Wednesday, 23 January 2013

Ways to Spend Less and Save More By Cheryl Jones

Are you looking to improve your financial future? You can start with cutting expenses. There are ways to spend less of that hard-earned money. It takes some thought and discipline, but it can be done. Think. A low wage part-time job gives you maybe $500 extra a month. What if you could achieve the same result without working an extra job, but just by cutting expenses?
One way to stop spending extra money is by eating out less. You can easily spend $5-$7 a meal, or $1.50 or so on a snack. What if you eat out twice a day? That can easily come to $300 a month. Eating out is a lot more expensive than cooking at home or buying in bulk, and taking a snack with you. Just by cutting out eating out at lunch, and bringing your own, you could easily save $30 or more a week. That small change would result in over $100 a month saved. Start planning how to eat out less and eat more at home.
Making a grocery shopping list is a good way to save money. Instead of wandering aisles and picking up whatever attracts you, follow the list. Plan your meals. This includes leftovers you an take to lunch. Base your list on the meals planned. If you are careful, that one onion you buy can be used in several different dishes. By knowing your recipes and buying according to recipes, you don't need extra ingredients "just in case". Before going shopping, go through the store ads and see what is on sale that you need. Then for even more savings, use coupons. Sometimes these can be printed off the internet. Sometimes stores have services that you can sign up for where they will send coupons to your email box.
You cell phone or home phone is another place you can save money. Over times, plans change; phone companies come out with new plans. It might be time to see if you have the best plan for your form of phone usage. Are there features you don't use? Are you paying for too many minutes? Cell phone representatives often are graded according to their customer service, so they should be happy to go over your plan to make you a satisfied customer and hopefully you will do them the favor of giving them a good review in return.
Your cable bill is another place you can save money. Can you bundle your cable with your phone and save money? Are there features or channels you don't use, need, or could live without, and which by dropping you would save money? The cable company might have some ideas of how you can save money. Talk to them.
Walk or ride a bike when you can. This is particularly possible in smaller towns, where you might not live that far from a small store or business. Why not walk to get that haircut on Saturday instead of driving the car? Another way to save money is to carpool.
Save money on banking fees. Don't spend money paying for ATM transactions. Sure, it is convenient to pull that cash out of the machine, but you are probably paying for the privilege to do it. Only use an ATM where your bank won't charge you, or get cash bank when you buy something at a store to get those few extra bucks in pocket. You should not have to pay fees to get those dollars from your bank account into your wallet.
Do you use prescription medicines? Call around to your local pharmacies and compare the costs of the medications you use. You may be able to save money by switching pharmacies.
As you can see, there are ways to save money each month. If you will make the effort to make these changes, you may find that you have given yourself a raise simply by being more careful about how you spend your money. Take that extra money you save each month. You now have something extra with which to build a financial future.
Cheryl Jones is a purveyor of useful information, products and work-at-home models that work. She has found solutions to problems for which the average person is seeking for answers.
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