10 Unusual Ways We SAVE MONEY | Minimalist Money Saving Tips

hey everyone and welcome back today i want to share with you 10 unusual ways that we save money and saving money has always been one of our top priorities whether that was saving money for our down payment in the past or now saving money to rebuild our emergency fund to pay off our house early and to begin to invest more but on top of all the normal ways that we save like budgeting paying ourselves first and all that we also save money in a few more unusual ways so today i want to look at some of the more uncommon or strange ways that we save money and my hope is that this gives you some ideas or inspiration to save as you chase after your financial goals and i'm excited to get into this so be sure to hit that subscribe button below if you haven't already and a big thank you to nerdwallet for sponsoring today's video we'll talk about them in a bit but now let's get started with the first weird way that we save money and that's that we refrigerate and freeze everything okay everything is a bit of an exaggeration here but there are a lot of normal pantry items that we choose to freeze or refrigerate instead to extend their life and if you find that you seem to always have food going bad on you i feel like that's definitely a problem when there's only two people living in a house or at least it's something we've experienced but if you have food always going bad on you a great way to save money to reduce food waste and really just to make the most of the food that you have is to refrigerate or freeze your items so for example most people tend to think of things like bread onions and potatoes as pantry items that don't belong in the fridge but by storing those items in the fridge you can actually prolong those items life by weeks and even months and so we love doing that because it allows us to actually finish the items that we buy before they go bad and i like to do the same thing when it comes to our freezer too we buy a lot of fruit and eat quite a bit of it regularly however as soon as i notice that something is on its way out what i'll often do is simply freeze that item whether it's spinach kale bananas avocados or any kind of barrier fruit we'll just freeze those items and then later use them in smoothies and so doing this really helps us to get the most bang for our buck when it comes to our grocery budget and make sure that we aren't wasting money unnecessarily and then another fun way that we save money is to only buy replacements and a motto that i like to live buy in a lot of areas of my life is replace don't accumulate and this is a great way to prevent any pileup of unused items and things going to waste which just results in money being thrown out the window for us and so i especially like to use this one when it comes to things like makeup and skincare i always try never to buy the replacement makeup item until i'm on like the last couple of days of whatever makeup item i'm running out of so right now i'm running pretty low on the daily moisturizer i use and i'm probably going to wait a few more days until i'm right at the end of the bottle before binder replacement and that's just one easy way of making sure that i don't have duplicates or triplicates of any items on hand and that i can keep my skincare routine simple without developing an expensive collection all right i feel like this next one is a bit more uncommon and that's that i never pay full price for a haircut now i'll admit i'm definitely lucky on this one and that christopher's mom is actually a retired hairdresser and so whenever we go over to visit she is always asking us if we need a trim or if we want a haircut or anything like that so right now she is the exclusive person who cuts my hair but even before we got married i never paid full price for a haircut either i'd have my mom or my sister cut my hair or if i wanted something a bit more elaborate i would go to a local salon school where they could cut my hair for a fraction of the price of a typical salon and if you tend to keep a fairly simple hairstyle this really can be such a great way to save money you can easily spend hundreds or even thousands of dollars a year getting your hair cut and colored and so having a friend or family member cut your hair or even if you want to learn to do it yourself cutting your own hair can be a fantastic way to save a lot of money and then one of the more recent money-saving habits i've developed is to plan my driving so i could save on gas if you've been around here for a while you probably already know this but we used to live literally in walking distance to all of the errands i could possibly want to accomplish we were right next to target we had a grocery store and walking distance everything was really convenient to get to but since we've moved a bit further away from the city i definitely need to drive a bit more frequently and so i've tried to become really strategic about planning my trips in a way that can save us on gas by knocking up multiple tasks at once i'm able to really save money on gas because i'm not taking more trips than i need to so for example if i decide to meet up with a friend at a local coffee shop i might on the same trip also decide to pick up any prescriptions that i have that need to be picked up and to get my groceries at the same time so that i can save time and money by not creating more trips for myself than i need to and then this next one has been a big one for me and that's to not be afraid to walk out empty-handed there was always something inside of me that would feel guilty whenever i walked out of a store without buying anything and so it would happen all the time that i would buy something small or sometimes something big just to remove that feeling of discomfort of walking out of a store without holding anything but the truth is whenever we walk into a store we are not obligated to come out of it having bought something if you walk into a store and they don't have what you need or what you're looking for it is okay and good to walk out of it empty-handed okay and i'm excited to share with you the next weird way that we save money but before i do i want to share with you a bit about today's sponsor nerd wallet and if you've never heard about nerd wallet before it is an amazing resource for everything financial with expert advice and helpful tools they really help you shop for financial products and manage your money but where they really tie into what we're talking about today is the fact that yes saving money is important but what we do with the money we save is just as important and if you like i did for years just have your money sitting in a bank account earning you little to no interest it's time to put your savings to work this is actually something that we did a few months back we used nerd wallet to find and open a high yield savings account so we could have somewhere to keep and grow our money as we saved up to buy a second vehicle and to rebuild our emergency fund and i'm happy to report we have good news on that front we are already able to meet one of those goals we recently bought a second used car which is actually identical to our first we love toyota corollas for whatever reason actually the reason is that they're super efficient when it comes to gas and rarely ever need repairs that's beside the point so we've got one goal down and one to go and we're already well on our way to the second goal of topping off our emergency fund and so if you're wanting to learn more or to open up a high yield savings account of your own nerd wallet really makes it incredibly easy they've done all the hard work for you by researching literally dozens of financial institutions to find the best options and then they compile them for you too so you can quickly compare options and find the one