll probably be in Target in a few days, why bother going tonight” so you have a few days to talk yourself out of a purchase – staying out of stores is an automatic money saver.
By Armen Shirvanian on Nov 24, 2008 | Reply
Combining errands to save gas can be difficult, as one has to plan the whole procedure before it occurs. For those that are a bit more organized, it would probably be more likely to be done. Replacing disposable items with reusable ones takes a bit of self-control, as it tends to be easier to work with disposable items than reusable ones. The transition could take a fair amount of focus.
By Norm on Nov 25, 2008 | Reply
I’m going to have to second that buy online tip. Not only is it quicker than going off to the store, but you save gas, headaches from dealing with traffic, parking and idiots, and the most important of all, you actually get what you want. How many times do we see something on sale, go off to the store and it’s not in stock? Then you go home empty handed, or, even worse, buy something you didn’t really want or need! I do all my shopping online, even my food shopping and I don’t miss it at all.