26 Frugal Tips To help you Spend less money

my name is joy of frugal creative living and today I have 20 Frugal Living tips that you're going to want to consider to help you spend less money on some of your everyday expenses my very first tip is to breathe before you buy it is so important to just take a moment before you make your purchases and ask yourself do I actually need this do I already have something like this at home how is this going to fit in with what I already have do I even have anywhere to put this and what is it going to help me accomplish just taking a few seconds before you purchase something can keep you from spending your money mindlessly on something that doesn't even serve you well or might even cause you to get further and further away from reaching the goal that you've set for yourself here's a a tip that I got from a viewer you can cut up cereal boxes to use as shopping list cards you can just clip them together hang them up somewhere in your kitchen and then grab one when you need it then when making your grocery list you want to make sure that you're choosing items that you know everyone in your household likes and that might sound a little harder to do than it actually is it might also mean that you'll end up having a lot of the same Foods over and over again which happens in my house but ultimately it will help you to spend less money so for example my daughter and I we're the only ones in the house that like to eat cream cheese and we only eat it on Bagels so when money is really tight it doesn't make sense for me to buy cream cheese and for that matter I don't even need to buy Bagels because we can just have toast and buy butter instead because I know everyone in the house likes to eat butter but then we can also use butter when we're cooking we can use butter when we're baking we can use butter for variety of reasons versus buying cream cheese which we can only really we only really use it in one way so that's not a good economical choice but just as a rule of thumb try to create meal plans and grocery lists that include items that everyone can partake in so that you're spending less money but still satisfying everyone's tastes next is to use coupons and I know this is one of those OG Frugal tips that everybody knows but you would not believe how many people still don't take advantage of coupons just clip them from those little circulars that get thrown into your driveway if you can pick it up before it gets rained on make sure you pull those papers out and you can throw away all the junk papers cuz it's I know it's always going to be some junk papers in there but there are also manufacturer coupons in those circulars that you can use at any store whether it's your grocery store or if it's a Walmart it doesn't matter the manufacturer coupons can be used anywhere where those particular brands are sold so when you use your coupons you can also get discounts on top of items that are already on sale and it just makes such a difference one of my favorite things at the grocery store is after the cashier has rung up all of my food then I hit her with my digital coupons and then I just love to watch the price trickle down to see exactly how much I saved it's beautiful I know that's a thing that's a thing for me so just don't sleep on coupons and don't sleep on those store apps and reward accounts because not only is that where most of the coupons are for your grocery store because let's face it we know they're just not putting those clippable paper coupons in the circular like they used to they're digital now and when you don't use the store app you're leaving deals on the table as a matter of fact I went food shopping just this morning and when the cashier scanned my uh barcode on my app account I was able to get $14 in member savings off of my groceries but then an additional $30 came off from digital coupons alone that was $44 that I was able to save on my total bill and if you have trouble using apps just try to see if there's somebody that can help you to learn how to use it so that you can take advantage of those deals next is to compare prices you can compare your prices online while you're doing your meal planning or making your grocery list so that you know ahead of time which store you're going to go to for which items and it doesn't always have to be for groceries any shopping that you have to do you can just look up the items online and then you'll see the prices right there on your Google search results this is also another great function of the store apps because when you're in one store you can look up the same or similar items on the apps of the other stores so that you know if you want to purchase that item from the store you're already in or if you want to wait and purchase it elsewhere and some stores also price match so if you can show them that the other store is selling the same item for Less they can give you that price and then potentially save you a trip next is to get food from food banks now if you are struggling to be able to keep healthy food in your home like fresh produce which sometimes can get more expensive at the grocery store just Google search food banks or food pantries in your area and in my experience the food is sufficient in quality and a lot of times the people that volunteer at food banks and food pantries are really nice and can sometimes let you know about other helpful resources in your area this next one is a little bit controversial it always seems to be a big debate I know in my house it's a debate all the time but don't throw away food based on the dates printed on it if it doesn't say expires on then the date that is printed on there is not an expiration date they are approximate time frames in which the food will be of its highest quality for example on a bottle of milk it often says sell buy and then it'll have a date and that's information for the grocery store so that they know that they're