that's going to help you earn the maximum amount of interest each year so if you want to start making the most out of your savings just click on the link in the description box below and that will open up a curated list for you and you can sort it based on where you live but then you can review their recommendations on the best savings accounts look at interest rates and more so you can pick the perfect option for you so if you want to learn more to open a high yield savings account of your own just click on the link in the description box below to explore your best money options with nerd wallet and that way you can start making the most of your savings today let's continue now though with another weird way that we like to save money and this is another food one and that's to buy large meals whenever i go to restaurants i'll often choose the larger option of a particular meal with the idea that i can take home whatever i don't eat for leftovers depending on what restaurant i go to i can often get two or three full meals out of one single order and so that's a really easy way for me to save money because i'm literally paying for one meals worth of food and getting two to three meals worth of return on investment i guess but the real idea behind this one is that you're trying to get the full value of your money and not letting any food go to waste and also maximizing your dollars because typically if you order a larger portion you're getting more food for each dollar and this one might seem like a pretty small one but it definitely adds up there are certain meals that i can literally make four or five meals out of like whenever i order pad thai i feel like that lasts me almost a week for the meals that might be a bit of an exaggeration but i can get several healthy size meals from a large pad thai serving next is that we like to buy used or buy second hand where possible and this is one that i feel like has gained popularity in recent years is people have come to understand more the sustainability aspect of buying second hand but it can be a great way to save money too but where this one becomes a bit more of an unusual money-saving strategy for me is that i'll often buy secondhand in categories and areas that people typically avoid things like shoes or activewear a great example of this is a few months ago i was actually looking at buying a pair of all birds as a replacement for my previous pair of sneakers and i was actually able to thrift a pair at a local consignment store and obviously with categories like this it's important to be cautious and to clean things thoroughly before using them yourself but at the same time this can be a great way to save money and just looking at the pair of all birds for example i was able to pay a quarter of the price for them as i would have if i were to buy them new that one really can have a massive impact and i love this next one too and that's to sell what you are already planning on getting rid of i find that when we're decluttering it can be really tempting for us to want to donate gift or simply to throw out things that we don't want anymore because it's easier but you can save up so much money simply by selling the things that you are already planning on getting rid of just since we've moved i was able to sell our patio set that literally had paint splattered on it and initially i was thinking that we'd have to maybe throw out because i wasn't sure we could even donate it and i got fifty dollars from that i also made five bucks from a paint can that i was literally going to recycle at our local recycling facility we sold an old tv stand too and quite a few other items that we might have otherwise just donated and we've literally made hundreds of dollars just in the past few months from selling things that we were planning on decluttering and so i think that's a great lesson of just because something doesn't have value to you anymore doesn't mean that it can't provide value to someone else and value that they're willing to pay for so i definitely think it's worth the effort to if you're decluttering and getting rid of items just to take those few extra minutes to list things on facebook marketplace or whatever your favorite selling app of choice is and then another unusual way that we save money is that we like to do a gift giving lottery around the holidays and so for context with this one christopher and i are both from fairly large families and so buying gifts for 10 people not even including ourselves was getting to be a lot every christmas and so in the past few years our families have started drawing names for christmas presents rather than everyone buying a present for everyone else and we also set a budget too so that everyone is giving and receiving something of similar value but the minimalist in me loves it to you because i'm able to buy one really intentional and thoughtful present for the person whose name i drew rather than trying to buy a bunch of cheaper gifts for everyone that probably aren't even going to be used this is a great one because it helps us to save money but it also helps us to approach gift giving with more intention and then the final kind of weird way that i like to save money is that sometimes i like to shop under a time limit and if you're prone to browsing stores and kind of picking up items that you don't actually need as you go this can be a great one what i'll do is just set a time limit for my shopping so i can kind of get in and get out without buying anything that i don't need and by putting limits on yourself in this way it really helps to reduce the temptation and any chances that you might come away with impulse purchases or just generally items that aren't going to be intentional for you and so i don't do this with every store but there are certain ones that i know that i have more of a tendency to browse in so for those stores i do like to set a time limit which is just kind of like an artificial constraint that i'm putting on myself that can help me to just naturally shop more intentionally and not waste money in the process so those are 10 uncommon or strange ways that we like to save money my hope is that this gives you some ideas or inspiration to really help you as you chase after your financial goals whether you want to adopt some of the ideas i mentioned here or simply to find your own unconventional ways of saving money now i want to know though are there any strange ways that you like to save money if there are i would love to hear about them so be sure to comment them down below and don't forget that if you want to really start making the most out of your savings today and to find and open a high-yield savings account of your own you can just click on the link in the description box below to explore your best money options with nerdwallet all right well i hope you guys enjoyed today's video and if you did and haven't already i would love it if you would hit that subscribe button below for more simple and intentional living videos coming at you twice a week and remember that if you're looking for daily inspiration and updates you can follow me on instagram as well i'm at ashland.eden on there and i'd love to have you join me that's everything for today's video though thank you all so so much for watching and i'll see you in the next one bye

Channel: Ashlynne Eaton

Views: 158,332

Keywords: Weird ways I save, strange ways I save, unusual ways I save, minimalism and saving money, minimalism and money, how to save money, minimalism, minimalist, finances, ways i save, money, with minimalism, ways to save, minimalist finances, personal finances, minimalist money ideas, money tips, budget hacks, money hacks, simple living, slow living, declutter, decluttering, ashlynne eaton, charlotte nc

Id: Q9hwppctEYs

Length: 13min 42sec (822 seconds)

Published: Fri May 28 2021