Living frugally without hardship: let's share actionable suggestions

For guys that need to wear suits on a regular basis for work, go to SE Asia, like Vietnam or Thailand and get some suits tailored there. Last year I bought 3 suits + 2 shirts made from their more expensive fabric and paid $660. While you can get a low-end suit from a department store for this kind of money, it will not look the same on you, especially if you have an interesting shape, like tall + skinny. If you just need a suit that you wear once in a blue moon to a wedding, those can be had as low as $100.

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Credit agencies’ monthly membership fees. I found that they work just like the telecom companies… when I was in serious credit rebuild years ago I needed to have access to all my credit reports on demand. The standard monthly rate would always get cut in half or more with very little effort when you call and try to cancel.

Just don’t go to Beijing. Bad experience there.

  1. Figure out how frugal you are currently

For those who can do so, track your expenses for a few months, and a year is even better.

I’ve been able to cut expenses dramatically by having just a few categories of expenses. Yours will depend on what your major expenses are, but I suggest the following:

Auto (or Transit for those in metro areas)
Charity (if applicable)
Child Care (if applicable)
Clothing
Debt (if applicable)
Education (SHOULD be applicable - put aside at least some money for self-improvement!)
Entertainment (including Alcohol and… other things)
Food (some people break out Eating Out to see how much they’re spending here)
Health Care
Housing (includes Utlities, Furnishings, Household Supplies, etc.)
Savings
Miscellaneous

You’ll probably be amazed at just how much you spend in some categories. For me, Food, Health Care and Housing are 75% of all my spending. That’s helpful when you want to cut expenses - it’s a lot harder to cut back on a 2% category than a 25% one.

Once you’ve done this, you should create a budget for a full year. No, you don’t have to make it something onerous and tough to keep up, but what gets measured gets done. If you want to lose weight, you normally keep track of your weight and/or calorie count.

  1. Price everything in terms of your after-tax hourly rate

This will help with reducing spending.

Would you pay $10 for a drink if you make $12/hour after taxes and therefore that one drink’s true cost is 50 minutes of work? Maybe, maybe not. But it makes it much more clear.

Large numbers are difficult to comprehend for many people. Spending $25,000 on a car, if you make $20/hour after-tax (a great rate of pay!) means that your $25K car really cost you 1,250 work hours, or more than 6 months of full-time work. In fact, it’s much worse than that, because if your discretionary cash (i.e. after you pay for rent, utilities, etc.) is 20% of what you make, you’re then spending as much as 3 years of discretionary income for that vehicle!

Conversely, some things that seem expensive may make more sense. A $200 pair of shoes that lasts for several years may cost you a full day’s work (at $25/hr) or even two days’ work (at $12.50), but if your feet don’t hurt because of the quality of the shoes, then that may actually make a lot more sense than dropping $50 or $100 on a dinner vs. going to Chipotle or cooking at home.

Try this with everything for a month and see if it changes how you approach life. You’ll start to see thrift stores, garage sales, clearances, etc. in a whole new light: As giving you back hours of your life.

  1. Cultivate spontaneity and a taste for flexibility

If you can be spotaneous and flexible, you will be able to take advantage of a lot of sales/promotions that will open you to new experiences.

Just out of my first job, Southwest Airlines offered a $30 round trip flight to St. Louis on Labor Day. I had never been to St. Louis, so I researched online and found out that there was a lot to do. So I flew in very early on Labor Day, took the subway-like system they had into downtown, and used local buses to visit: St. Louis’s two cathedrals, the site of the Dred Scott decision, the famous Gateway Arch, the St. Louis Zoo and a museum. And on the way back to the airport, I stumbled across an outdoor jazz festival, so I spent an hour hanging out and listening to great music for free. Total cost of this trip: less than $100, which included my food, transportation (air and ground), parking at the airport and a ticket in the Arch.

Likewise, your smartphone is your best friend. So many places offer deals and specials on the Smartphone - fast food restaurants certainly (McDonald’s free fries on Friday, free drink with any purchase, etc.) - but also using Groupon when wandering around can open up new avenues you might not otherwise consider. A new play, a contemporary museum, opera, classical music festival, whatever.

  1. Decide what you like and ignore what others think you should like

Pretty basic for FWF refugees, but uncommon in larger society. I own a 10 year old Toyota, an upgrade from my 20 year old Toyota I owned until last year. I’m an executive and I get ribbed from time to time, but I also pay less in total expenses for my car in a year than some of my colleagues pay in a month. I wear thrift shop clothing in many cases, including buying ties and even sport jackets there. Instead of expensive nights out in pricey bars, I play board games with like-minded friends.

If you like pricey things, go to step 2 above and ask yourself: Why? Is it worth it? Can I get equal pleasure from something that costs a whole lot less? Can I become an adventurous individual who tries new, cheap (or free) things that expand my capacity to enjoy life without heavy spending? Money is fungible - if watching a movie in the theater is a true thrill, then enjoy it. But if you have almost as much fun for 1/20 the cost, then keep the theater experience for dates or special occasions and pocket the difference, either to save or to spend on something important to you or to give to those less fortunate.

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Came in to post this. Just bought a house and I’m considering buying a beater truck to pick up tools and furniture off craigslist. There are tons of good pieces of solid wood furniture at below ikea prices.