selling it at its peak freshness and then you should be able to enjoy it but sometimes milk can still be good for a few days even a week after that particular date and then you have those times when you're not even close to this sell by date and the milk is already going bad in my house no matter what date is printed on the milk we do the sniff test the beauty is that milk smells funny when it's bad so if it's stinky we know drinky and then you have dates that are marked on other items that might stay best if used by or freeze by which is just letting you know if it's meat for instance it might say freeze by that means get it into the freezer before that date and then it's frozen while it's still fresh and then you can have that in the freezer for 6 months to a year depending on what it is and how well you have it wrapped but please don't throw away good food just because of that date on there make sure you read what kind of date it is and then make your choice wisely bring snacks from home instead of buying them while you're out if you can create a snack center near your front door so if you happen to be rushing out you can grab a snack really quickly without having to rumage through your kitchen cabinet trying to find something and then rushing out and then having to buy something while you're out anyway being Frugal you do want to try to avoid eating at fast food restaurants because the amount of money that you spend on one meal could potentially fund dinner for the entire week for a family of four but we do know that life happens and if you should find yourself in a Drive-Thru of a Mickey de or a Burger King this is something that I have always done over the years and it might not save you money but it will allow you to get more of your money's worth when you order your drink ask for it without ice restaurants tend to fill the cups up with so much ice and the beverage that you want only fills in the spaces and crevices between the ice cubes and you only get maybe 1/3 of the cup full of the drink and if you ask for no ice then you'll actually be getting a full cup of the drink that you ordered and most of the beverages are already cold [Music] anyway another tip is to use a reusable silicone baking sheet instead of parchment paper or even foil when you're baking every time I would buy a roll of parchment paper I would cringe and then every time I had to actually use the parchment paper I would cringe again and I know that sounds crazy but it was because often times the paper would be somewhat still clean after I was done baking and then throwing it away always felt like such a waste and then I found out about silicone baking mats and I got this set from Amazon for $12.95 and it has four different sizes and then I just love them because the clean up is so easy and there's just no waste keep the bread bag tabs for closing sandwich bags now ziplock sandwich bags are much more expensive than just the regular foldover sandwich bags you get about five times more of the foldover kind in a box but you're still paying basically the same price as the Ziploc ones but with fewer in the box so you can just save and then reuse the bread bag tabs and ties to close those cheaper sandwich bags and keep your foods safe and fresh but if you absolutely love using zip top bags just reuse them you can rinse them and stand them upside down on a drying mat and then put them away however I would not recommend that you do that if you had raw meat in the bag my suggestion if you had raw meat in there is just to throw the bag out reuse containers you can save and reuse the containers that you get with your food products for future storage purposes you know those old butter containers and old sauce jars and hummus bowls just clean them out really good put a nice big label on it so nobody gets confused and really as long as you keep buying more food you'll always have more cont containers coming when those old ones get worn out and honestly you may never have to buy plastic food storage containers ever again if you buy Dollar Tree labels to put on your leftovers cut them in thirds so that you have three times as many labels for the price of one pack reduce the cost of your hair care and beauty products by buying multi-purpose items if you need sunscreen and you need a facial moisturizer then try buying a moisturizer that already has sunscreen built in try to do two in one hair shampoo and conditioner so you're not spending extra money on multiple products and then another tip for Hair Care is if you have really healthy hair you can potentially get your hair done for free by volunteering to be a model or a test client just contact some of your local beauty salons or cosmetology schools and see if they're looking for a model because sometimes they need real people for their students to work on because they're not just learning how to do hair they're also learning how to satisfy a client so that's one way that you can get your hair done for free and you can also try the same thing for getting your nails done use bar soap instead of liquid soap I always buy a pack of about six or eight bars of soap it costs about the same price as one big bottle of liquid soap and one to two bars last about the same amount of time as one big bottle of soap liquid soap just in general costs a lot more than bar soap because one of the things that you're paying for when you buy liquid soap is the packaging you're paying for the bottle not just the soap if you want to save money on soap buy the bar instead of liquid I have two Elementary age children well one is getting ready go to middle school but they are growing so fast so I have just a couple of tips when shopping for your kids or grandkids number one for children buy their clothes one size up if you buy the jogging pants that have a drawstring then it's easy to tighten and loosen as they grow but then for jeans and dress pants if they're a little too long because