These days, people are STRESSED about finances. It is what it is! Around the holidays, we all feel the need to buy gifts for everyone that we know and love. Then there’s also the stress of making sure we get them exactly what they want no matter the price tag attached to it. If it’s not the holidays, it’s a birthday party, an anniversary gift, etc. The cycle just never ends! It’s stressful! So how do we save some quick cash in a month to help with that present budget? Let’s find out!
1. Eat Breakfast at Home
I said it, and I meant it. Wake up a little bit earlier to make sure you get to eat breakfast before you leave the house. Why? Let’s do some number crunching…
You can stop by Hardees and get a bacon, egg, and cheese biscuit combo is $6.69. That doesn’t sound so bad, right? Let’s take a closer look…
If you buy that same combo 3 times a week, that’s $20.07 a WEEK on breakfast (keep in mind that this price does not include the taxes you pay). That’s just for 3 days a week. If you do it for 5 days a week, that’s $33.45 a week. If you pay that for a month, that’s $133.80 a month! That does NOT include you buying breakfast on the weekends, my friend!
So what can you eat at home? My husband prefers oatmeal, and I’ve broken down the costs. He eats two packets every morning, and that costs me $0.33 a day. That’s it.
I don’t eat oatmeal, but I make myself a homemade oatmeal shake. It does contain granola, oats, flaxseed, frozen fruit, frozen spinach, a whole banana, and milk, so it’s a healthy option. That costs us roughly $1.80 a day. I’m telling you… if you make your breakfast at home, you can save almost $100 a month if you’re getting breakfast multiple times a week!
2. Pack Your Lunch
Yes, you read that right. Pack your lunch for work. Don’t stop by the drive through or get stuff out of the vending machine. It is MUCH cheaper to just pack a lunch. According to an article published on Visa.com (Let’s do Lunch: Visa launches lunch budgeting app article) the AVERAGE American spends $53 a week eating out for lunch. That is $2,746 a YEAR! Keep in mind that it’s an average, so for some, this number is more. For others, this number is less. For reference, this article was published in 2022. So, can you imagine what those prices would be today? They’d be crazy! If you think your grocery bill has gone up, know that the food for restaurants has went up as well.
Either way, when you eat out for lunch every day for a week, it adds up fast. For an entire month, pack a sandwich. I like to pack my husband two sandwiches to eat on his way to work (that’s his “lunch time”). So for four slices of bread and lunch meat, I spend less than $1 for 2 sandwiches. Keep in mind that I buy the bread that’s $1.97 for 24 slices, and I buy the Kroger brand lunch meat.
Another option is to pack a Chicken Ranch Wrap! Those are my “go-to” lunch options. Even with a Tyson Chicken Patty, I spend about $0.86 per wrap! You can also pack leftovers from the night before, make a turkey ranch wrap, or something else that you enjoy eating. By doing this, you’ll find that you’ll save $100-$200 easily in a month’s time!
3. Make Your Own Drinks at Home
I know some of you are going to hate when I say this, but make your own coffee at home. Make your own sweet/unsweet tea at home and pack it with your lunch. Buy a huge case of sodas, and pack a can in your lunchbox. I know little things like these seem like small things that do not cost a lot, but they do add up.
We will use Starbucks for our coffeehouse example. I looked up the Starbucks Menu Prices (Updated: December 2022) as a reference for my numbers. If you buy a small freshly brewed coffee, which is the cheapest drink on the menu, it is $1.85 plus tax. That’s the cheapest thing you can buy. It comes out to being around $2.02 (depending on taxes in your state). In a work week’s time, that adds up to $10.11 a week. That’s not terrible, right? It’s not, but it’s still $40.42 a month. That’s only the total if you go once a day. Plus, I don’t know ANYONE who goes to Starbucks for a freshly brewed coffee with nothing in it. Let’s face it: most people want the nicer drinks.
So let’s examine the example with a Caramel Macchiato. A medium Caramel Macchiato is $4.45, which is roughly $4.86 after tax. That’s $24.31 for an entire 5 days of coffee. That turns into $97.23 at the end of the month. I say all this to say that you could easily save almost $100 a month if you buy a nice coffee every day. Make your coffee at home. It won’t taste as glamorous and dreamy, but it will give you your caffeine fix!
4. Meal Plan & Portion Out Food
I won’t lie, this is difficult when you’re first starting out. It’s daunting, and it can be very overwhelming. However, it is worth the hassle in the end. Right now as a family of 4, we spend about $500 a month on food. Most other people around us spend double that, and then they also dine out some nights. Essentially, they tell me that a lot of their food goes to waste.
