Over the years we have talked about how we pride ourselves on being good at saving, and have dished out some advice on the topic (as seen here and here), but over the past year of living off of our savings we’ve developed some new money saving habits we wanted to share with you all (as broke small business owners).
Feel free to watch the below video or skip ahead to the bulleted list…
- Live below your means
- One way we do this is live with roommates (each other), so our rent per person is cheaper
- We both drive old (reliable) cars and not having a monthly car payment is HUGE when you’re trying to save
- Keep a spending tracker just so you can see how much you are spending each month on non-neccesties
- I use a Google sheet and just keep track of what I spend each day, and I start a new tab at the top of each month. It’s great because you feel really proud when you have a no spend day, and you can see week over week how your spending fluctuates. It helps me keep myself in check.
- Have a grocery budget and shop at budget friendly stores like Trader Joe’s
- As a sub to this tip, we are also vegetarian which also helps keep our monthly grocery budget low (technically we eat fish but we don’t buy it since it’s expensive)
- We also drink bagged coffee ($7.00 organic from Trader Joe’s) during the week and save our expensive Nespresso pods for the weekends
- Try to eat most of your meals at home and minimize eating out
- If you are ordering food from somewhere to eat at home, always pick it up instead of paying for delivery fees
- Limit apps and other subscriptions. Get rid of all streaming apps that you don’t use.
- We also recommend to check your Apple subscriptions on your phone and see if there are better plans available. Sometimes you can click into the tab under subscriptions and there will be other (cheaper) yearly plans there that you can switch to.
- Minimize services. We get our hair colored every six months, and a friend cuts our hair when she’s available. We’ve never paid for a facial or to get our nails done. Services add up fast!
- Unsubscribe from emails that make you tempted to buy.
- On the flip side- buy things online if you’ll be tempted to shop in store. This for me particularly pertains to Target. If I think I’m going to add a bunch of things I don’t need to my cart- I’ll do an online order for shipping or pickup instead.
- Be mindful with purchases. We both have a Pinterest wishlist and we’ll pin things to it when we want them, and then revisit and think on the item before actually purchasing it.
- As a side tip, we try to never pay full price for something and always wait for a sale.
- Buy more clothes second hand. We love Depop, eBay, and Poshmark.
- Buy off brand non-necessities like: cotton rounds, q-tips, toothbrush heads, etc. We love the Amazon basics brand.
- Don’t buy multiples of a product. Use up what you have and then try something new. For instance, finish a mascara before buying a new one.
- As a sub point never buy backups of makeup products unless you think it may be discontinued
- Try to buy drugstore haircare and skincare products. We do love luxury makeup but we use affordable skincare almost exclusively!
- Don’t pay for a gym membership. Try an affordable subscription based at home program, or Youtube has great free content!
- Try free/low cost activities when you have some free time. Some of our favorite acitives are:
- Reading. We rent all of our eBooks from the library so it’s 100% free (aside from teh cost of our kindles)
- Walking. We love to walk around Lake Hollywood, or to our neighborhood coffee shop
- Watching Tv. We can’t get enough TV. Apple TV has the best shows right now!
- Improv shows. UCB Franklin has shows every night that range from $10-$20. So affordable and hilarious!
- Movies on a Tuesday. We go to an AMC and they have a great deal on Tuesdays where movies are almost 50% off!
- Window shopping at the mall. We love to go to Sephora or Nordstrom and just swatch and play with products.
- If you have any side income that you make through a business, we recommend seperating all personal and business related expenses and income.
Please let us know your money saving tips below, and if any of our tips helped you!
xx, Britta