Do you want to put away over $300 monthly? As advocates for reducing consumer spending, we ask this question every time we go through the household budget. We got together lately to figure out ways to cut costs and put away more money per month. You may use our advice to your own household, too. Set aside some time to chat to your partner about finances and decide how you will split up the money-saving tasks.
Tip #1: What did we do differently that allowed us to put away $300 monthly?
One easy way to save costs is to examine subscriptions you don’t use.
Our AT&T Bundle bill was the first monthly expenditure we looked at reducing when we did our budget assessment. Possibly you subscribe to a service such as DirecTV, cable, or pay television.
Premium channels like Cinemax and HBO were costing us $9.99 each month. While we do take pleasure in viewing films, we just did not have the time to sit down and watch as many as we would have liked during their scheduled airings. We were able to save $20.00 a month by cancelling our premium cable package.
Tip #2: Stop Paying for Boring Entertainment.
We consider ourselves rather thrifty when it comes to leisure activities, what with our use of the Entertainment Book and our attendance at various free events. Many of the things that we enjoy doing are either free or very inexpensive thanks to discounts, special offers, and free events. Unfortunately, we were once again shelling out money every month for cinematic entertainment.
Blockbuster Online was $15.99 per month, and we had to rent four movies to qualify for in-store discounts. We realised this was a wasteful expenditure after going without going to a free movie for nearly a month. We felt that our money was being wasted. Instead, we enrolled in Block Buster’s movie rewards program in-store, and now we receive BOGO free on movies three days a week, and we only pay for the service on the days that we actually watch a movie.
Thanks to this, we were able to put away an extra $35.99 this month.
Tip #3: Look at your phone bills for the third frugal hint.
Our Verizon cell phone bills were next up for review. We realized we weren’t utilizing all of our allotted minutes because our home phone plan included unlimited long-distance. Verizon was our mobile phone provider of choice, and we contacted to inquire about possible discounts, such as those offered to businesses and educational institutions, for our college-bound son. We were able to cut our monthly communication costs by $15, or $37, by switching to the Friends and Family plan and decreasing our minute allowance.
At the end of this month, we had saved $72.99.
Keep in mind that all it needed to save money with the first three steps were making one simple phone call. A single phone call resulted in ongoing monthly savings.
Tip #4: Bring your own lunch to work to save money.
In reality, how much do you spend on lunches every single month? By comparing our monthly bank and credit card statements, we discovered that one of us was spending around $12.00 on lunch alone per month. The cost of lunchtime transportation is not included here. Our family is saving money, cutting down on mileage, and being more environmentally conscious by packing lunches from home using reusable containers and leftovers.
Our monthly savings amount to $192.99 thanks to my husband and I both brought our own lunch to work 20 times a month.
Tip #5: Clip Coupons Wisely
Coupon clipping takes skill and intelligence. If you don’t follow these criteria for clipping coupons, you won’t see any time or money savings from using them.
Do not trim what you do not need.
B. Don’t use a coupon as an excuse to buy something.
C. Stock up while necessary groceries are on sale to maximize coupon savings.
Recently, we were able to cut $45.00 off of our grocery expenditure thanks to the use of coupons. We’ve calculated that using coupons can save us roughly $110.00 every month. What is the greatest place to look for discounts? I utilize Coupons.com, Smart Source, and Red Plum, in addition to the Sunday circulars.
These strategies, in addition to coupon cutting, have resulted in a monthly savings of $302 for our household.
Just how can we implement these frugal strategies? Divide up the cost-cutting tasks between you and your coworkers and let everyone 24 hours before you follow up on their progress. Keep in mind that while two of these suggestions—packing lunches and clipping coupons—require a persistent effort, over $70.00 per month was saved by making just three phone calls.
If you had an additional $300 each month, how would you spend it? Can you pay off your debt? What about a college fund? Time off? These are the true money-saving strategies that have helped our family, and we hope they may do the same for you this month.