I often talk about my money saving habits with my coworkers and they find them hilarious and ridiculous, so I thought I'd share. Please share others as I'm always looking for ways to improve:
- Cloth diapering - Most people are grossed out by the idea, but it saves so much money. I often hear, "You're paying more for water and detergent though," but not really. Our water bill has been pretty steady since we've started and I buy cheap Tide powder detergent that lasts quite some time.
- Toilet tank displacement - We bought these bladders that go into the toilet tank to displace the water and flush less. Not sure how much of an effect it has had, maybe it offsets the extra laundry on the diapers though.
- Laundry balls - We use these laundry balls instead of detergent. There is some science to them that I don't care to explain but they work on everything except extremely dirty or oily stuff.
- Bath water - We don't do this anymore, but when my daughter took a bath in her infant tub we would save the water and use it to flush the toilet.
- Google Fi - Switched from Verizon to Google Fi and save probably $40/month total. The service is okay, not great, but we don't talk on the phone much so it doesn't really bother us.
- Cable - Obvious, but cut cable if you can. In our case it is actually more expensive to cut cable off altogether and just have internet, so we keep it at the lowest package, but with HBO ($10 month) until GOT ends next month, then we are taking that off. The cable provider has a monopoly in the area, otherwise I'd just switch providers altogether.
- Pack a lunch, don't eat out - We've been packing our lunch for years now, but recently cut down our eating out. We were spending $300+/month on eating out, but now try to stay under $150.
- Pay off debt - Don't have to worry about interest anymore. My student loans were accruing over $100/month in interest. We had enough in the bank to pay them off in full, so we did.
- Amazon Mechanical Turk - This is more about making money than saving, but I do Mechanical Turk whenever I get a chance. Last year I made $500 that I cashed in in December to pay for Christmas presents. So far this year I've made about $50.
- Switch lightbulbs - We switched all out lightbulbs to the LED or more cost efficient ones, whatever they're called.
- Make a grocery list - Make a shopping list and ONLY buy what is on that list. Our grocery bill went from $500/month for 2 people to $350 for 3 (now buying table food for an infant) by doing this and shopping at Aldi. I'm trying to convince my husband we should eat vegetarian just to save money, but no dice on that one yet.
- Eat all your food - Bring leftovers for lunch, eat it for dinner the next day, eat everything in your pantry. This helps spread out grocery spending.
- Price compare - Get multiple bids for home projects, shop online at the checkout to see if the online price was different and ask the cashier to price match, get an app to compare grocery and gas prices.
- Do it yourself - If you can fix it or do it yourself, then try. YouTube is a great resource.
- Become a minimalist - I shop wayyyy less and have sold a bunch of stuff I no longer need. I also don't buy makeup anymore, which was soo expensive. Can't even quantify how much we've saved/not spent.
- Health program - If your work has a health app (Virgin Pulse) do it! Just by tracking things in the app my husband and I have made a combined $200 this year.
- Shop second hand - Most of my daughter's clothes have come from TotSwap events or Once Upon a Child. Why pay more when they will only use it for a short period of time? If there is something I know will get more use, I buy gender neutral so it may be used for another child.
ETA:
- Make cleaning products - I make our own cleaning product with cleaning vinegar, lemon juice, bleach and water. Works pretty well and the vinegar smell dissipates quickly.
- Elimination communication - Started potty training/elimination communication with my daughter at 10 months old. She uses far fewer diapers/ wash diapers less often now because often she will tell us when she needs to go to the bathroom through sign language or just her body language. She is currently 15 months old.
- Shampoo - I cut about 10 inches off my hair and cut back on washing my hair to twice per week. As a result I use far less shampoo and conditioner. I still take body showers though and use castille soap or the free soap samples from hotels.
- Breastfeeding - I know not everyone can or chooses to breastfeed, but I am able to. I never needed to purchase formula and still breastfeed my 15 month old. Saves me from having to buy alternative milk for her. I also sold it for a brief period of time for $120 for about 150 ounces. I wanted to donate it to her, but the mom insisted on paying me for it.
- Reusable items - We use reusable k cups now with $4.50 coffee from Aldi which lasts a month, I use reusable breast pads for nursing, and we use reusable baby wipes. I would like to try silicone baggies and cloth paper towels next, just need to run out of our current stock. I haven't had a period yet since having my daughter, but when I do I will be purchasing cloth pads and a menstrual cup. I'm also interested in buying a bidet attachment so that we can do away with toilet paper.
- Garden - Each summer DH and I plant a garden. We usually get tomatoes, peppers, and some kind of squash that feeds us all summer. This year we are planting tomatoes, peppers, and spaghetti squash because we've been eating spaghetti squash a lot and it's expensive.
ETA 2:
Yes, I am now aware I could have put a brick in the toilet, but I didn't. Also learned laundry balls are garbage. Please move on and stop harping on it.
More tips I forgot:
- Manager's Special - When I shop at my secondary grocery store than Aldi I always buy the meat that is about to expire, or the Manager's Special. You can get some deeply discounted meat this way. The other day I got 8 chicken wings for $1.78. We ate them for dinner and I had them for 2 different lunches.
- Shower together - Most of my showers are taken with my husband. We save water that way.
- Blinds - We keep the shades and blinds drawn in the winter to keep heat in and cut our gas bill.
- RoFo Rewards - We subscribe to the Royal Farms rewards club. We linked it to our bank account. We get 10 cents off per gallon and earn rewards. We usually get enough rewards in a month to get a free 8 piece of chicken.
- WiFi/Data - We rarely use our data on our phone and are always connected to WiFi at home. We usually keep under 1 GB total on our phone plan.
- Ask for a discount - Just ask, it doesn't hurt. Went away for my husband's 30th and asked the massage place for a discount. We got the whole thing including gratuity for free because of a glitch only the staff knows about showing we had enough rewards points at the hotel to get a free massage. The receptionist said if I hadn't asked she wouldn't have given it to us. This saved us $210.
- Amazon Prime No Rush shipping - Choose the no rush option for video credits. We've used these to buy or rent movies on Prime Video.
April 03, 2019 at 07:46AM