That doesn’t have to be the case though. When you make a meal plan, you should write out all ingredients and items needed for the meal. You should take into consideration what sides you’ll need, spices, and sauces. Write it out on a grocery list, and then pick up only those items.
When I say portion out your food, what I mean is this: you don’t need to cook a whole large case of chicken breasts if you’re only cooking for two people. Instead, take out what you will eat for that one meal, and then freeze the rest. If you are cooking for yourself, your partner, and three active teenage boys, then yes, you might need to cook the entire package 😉 but most of us do not.
By freezing the other meat that you won’t use, you care saving money! You now have meat to use for another meal, and you don’t have to buy more.
By meal planning, you can reduce how often you eat out. In some cases, you might need to cut the dining out budget completely! If you do, then that’s awesome. In other cases, some might want to be able to eat out once a week, and that’s totally fine. I say do whatever your budget allows, and paying to eat out one night a week is much different than 3-5 times a week!
Just by eliminating some of those nights eating out by planning your meals, you’ll save between $100-$400 a month depending on your family size, where you’re eating at, and how often you’re going out. That’s a SIGNIFICANT amount of money back in your pocket every month!
5. Cut Unnecessary Subscription
I know many will disagree with this, but hear me out! I want to show you some numbers before I even begin.
- Netflix Subscription: $9.99 a month ($199.88 a year) or $6.99 a month with ads ($83.88 a year)
- Hulu Subscription: $14.99 a month ($179.88 a year) or $7.99 a month with ads ($95.88 a year)
- Disney Plus Subscription: $10.99 a month ($131.88 a year) or $7.99 a month with ads ($95.88 a year)
- Sling Subscription: $40 a month of live TV streaming ($480 a year)
- Amazon Prime Video Subscription: $8.99 a month ($107.88 a year)
- Xbox Live Subscription: $14.99 a month ($179.88 a year)
These are all current subscription prices in 2023. I know some people who have all of these subscriptions at once, and all I can think is, “Why?”
Do you really watch every single one of those on a monthly basis? I would wager that many people do not. For that reason, it’s time to breakup with some of your subscription packages! I challenge you to keep 2-3 of them IF it is within your budget. If it’s not, limit yourself to 1!
Personally speaking, my husband and I have Amazon Prime because we use the music app, the video app, and the shopping app (I get a better price on my toilet paper and lotion currently), so we pay the year’s worth of Amazon prime at once. The only other subscription we have is Disney Plus, but we’re actually thinking about sharing this streaming option with a family member and splitting the costs for the year. By doing so, we’ll be paying $65.94 for the year instead of $131.88. Right now, we do not do the ads because of our children (my daughter easily gets nightmares if she accidentally sees something scary, so she cannot see a preview of Bad Batch or anything like that without it bothering her). Otherwise, we would do the option with the ads just to save money.
We used to have Sling TV before we had kids (we didn’t have Disney Plus yet), and we paid $35 a month for the basic package, and then we paid an extra $10 for a sports package during basketball season. That was three years ago… to get the sports package now, it was going to be $75 a month. So we just cut Sling completely because it wasn’t within budget.
Which brings me to my main point: look at your budget. If it’s within budget to pay for Disney Plus, Sling, Amazon Prime, and Xbox, then do it. If you feel the squeeze in your budget every month though, cut some of those ties and SAVE MONEY! Just by cutting 4 of the subscriptions, you can save nearly $100 a month! You’ll also be surprised how well you’ll get by just watching whatever is available to you 🙂
Conclusion? Save Money by Cutting Conveniences
I think the numbers speak for themselves…
The bottom line is this: we all like to use our money to make life more convenient. Hey, even I appreciate convenience. However, sometimes, convenience just costs too much. For that reason, putting in a couple extra hours to plan out your meals, lunches, and drinks for the week could save a lot of time and money in the long run. By eliminating the costs that I mentioned above, you have the potential to save between $400-$900 a month. Those numbers all depend on how frequently you: get fast-food for breakfast a week, buy your lunch out, grab a coffee or beverage from the coffee shop, dine out for dinner, and how many subscriptions you have.
All of these costs separately seem small… until you add them together at the end of the month. Try to make a budget, and just see where your money is going throughout the month. You could be surprised by the results!
If you’d like to read about how to start meal planning, stay tuned for my upcoming article about how to get started!
If you’d like some inexpensive, easy recipes, click here! It’ll take you to Mama’s Kitchen!
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