How to Cut Expenses without Sacrificing What You Love

A lot of people can relate to this Reddit post. How do you budget when you have no idea where to start?

One user suggested pulling three to six months of credit card statements and looking at your expenses:

“This is basically doing a budget after the fact, and it allows you to get an idea on how much you typically spend on different things. Then from there, you can start looking at that and question "is spending $500 on ubereats each month really the way I want to be spending my money?", and then you can start making the conscious effort to reduce unwanted spending.”

I like that idea, but what if, instead of giving up Ubereats or whatever it is that you really enjoy; cut down slowly. It’s like losing weight. Shedding a few pounds at a time will help you keep the weight off.

In this case, curtailing what you love slowly will keep you under budget and still allow you to enjoy life!

Say you are spending $500 a month on takeout. Next month, work on spending only $400, then the next month, $300 until you can comfortably eat out a little to satisfy your cravings while still living within your means.

Also, examine where you are purchasing your meals. You probably have a favorite restaurant you like to order from. And that’s fine. But what if you only get takeout from there once a month, and then find a less expensive establishment the following week.

Compare Prices

I know that seems obvious. But if you actually look at the menu online, you’ll notice that menu items vary wildly from restaurant to restaurant.

One Chinese restaurant could price their egg drop soup at twice as much as the establishment down the street, yet they taste the same.

What if your indulgence is coffee (as mine is!). You don’t need to give up your cup of espresso. But maybe you treat yourself to a high end coffee maker and prepare your own at home everyday. Then visited your favorite barista only once or twice a week.

Do the math. Even an expensive coffee maker (not too expensive!) with all the bells and whistles might actually be cheaper in the long run than making a trek to Starbucks everyday.

I love this Reddit thread. One poster lamented that he got tired of sacrificing everything and realized he didn’t need to:

“When I (25M) started getting serious about my budget, I thought that I could strip my spending down to the bare minimum. No eating out. No more snowboarding/golf twice a month. But what I quickly realized is that cutting things I enjoyed made me really unhappy (go figure). Somewhere along the line I learned that budgeting isn’t all about suffering, it’s about being intentional.“

Why not share an entree when you go out to dinner? My husband and I do that all the time. Not necessarily to save money, but more because the portion sizes are outrageously large.

We also go out more for lunch than dinner because plates are smaller (and cheaper) and it‘s healthier to eat your large meal earlier (at least we think so!)

It’s also fun to cook at home. I remember we took a couple’s cooking class several years ago, and still prepare many of those same recipes today.

Takeaway

Saving a little more money every month will make you feel better, and you aren’t sacrificing what you enjoy. As long as you are slowly chipping away at your debt, you will learn what indulgences you can hold on to (or at least curtail) and which ones you should give up completely.