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  1. If it’s expensive, buy it refurbished or used. My computers, phone, printer, TV, and tablet are all refurbished and at 50-90% off the original price.

  2. Getting a Kindle has already been mentioned, but for manuals, magazines, textbooks, and books with pictures an old tablet cannot be beat - especially for reading pdf files. I like the old HP Touchpads from the fire sale back in 2011. They have an active development community that releases all the latest android versions customized to run on the Touchpad. I like Touchpad and iPad size because it comes very close to resembling a piece of paper. Many other manufacturers opt to create longer but more narrow tablets that don’t work as well for these kinds of documents.

  3. Buy cleaning supplies at the Dollar Tree/Dollar store.

  4. Seek to eliminate daily expenses. Limit drinks to water or homemade coffee/tea. If energy drinks are your thing, seek out less expensive options.

  5. See if there is a grocery outlet/salvage store in your area. The one close to me frequently gets high quality organic/healthy foods that failed to sell in grocery/health food stores. These can be purchased for pennies on the dollar. It’s not a place you can do 100% of your grocery shopping, but rather a place where you can try new things.

  6. Repurpose an old PC by getting a wireless keyboard with touchpad and connecting to your TV. Use this to stream online content or just browse the internet. I find this easier to navigate and more robust than being locked to whatever the TV gadget of the year is (Chromecast, Roku, Fire stick, Apple TV, etc.)

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Excellent post. Green for the casual Chipotle reference.

When ordering any fast food drink that’s non refillable, do the same. Drink dispensers keep drinks cold already. I drink it as is, but for those that like frostbite on their tongue just use the ice as desired. Restaurant employees are trained to fill ice to the brim which leaves ~35% space for actual liquid.

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Directions unclear for my H&B expenses. Used B didn’t have the same effect and the H didn’t appreciate my suggestion of “refurbishment”.

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Totally agree, especially the younger the kids are. We got hand-me downs from teenage relatives who all wanted the newest and greatest. Then you can buy pre-owned games at the local store for fractions of what the new ones are. My kids still play on the PS2 or the “newer” Xbox360.

And if you need tablets for the kids, the Kindle Fire deals are great. Got a brand new 8" Fire for <$30. First time around I ended up buying the “kid” case which cost about as much as the device but it’s not needed, especially if you use it teach them to respect their property. And they come with good lock-down so no buying apps/getting to the Internet/ even limiting screen time.

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Buy paint and stain at Ollie’s Bargain outlets instead of home depot.
$60 cans of floor poly for $6.
$20 cans of paint for $5 (perfect for white ceilings, if you need it tinted you’ll have to buy in store).

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This goes against the “Reducing Healthcare Costs” thread - because you’re far better off drinking 65% less soda for your health.

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Actually, I use the strategy when I get lemonade from Chick-fil-A. :stuck_out_tongue:

Sugar-filled drinks are fungible. Soda, lemonade, sweet tea, etc. If it has sugar in it, you’re harming your health.

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We were paying around $1200+ a year for satellite tv. Loved the dvr and didn’t want to give it up, but didn’t watch enough channels on it to justify the expense. We cancelled satellite and bought a $99 HD Stacker Antenna and a TIvo w/lifetime subscription for $399 from Amazon. Initial expense of $498, but saving about $700 dollars in first year, and $1200 a year thereafter. We actually have more tv shows now ( plus streaming) to watch than we can keep up with. We get 60+ ota channels, most come in excellent all the time, some come in now and then, but that’s only because we live out in the sticks about 45 miles away from nearest city.

The bonus is, if for some reason we miss a recording, it is available for a while on the network site to watch for free. We can skip all commercials if it’s recorded and we don’t feel like we are really missing out on anything. Except BBCA, miss that channel, but if there is a show we really want to watch (like Orphan Black) we can purchase the season on amazon or wait until next season and see it on prime for free.

The other way we save a lot is having only 1 credit card and using it to purchase everything. We get reward points for every dollar spent and it keeps track of our spending (at the end of the year we get a statement with what we’ve spent in every category). We take our saved points and use that for Christmas gifts. Haven’t paid for Christmas gifts for 5 years now. We do however, pay the card off every month. We just record all our purchases in the checkbook just like a regular expense, that way we ensure we’ve already got the money to pay off the card without having to go into savings.

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If your strategy works for you, great. I caution you not to fall under this type of thinking. It’s similar to “I got a $2k tax return! So I can splurge and buy a new purse/shoes/downpayment on a car/etc)” The tax return was just giving the IRS an interest-free loan.

If you use your reward earnings for Christmas gifts, you are actually paying for Christmas gifts, even if you don’t think you are, because those reward points could have been used for something else. You could say “the rewards points pay for all our groceries every December” - they have a cash value so the gifts were not free. You did pay for them.

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Prepaid cell service. I can’t wrap my head around why contract plans even still exist.

The cost of prepaid has been steadily heading closer and closer to $0.

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InstantPot FTW. We just bought one a month or two ago and it’s changed the way we cook.

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What makes the instapot so great?

I agree on the importance of cooking both for health reasons and for $ savings. Cooking extra portions of food takes almost no extra time and when packed for lunch saves big money over the course of a year.

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For us, it is the time savings. We were using a slow cooker for ease and quantity. The instant pot does the same meal in 30-45 minutes. ie big chicken meal, chili, etc.

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