Few simple ways to save money.

I just wanted to share with you a few simple but effective ways to save more of your money and cut back on spending you don’t need so you can have more save in your bank account. Don’t you want to have a bigger savings account? Everybody does, but not everybody work for it; they just want to see results right away and it doesn’t happen like that.

• Make coffee at home. Admit it, you wake up in the morning late for work hurrying to brush your teeth and put your clothes on then run out the door.  Guess where you’re going to go next? Starbucks or Dunkin Donuts right? Even a few bucks on a cup of coffee can add up in a month. Cutting back on your morning coffee and start making it at home before you go to work(if you manage to wake up early).

• Bring your lunch! It doesn’t take much to make your own lunch or buying quick meals at the local grocery store than having to spend at least $10 every time you go out to lunch. If you’re too lazy, have your wife/girlfriend/mom/dad do it for you. That’s $200 you have to spend each month if you were to go out for lunch 5 days of the week!

• Limit Driving your car as much as possible. Especially if you drive gas guzzling monsters like trucks or SUVs. Go where you need to go and back, joyriding is going to hurt you in the end. Put a limit to how much gas money you can spend each week or month.

• Drinking Water is good for you and in most cases, it’s FREE. If you can’t drink tap water then buy a filter and slap it on there and now you have filtered water. However if you HAVE to buy sodas, buy them at wholesale so it’s much cheaper than buying them individually.

• Cable Service. Not everybody’s going watch 500 channels, so cancel some of your channels and keep the ones you usually watch. Stay away from sports package, you can watch that stuff on your basic package.

• DVDs.Who actually buys DVDs these days when you have Netflix? I don’t even get DVDs from Netflix for that matter, I just stream everything for $9 a month(they raised it).

• Going out. I’m not trying to convince you to be a homebody, everybody deserves to go out and enjoy life, but know your limits. If you’re going out drinking with the guys or with your gal pals, set up a limit on how much you can drink and not go over that limit.

:::This article was featured on the August 26th edition at The Carnival of Financial Planning