Families practice some careless spending these days and before they realize what is happening, they may be too far gone. From little things like going shopping without a list to wanting recently-released electronic gadgets or phones, you could find yourself totally empty as the head of the family just a few days after receiving your salary. Here are some practical tips that can help you reduce your monthly outgoings.
Before getting into the tips, a general piece of advice is to look for discount codes and vouchers before shopping online and in-store. Latest Deals is a website that publishes daily the best deals from foods to clothes and everything you can imagine in between. With them, you can save money, stick to your budget and take home a bargain.
Now here are 5 tips to spend less each month…
1. Know Where Your Money Has Been Going
Most times, families go on spending sprees just because the money is available. No one knows the future, so it is always good to have some savings even if you have too much to spend at any given time. The first step towards reducing your monthly outgoings is by tracking your spending habits. You would be shocked at how much goes out on certain items and how much you could have saved if you left out some unnecessary spending. Tracking this spending habit for about two months would avail you with enough piece of information to work with. After getting to know how the money leaves, you can devise a plan to start curbing the excess spending.
2. Work On Your Monthly Subscriptions
There are so many services that families subscribe for that are wastes. For example, people subscribe to cable TV or streaming services monthly, they also pay for cell phone subscriptions, gym memberships, and even weight loss programs. Some families even set these subscriptions up as recurring payments from their accounts. How about asking yourselves some salient questions like, How much of these monthly packages do I use to full capacity? And can I live without them? If you have decided on which ones to cancel, you have to do a follow-up through email and unsubscribe to newsletters or other adverts coming from that source. For your cell phone subscriptions, you can opt for money-saving phone plans like a sim-only contract which allows you to pay as you go.
3. Spend Based On Budgets
Using a budget can help you curb some unnecessary spending. Creating the budget doesn’t have to be complicated. You can use just a pen and some pieces of paper. It is just a plan for what your monthly outgoings will look like. Some people make it too complicated and it is in fact a big mistake on its own. You can create different columns for needs, wants and goals. This will help you to make adjustments easily by striking out more wants for needs or vice-versa. When preparing the family budget, it is good to allocate some funds to pay off debts. Cutting expenses to reach a debt-free goal should be of primary importance when preparing your budget. You should consider your income, determine fixed monthly bills like utilities, rent, insurance, etc and make plans for needs like food, gas, and medical expenses. Whatever is left can be put into emergency savings.
4. Cut Down On Your Insurance Premiums
Another way of reducing monthly outgoings is by making adjustments to home and car insurance premiums. If your family pays both, you can shop around for companies that will help you put them together for cheaper premium repayments. Some companies offer lower rates if you have a safe driving record. If you also raise your monthly deductibles from say $1,000 to $2,000, it could save a significant percentage of your premium. Many families just pay these premiums and forget about the whole thing till the next year but you can do something serious about lowering these repayments and reducing your monthly outgoings as a family.
5. Eat At Home More Often
Eating out is definitely costlier than eating homemade meals. You can take your family out for dinners or lunch sometimes but do not make it an everyday habit. If there isn’t much time to cook every day, you can prepare soups during weekends and store them up in your freezer. Whenever there is a need to use any of the soups, they can be thawed and used. As much as possible, do not make eating out an everyday habit. Eating home-cooked food every day will help you reduce monthly outgoings.
Final Words
Reducing your monthly outgoings is not as easy as it is written down here. It takes great discipline to adhere to these tips and many other tips you can get online. Sometimes, parents lose the focus to reduce unnecessary spending when their kids mount pressure on them by demanding things that are not part of the budget. This will be where the discipline comes in. The kids can have these things some of the time but not all the time.