buying them a size up or they're too big just make sure that you buy pants with the adjustable waist or sew in a piece of elastic add a few holes and one button so that you can adjust the waist and then use hemp tape if the pants are too long and as they grow you can let the pants out without damage another tip for shopping for kids particularly for clothes is to just buy their stuff from thrift stores the kids grow so fast they pretty much wear their clothes for no longer than a year because they grow out of them just that quick and I remember one year I was able to get my daughter's whole winter Wardrobe from a thrift store for about $20 and the beauty of shopping at thrift stores is that you can still get clothing that is quality clothes it's just cheaper because it's been worn before but you know you can clean it do whatever wash you feel like it's necessary to it if you feel a little bit uncomfortable about people having already worn the clothes but it just makes more sense to go cheaper and just ask around so that you can find a nice thrift store where you can feel good shopping for home organization you want to use your old boxes shipping boxes shoe boxes cereal boxes and just cover them with contact paper or wrapping paper even old Fabric or old shirts and sweaters to make uniform storage options that match your Decor I did a video where I show you about 20 different ways that you can use cereal boxes for absolute free home and personal organization and you can check that out after this video reuse your old washcloths as dust and cleaning rags and you can use old t-shirts as well but I find that the texture of washcloths offers more scrubbing action than using old t-shirts or microfiber cloths another tip is to just focus on doing DIY Decor in your home instead of buying expensive items one of the easiest things that you can do is to just create your own art I have an account on canva you can go on there you can create your own little designs and pictures you can purchase and download art from people online you can pull out pages from an old calendar and put them in picture frame and put those on the walls you can sew pillows you can put fabric on the wall as a tapestry so many different ways that you can decorate without paying a whole lot of money and you know my favorite thing is repurposing so just start by looking around your house and see what you can pull together to create some new and beautiful things do not use coin counting machines to count your coins I don't think a lot of people know that they take about 9 to 13 % of the total of the money that you put in there you would do a lot better just to roll your own coins and then deposit them or exchange them for cash at your bank and most banks will give you the paper coin sleeves for free and if your bank doesn't give you the coin sleeves for free you can get a bag of them from the Dollar Tree here's a way to generate a little extra income if you've already kind of mined your current income and have pulled out all the savings you can one way that you can earn some extra income is by renting a room in your home you can do this on platforms like Airbnb but if you don't feel comfortable renting out to complete strangers especially in your home start by asking around in your network of friends and family you might be surprised to find that there's someone that you know or someone who knows someone that you know that needs cheap lodging but maybe was afraid to ask someone to let them rent from them my grandparents parents my great-grandparents often had borders to help to supplement their income it was a very common thing um many many decades ago and I know my grandmother even until her passing she would rent out rooms in one of the houses that she owned it helps the people who were living in the house to pay a lot less in rent and it also helps you to get just a little bit of extra side income exchange your skills and services for other people's skills and services so instead of paying for someone to come and do something for you see if you can offer someone your services in exchange for theirs so for instance instead of me paying someone to babysit my kids I know someone who also has a small child and we just trade off watching each other's kids and another idea is maybe you need your house cleaned but maybe your thing is that you like to cook and maybe this other person has a family and doesn't like to cook you can exchange those skills and services so that you don't have to pay someone else to come and clean your house or that person doesn't have to pay someone to come and cook for them just exchange for the things that sometimes are need and sometimes there are things that you just want but that you know that you can't afford to spend money on the beauty of it is that it's usually a win-win situation for both parties I hope that you were able to grab some tips write some things down that you can take and make your own to help fit the needs in your life if you like the video please give it a thumbs up and then feel free to share it with someone else that you think will benefit from it if you haven't subscribed to the channel yet you can do that today as well and then check out this Frugal Living tips playlist where you can find loads more tips to help you saveone and I will see you next time bye

Channel: Frugal Creative Living

Views: 26,531

Keywords: frugal, frugal living hacks, frugal living tips, frugality, frugal living, how to save money, frugal living ideas, frugal hacks, frugal living hacks to save money, tips to save more money, how to live frugally, how to spend less money, frugal living tips to save money, save more money, live frugally and save money, saving money tips, frugal habits, frugal tips, grocery hacks, save money, money saving hacks, frugal living habits, money saving tips, saving money, on a budget

Id: 64JjgtW3EaQ

Length: 16min 13sec (973 seconds)

Published: Sun Jun 02 2024