What are people doing to save money in this insane economy?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Would love to get ideas for what else we could be doing as everything just gets more and more unaffordable. I really didn’t used to think about it this much for the last two years have been brutal. I’ll start:

- Used to eat out twice a week, now we eat out twice a month (take out only). Cook 7 nights a week but meals have gotten less complicated because who can realistically cook that much?

- started buying frozen afterschool snacks (tater tots, chicken tenders) and don’t let the kids stop at Starbucks or Boba place or whatever more than 2-3x per month

- Decided to drive our car until the wheels fall off. New cars are insane. When did that happen?

- started buying all basics (socks, underwear, basic tees) on Amazon.

- only shop for clothes off season and on sale. Have bought some basics from Target and Uniqlo. Saw a fairly basic sweater at J.Crew for $350 and almost laughed out loud.

- only reading books from the library

- no more sporting events for entertainment (we used to enjoy basketball games)


I would not have considered us to be in a difficult financial situation even two years ago. Our jobs are thankfully stable. But neither of us got pay increases this year because of cost cutting. It just doesn’t feel sustainable.

It happened under Biden, I had to pay $12,000 over the manufacturer price to get the vehicle and had to wait for it for 4.5 months.

But you still vote dem right?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I keep my house much hotter in the summer than I would like and much colder in the winter than seems normal. It sounds vaguely Soviet, but the truth is, doing this saves me $200 to $300 every month.

(I set the air conditioning to 80° in the summer and the heat is 60 or 59 in the winter)

"saves me $200 to $300 every month."
Your mansion must be huge.

[Anonymous]

Give DW a facial instead of getting it out

[Anonymous]

We still are doing our covid things that just happened to also save money as well, at home hair cuts, at home car maintenance like oil changes, I do my own nails, we even give each other massages. Also going to the grocery store less like once a week saves on impulse buying and overbuying. We don't eat out or go to the movies. We use what we have, find substitutions that we already have, repair what we have. Cars are old but are paid off. There are so many ways to save money.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Would love to get ideas for what else we could be doing as everything just gets more and more unaffordable. I really didn’t used to think about it this much for the last two years have been brutal. I’ll start:

- Used to eat out twice a week, now we eat out twice a month (take out only). Cook 7 nights a week but meals have gotten less complicated because who can realistically cook that much?

- started buying frozen afterschool snacks (tater tots, chicken tenders) and don’t let the kids stop at Starbucks or Boba place or whatever more than 2-3x per month

- Decided to drive our car until the wheels fall off. New cars are insane. When did that happen?

- started buying all basics (socks, underwear, basic tees) on Amazon.

- only shop for clothes off season and on sale. Have bought some basics from Target and Uniqlo. Saw a fairly basic sweater at J.Crew for $350 and almost laughed out loud.

- only reading books from the library

- no more sporting events for entertainment (we used to enjoy basketball games)


I would not have considered us to be in a difficult financial situation even two years ago. Our jobs are thankfully stable. But neither of us got pay increases this year because of cost cutting. It just doesn’t feel sustainable.

It happened under Biden, I had to pay $12,000 over the manufacturer price to get the vehicle and had to wait for it for 4.5 months.

You're insinuating it was Biden's fault. I'm sure you didn't mean to do that. Right? Because if that was your intention, it would make you a goddamn idiot.

COVID disrupted supply chains. Higher prices were the effect. Trump made things exponentially worse with his stupid unconstitutional tariffs. But then again, Trump hates America and everything it stands for, as does anyone who voted for him.

The massive stimulus spending under Biden, which was far more than needed, definitely fueled inflation big time. Because the Democrats had the trifecta majority they went big time on spending in the name of covid recovery, but it was insanely excessive.

-- not a MAGA.

[Anonymous]

You really have to focus on finances before expenditures. For example:

*Make sure you have the best mortgage rate if you own a home;
*If you rent, try to negotiate A better rent
*Pay your credit cards off in time
*Get the best interest rates on savings
*Strategize credit card use to get cash back or points
* Maximize 401 k matches + other employer contributions
*Check to get the best health care coverage/rates ( if married, check to see if you should use your health care spouses, or both
*I am sure there are many other ideas....

*To save $ on shopping OP, we buy very little meat
*We make our own food
*We have clothes swaps with friends + family
*We rarely drink alcohol
*We buy boxes of holiday + greeting cards on sale
*We have one car
*We live in a small house
*Overall we live like we're poor except for our several trips a year...we won't give them up

[Anonymous]

Cooking at home. We used to eat out a few times per week, or even sometimes 5 times a week. Now it is once per week at most.

Ordering groceries for pick up. When I buy them online and don't actually go into the store I seem to spend about half as much. I think it is a combination of lack of impulse buys and an ability to shop sales on my computer in a way that my brain just can't do in the store, even with a detailed list.

