15 Clever Ways to Cut Costs

During our recent webinar presentation, Money Management in Turbulent Times, we asked our attendees to collaborate and share their top tips for cutting costs. Cutting costs is an important strategy for stretching your budget so you can pay your debt down faster or hit your savings goals quicker.

Check out the top 15 tips to cut costs as shared by our guests:

1. A written budget helps me not overspend.
2. Always shop with a list — and stick to it.
3. Cut down on dining out, or find ways to cut back. Ordering water instead of a soda saves money and is better for your health anyway.
4. Meal plan for the whole week.
5. Combining my errands helps me be more efficient with my gas (and time).
6. Get creative stretching your food budget. For example, I add lentils or chopped mushrooms to ground beef dishes — the vegetables absorb the flavor and doubles your “meat.”
7. Don’t let online shopping sites remember your credit card information! That helps me avoid impulse purchases.
8. Think about new ways to reuse things. For example, when your box of cereal is empty, rinse and reuse the cellophane bag instead of buying plastic sandwich bags.
9. Use coupons whenever possible.
10. Stay organized — know what you have in your pantry or closet so you don’t end up buying duplicates.
11. Learn to love your freezer!
12. Cook large meals and freeze individual portions so you don’t splurge on take-out dinners when you’re too tired to cook.
13. Always look at the unit price when comparing prices.
14. I keep a list of things I’ll need to stock up on or replace in the near future so I can keep a look out for sales for a few weeks before I actually need to buy it.
15. “Budget stores” don’t always have the best prices for everything. Take a little time to comparison shop.

Thank you to our SESLOC members for sharing these strategies!