Living on Less: 20 Painless Ways to Cut Costs and Save Money

Is your family budget showing you that you need to cut costs and save money, but you aren’t sure where to begin? Here are twenty painless ways to cut costs and keep some of those dollars in your own pocket.

1 Hang laundry on the line
One of the best ways to cut your electricity costs is to hang your laundry on a line instead of using the clothes dryer. Estimates are that you can save approximately fifty cents to one dollar per load that you hang to dry. If you do not have a clothesline, or they are not allowed where you live, try using a drying rack in the house, or out on the porch or deck. Even hanging a few items on hangers on the shower rod will work.

2 Skip Starbucks
When heading out the door to work in the morning, take your own commuter mug of coffee with you. Skip the trip to Starbucks. Pocket the savings. If you don’t mind it, you might even keep a jar of instant coffee and a container of powdered coffee creamer at your office.

3 Nix Netflix
Cancel your Netflix subscription. Don’t buy videos. Don’t rent as many either. Instead, borrow videos and dvds from your library. Most libraries have excellent selections about nature, travel, history, or topics to teach/entertain children.

4 Cut the cable
If you can, cut your cable subscription entirely. If this wouldn’t work in your family, at least reduce your cable package by cutting out whatever premium channels you can live without.

5 Reduce phone expenses
Are there any extra phone services that you can do without? If you don’t have teenagers in your home, could you get by without call waiting? How about Caller ID? Call forwarding? Consider switching to a cheaper plan for your long distance and/or cell phone too.

6 Buy a not-new car
Next time you need a car, pay cash for a good, used one instead of taking out a loan for a brand new one. You will keep thousands of dollars in your own pocket this way. Just driving a new car off the lot decreases the value by hundreds of dollars, yet you are still paying new-car price. Look for a clean, well maintained, pre-owned automobile to help you cut costs in your family budget.