Hey guys, it's Dana, and it's Tuesday, so we're gonna talk about money, and I wanted to share with you 25 things that frugal people do everyday. (cash register ringing) All right so first, I looked
up the definition of frugal, and frugal is sparing or economical with regard to money. So now that we've defined frugal, what are some ways that
frugal people live everyday? And number one, live
below your means, right? This is kind of a duh
one, but I just wanted to start out at the top with
the most important thing that we pretty much all
know, but not all of us do, is to live below your means,
which means you're spending less than what's coming in. Second is put aside an emergency fund, because emergencies are gonna happen, so set aside some money
in a savings account or a money market account for emergencies, and don't touch it
unless it's an emergency. Three, cook from scratch. So we always cook at home. I can't say I cook from
scratch all the time, but I don't, we're
trying to really cut back on the amount of processed
foods that we buy, and we never eat out. Like I mean never. Maybe once a year we eat out, and even then eating out is like, it's not a fancy restaurant, and it's usually just Jim and I. The kids actually, our
son, our sons are six, they just turned six,
and last week one of them was in a restaurant for the first time in his whole life. Which leads to number
four, which is frugal people stay home. They stay home and they
enjoy staying home. I am a total homebody, a total homebody and so is my husband. Thank goodness or we would
not get along probably, but we both enjoy being home, and on Friday, Saturday night, I have absolutely zero desire to go out. I like being at home and that saves us a ton of money, because we're able to find things to do around the house. Even if we're just sitting
on the couch and talking, we do games at home, or we're
cleaning or doing whatever. I just, I do enjoy being at home and I would choose it over going out every night of the week. Number five is to redefine fun. Redefine entertainment to be something that is inexpensive, right? So look for things that are free, and if you're used to doing things that cost a lot of money
like going to restaurants, or shopping, going to movie theaters, try to redefine what it is that you enjoy. If you can find hobbies
that will be productive but also fun, which leads actually into the next one, frugal
people find hobbies that produce, like crocheting, gardening. If you get really into
gardening and you find that fun, then it's kind of a double whammy because you're enjoying yourself but you're also producing food that you could probably
eat, you and your family. If you're gardening
vegetables, not just flowers, then it's something that's producing. If you learn how to sew you
can make your own clothes, and that will save you a ton of money. Next, frugal people take
lessons from YouTube. You can learn anything from YouTube. I remember years ago, years ago my sister telling me that she was just, you can learn how to do your makeup, she said, "You can learn
anything from YouTube," and it's true. Anything you want to learn,
you can type it into YouTube and you can learn for free. So you can learn a whole bunch of stuff. Like I said, you can learn
how to play the piano, I was looking up how to teach your kid how to ride a bike. I mean, anything you want
to do, you want to learn, you can find that on YouTube. It's incredible, I love the internet. Next, frugal people save their pennies, and I mean this literally,
because I actually have met some people who take their change and throw it in the trash,
just throw it in the trashcan. And I was like, that's good
money, that's good money. Save your pennies, put
them in a piggy bank and you can cash those in. You can go to the bank
and use the coin machines, so frugal people save every penny, and I pick up pennies too off the street. It's money. Frugal people shop around,
they comparison shop, they get multiple bids on things before they get worked on on their house. Frugal people, they shop
intentionally, not impulsively. So I often will find something
that I want in Amazon and I'll put it in my shopping cart, and I leave it sit there
for at least a month or a couple weeks at
least, to make sure that it's something I really
want, I'm really thoughtful about things before I buy them. I don't just go ahead and say, oh I want that, and just buy it. I make sure I take the
time to think about it, make sure it's something I really want. Make sure I'm comparing other prices. I'm not buying it at what
could be the highest price. So if I buy something,
especially large items, I want to make sure that I am getting the best possible deal, the lowest price, best quality, and so I have to shop around and look at different
places, different sellers, and make sure like I said that
I'm getting the best deal, and that I really want it. Frugal people fix stuff. If it breaks, then we do our best to try to repair it. Because if you can repair
a part to certain things, if your lawnmower breaks or something, or even my camera which
has fallen down repeatedly, the lens has broken, if
you can repair things or just replace one part,
then it'll extend the life of that item rather than go
and buy a whole brand new item. This is actually true for your car too. If you repair your car
or get good maintenance rather than just say, oh it's broken, this one part of it is broken,
let's just get a new car. I mean that's, a lot of
people actually do that. Which brings us to our next
one, frugal people drive their cars until the wheels fall off. We will be driving our cars
forever and ever and ever. We will continue to get them repaired, get the maintenance done on
it, oil changes and everything, until it is really, really dead. Like it won't, if we can't, we're gonna take it all
the way until the end, until the price to
repair it is greater than the value of the car. Then at that point we would get a new car. Frugal people live in smaller houses. I'm actually really
surprised how many people I hear talk about how they
need to buy a new house because they want their children to have their own bedroom. A lot of people feel that way. But I don't at all. I feel as if, I shared a bedroom
with my sister growing up and I'm so close to my sister, and I actually think that was a gift that helped me to learn how
to compromise with people. I think I'm more tolerant of others because I had to share a bedroom, and I actually prefer that our children do share bedrooms, because I think it'll give them, they'll also then get those qualities. I think it's a good learning experience, and so I have no desire
to live in a larger house also because it's just more to clean, more bathrooms to keep up with. I would like one more
