New money saving habits

I have been listening and reading lots of material by personal finance and FIRE gurus to find ideas and inspiration on how to be more frugal and channel this extra money into investments and savings. I don't live in a rural area and have no plans to move to the countryside so living off the land and using firewood for heat will not work for me. Instead I think I will work on small steps which eventually will become ingrained habits. So here are some of my ideas:

- Get rid of Sky! This should save about £40 a month although it is likely we will be subscribing to Netflix for £7.99.
- Cook more meals from scratch and plan meals over the week. This will hopefully mean less waste and a lower grocery bill.
- Go to Lidl to buy things like pasta, tins and biscuits. Again this should shave some money off the grocery bill.
- Change mobile contracts. Saving will be about £20 a month
- Stop mindless spending on things like clothes, shoes, snacks, drinks, books, magazines and other pointless things. I am going to try and only buy things I actually need and use the things I already have.
- Turn off the lights and standby gadgets. Not sure this will save much but I think its a good habit to get into anyway.
- Stop gambling. The reality is that the odds are never in your favour so no more lottery or scratch cards even when I have had a bad day and would like to wallow in some wishful thinking.

I am sure there is much more I can do but lets see how these go first.




Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Need some extra income? Go look in the shed!

I try (although don't always succeed) to view life as a glass half full so I am hopeful that I will be able to find another local part-time job but I am also realistic that this may take some time. So until then I decided to turn to the Internet for inspiration and ideas on how to make a bit of money. I typed a few choice words into the search engine and discovered the rather wonderful site called The Money Shed . "What's that?" I hear you ask. In the shed, a community of knowledgeable homeworkers generously share their ideas, stories of what has worked or failed for them, and tips on how to make money online. There is a real supportive feel to the forum and other users will happily help or give opinions if you ask. I never knew such a world existed but am very grateful to have found them. I am currently joining lots of different sites covering paid to click, micro tasks, surveys and everything in between. Most of these sites have already been tried and tested by th
Read more

Autumn is here. Let the leaves fall from my eyes.

I haven't posted on this thread for quite a while and I have no reason to justify this, I guess I just kept procrastinating until I simply forgot about it. I would like to say that I have used the last year well and achieved a lot but I think it has been a bit of a write off and I achieved little that could be called productive. Instead I fell into a bit of a limbo feeling sad about the state of the world and a little lost about what to do with myself. I wouldn't say I was depressed, more just a complete loss of focus so I threw myself into concentrating on the lives of my family and friends. I peaked in the summer and perhaps the heat wave we 'enjoyed' finally sweat out this apathy with my own life as with the return of grey clouds and a chill in the air I am beginning to feel myself again. With regards to frugality, I am still plugging away at it and to rejuvenate my commitment, I am returning to the basics: turn off lights and plugs when not in use; put on a cardig
Read more

What do you do with a problem like Merlin?

I have a cat who I've had now for about 3 years, my children love him, I love him and my husband despite loving cats only puts up with him. He isn't a very nice cat. He doesn't like sitting on laps or being picked up. In fact most of the time I wonder why we keep him. If he was a friend I would stop replying to his texts and ignore his posts. But he isn't, he's a white and ginger ball of fur who often wears a face that is either plain stupid or is in a constant state of disbelief that we are crazy enough to put up with his shenanigans - its hard to be sure which it is. He is incredibly fussy about his food and I have wasted tonnes of money pandering to his tastes which are of course expensive so he certainly does not do thrifty. What do you with a problem like Merlin? Nothing as when his highness does come close for a tickle and a lick, all is forgiven. I am pathetic and he knows it! Damn cat!
Read more