Eating what we have. I have been making a big effort to use up what we have and eliminate food waste and it is working. Yesterday I noticed I had about half a large onion on it's last legs in my fridge, half a pack of bacon, and had bought a pack of swiss cheese by mistake when I already had some. So I made a quiche to use it all up. It was delicious. I also had two packs of blackberries from buy-one-get-one that I hadn't used that only had about a day on them and I made muffins with them (saw an extremely easy recipe on a reel a while back and now I use it all the time). I'm a busy working professional, but we now live fairly far south and it will take me as long to go pick something up as it does to throw muffins together or whatever. So I'm cooking a lot more than I used to.

We are driving our cars a long time, but we have always done that. DH's car is about 20 years old, and mine is about 8 years old.

I've been doing my own nails. It started out of feeling like I didn't have the time to go sit in the salon, but then I started adding up the savings in my head, and now that is a huge part of what motivates me to do it myself. I still go sometimes.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Would love to get ideas for what else we could be doing as everything just gets more and more unaffordable. I really didn’t used to think about it this much for the last two years have been brutal. I’ll start:

- Used to eat out twice a week, now we eat out twice a month (take out only). Cook 7 nights a week but meals have gotten less complicated because who can realistically cook that much?

- started buying frozen afterschool snacks (tater tots, chicken tenders) and don’t let the kids stop at Starbucks or Boba place or whatever more than 2-3x per month

- Decided to drive our car until the wheels fall off. New cars are insane. When did that happen?

- started buying all basics (socks, underwear, basic tees) on Amazon.

- only shop for clothes off season and on sale. Have bought some basics from Target and Uniqlo. Saw a fairly basic sweater at J.Crew for $350 and almost laughed out loud.

- only reading books from the library

- no more sporting events for entertainment (we used to enjoy basketball games)


I would not have considered us to be in a difficult financial situation even two years ago. Our jobs are thankfully stable. But neither of us got pay increases this year because of cost cutting. It just doesn’t feel sustainable.

It happened under Biden, I had to pay $12,000 over the manufacturer price to get the vehicle and had to wait for it for 4.5 months.

You're insinuating it was Biden's fault. I'm sure you didn't mean to do that. Right? Because if that was your intention, it would make you a goddamn idiot.

COVID disrupted supply chains. Higher prices were the effect. Trump made things exponentially worse with his stupid unconstitutional tariffs. But then again, Trump hates America and everything it stands for, as does anyone who voted for him.

The massive stimulus spending under Biden, which was far more than needed, definitely fueled inflation big time. Because the Democrats had the trifecta majority they went big time on spending in the name of covid recovery, but it was insanely excessive.

-- not a MAGA.

+100,000

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Regarding new cars, lightly-used certified used vehicles are a better deal in most cases. That doesn't really apply to inexpensive import cars like Honda Civics. But it applies for a large chunk of the car market. Any segments that have a large percent of sales that are actually 3-year leases.

Anybody know a list of what these cars are, or have advice on how to target shopping them?

[Anonymous]

Since 2020 my spending is minimal. I make a decent living but I can’t justify spending so much on non essentials.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Don’t defer car or house maintenance
Programmable thermostat- set to a lower temperature in winter and higher in summer
Mow your own lawn, trim your own bushes
Brown bag lunches
Go vegetarian 2-3 times a week beans and eggs are cheaper proteins
Only buy fruit when it is in season. No berries in the winter. Frozen veggies and fruits can be economical too.
Clean your own house. Make it a daily/weekly family activity
Use municipal summer camps
Downsize your house
Visit family/friends and have them visit you instead of vacations

If you have a good mortgage rate, you're extremely unlikely to save money downsizing your house. Maybe if you are going from a large SFH to a condo that is not close in, such that you could buy the condo outright or nearly so.

It's not that simple. You aren't factoring in that many have a lot of appreciation in their larger homes that they can pull out.

[Anonymous]

Spend as little as possible. Only buy what is necessary to live. But I do need my streaming services. That is nonnegotiable.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I keep my house much hotter in the summer than I would like and much colder in the winter than seems normal. It sounds vaguely Soviet, but the truth is, doing this saves me $200 to $300 every month.

(I set the air conditioning to 80° in the summer and the heat is 60 or 59 in the winter)

"saves me $200 to $300 every month."
Your mansion must be huge.

Not necessarily. My house is just under 2k sq feet and managing our thermostat saves hundreds each month.

[Anonymous]

Eat all meals at home.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I keep my house much hotter in the summer than I would like and much colder in the winter than seems normal. It sounds vaguely Soviet, but the truth is, doing this saves me $200 to $300 every month.

(I set the air conditioning to 80° in the summer and the heat is 60 or 59 in the winter)

"saves me $200 to $300 every month."
Your mansion must be huge.

Not necessarily. My house is just under 2k sq feet and managing our thermostat saves hundreds each month.

My house is 2500 sq. feet, and we rarely have an electric bill of more than $250 - most often, considerably less. What would your bill be if you didn't "manage" your thermostat to ridiculous temps?