bathroom, we just have one. I would like another bathroom, but I don't need five bathrooms. So frugal people I think
live in smaller houses, even if they can afford bigger houses. Then they use that money that they have because they're living
in the smaller house to travel or do other things with. Frugal people shop
second hand or buy used. We always have bought used cars, except for the first car that I bought right out of college, and
that was a huge mistake. I don't recommend that,
but I buy used clothes. You can buy used furniture. We buy used furniture. Our dining room table
actually is beautiful and I found that for $50
at a local Goodwill store, so it was a huge find. I was so excited about it
and it's a great table, really good wood. So frugal people shop secondhand. Frugal people brown bag lunch. Every single day I go to work and I always bring my lunch, and we always pack lunch for our kids when they go to school. I am shocked though at work how many people purchase
lunch every single day, and that money really adds up, so frugal people pack. All right, frugal people
plan and make goals. We like to plan things
out into the future. We typically think five years in advance. I think 10 years in advance, and I like to plan things. I like them in my spreadsheets. I like to set goals,
frugal people set goals and they stick to them, because it just helps
you overall to save money if you know where you want to go. You can calculate how much
money you need for Christmas. Also it's just a part of
budgeting when you're a planner. Which is the next one,
frugal people budget. You have to have a budget, so you know how much
money you're gonna spend say over the summer. We have a summer budget for
activities for the kids, camps. And once we've reached the max, we've reached our budget, then we know we're not doing anymore camps, we're not doing any
other vacation planning. So, that brings us to the next one which is frugal people camp. I'm just getting into camping because I realize that frugal people camp, and we are going camping this summer, and I am so shocked when
I look at the prices. So we're spending $20
a night for a campsite, and last year we went camping and we slept in our minivan, and that
was really inexpensive because we didn't even buy a tent. We slept in the van, and it was fine. So you can really travel
and do a lot of things with your family very inexpensively if you can learn how to camp. You could pick up a second
hand tent somewhere maybe if you wanted to do the tents, but it's just a fraction of the cost than it is to get hotel
rooms or to rent homes, and you can go so many places. I think even Disney World
I think has a campground. Frugal people don't smoke or drink because smoking obviously
costs money for the cigarettes, and if you're going to be drinking you have to buy the alcohol. Jim and I have two or
three bottles of wine, and they were purchased I think
like two or three years ago, maybe five years ago, and
we still haven't drank them. I actually really do
enjoy a glass of wine. Jim doesn't drink at all, like
he has no desire whatsoever to drink, so when your husband doesn't want to drink a
glass of wine with you, I just tend not to
drink, so we just don't. But that saves us a lot of money. We don't have to buy the
alcohol and we don't smoke so we don't have to buy the cigarettes. Frugal people eat a plant-based diet, because meat is expensive, and if you buy fresh vegetables, especially
if you buy locally, also beans, rice, all that
stuff can be really inexpensive. If you cut back on processed foods, then that'll really save
you at the grocery store. Frugal people cancel subscriptions. Subscription services, newspapers, magazines, if you get those
boxes of stuff in the mail. Sometimes I think a lot of people sign up for subscriptions like
with the free 30 days or whatever they give
you, and then they just forget to cancel it ever, or they just are lazy about canceling. Then you end up getting all this stuff just being sent to your house that you're paying for every month that you might not even really be using. And newspapers and stuff, like newspapers, maybe if you get like the coupons but we don't have any of that going on. The only subscription I
have or we have is Netflix, because we don't have cable. Right, frugal people don't have cable. They typically cut cable. We've cut cable, and we
do have Netflix though. So that's our one subscription but we've canceled everything else. Frugal people cut their own hair. I don't cut my hair but
I do cut my boys' hair with the clippers, so I cut their hair. Some of you though have recommended that I go to a hair school. Is that how you, a hair cutting school? So if you can find a school with students learning to cut hair,
then they'll cut your hair really inexpensive, that's a great idea. Frugal people hang dry their clothes. We try to do that over the summer. We've done it over the winter actually, and hang drying your clothes
will save you a lot of money on your electric bill with your dryer. Frugal people use un-paper
towels and un-paper napkins. We use hand towels in the kitchen for our paper paper towels, and we've been doing that for years, and that saves us a lot of money. We don't have to buy
paper towels or napkins, and it's great. And cloth diapers, frugal
people use cloth diapers. Frugal people drink water. So we don't drink any sodas,
no sodas in our house. So if you just do that one thing alone, then you'll probably save a lot of money. Don't buy juices. If you want juice, you
can juice, get a juicer and do fresh fruits, and that'll
be much healthier for you, but just drink water. That'll save you a ton of
money and it's healthier too. Frugal people exercise for free, so bike, walk, run. I've been jogging, I'm going to jog soon, that's why I'm wearing this. So that is something that is
very inexpensive obviously. You don't have to pay for a gym membership and you're gonna get your workouts in too. Oh my foot went to sleep, oh. Okay lastly, frugal people
find frugal friends. So if you have friends who
are out shopping all the time and that's what they like to do for fun, or they do, I don't know. They do things that are not frugal, then that's going to impact you. You are heavily influenced
by who you spend time with, so finding fellow friends
who like to shop second hand, or who also are living a frugal lifestyle, that's gonna really help
you to be living frugally. So I highly recommend trying to find some like minded friends if
you are trying to be frugal. Right, makes sense. Okay? All right you guys, thank
you so much for watching. If it's your first time here don't forget to subscribe. I am here every single Tuesday talking all about money,
and I will talk to you in the next video. Bye guys.
