RSS
Home
Money saving tips for families
Print
Email
RSS
Subscribe
The only story that seems to be headlining the news lately, besides Octomom, is the economy and what people are doing to make ends meet. A sampling:
- Recently, a family of five that put themselves up for sale.
- A family in Missouri put their house, which is also a cave, up for sale.
- USA Today, in cooperation with Good Morning America, has started the Frugal Family Challenge.
- The Duggars had a whole episode devoted to their frugality.
- The Today Show featured the Cheapest Family in America.
- The popularity of Dave Ramsey and Suze Orman are through the roof.
- Oprah now has the Debt Diet .
With all of this information coming in, how is a normal person able to sort it all out? How can a regular family save money, or at least make the most of what they have coming in?
Below, I've listed some of my favorite tips from around the web, and my own personal experience, to make the most of your money:
- eBay is great. Especially for children's clothes. At first, I was hesitant to purchase clothes from eBay, but I have not been disappointed. The clothes have been of fantastic quality, arrived quickly, and were very inexpensive. Check out eBay for toys and books as well. It's a really great deal, especially if you don't have a thrift store or resale shop nearby.
- The Entertainment Guide is your friend. This is a book filled entirely with coupons. The Delaware book has coupons not only for Delaware stores, restaurants, and activities, but there's coupons for places in Philly, Baltimore, and Ocean City, MD. There are also travel discounts and coupons you can use online. The coupons for the movies make the book worth it! The book can be purchased at www.entertainment.com
- Make a budget. Every financial expert touts the benefits of having a budget. Budgets help you track how much money you have coming in and how much money you have going out. It really gives you a road map for using your money (for those who don't like the word "budget", "spending plan" is a nice euphemism). If you don't know how to make a budget, visit websites such as www.kiplingers.com, www.mint.com, or even go to Google and type in "budget tool". It is amazing how many resources there are!
- Another tip that most financial experts tout is the benefits of using grocery coupons and menu planning to help save money at the grocery store. www.couponmom.com takes a lot of the work out of searching for coupons (just double check with your supermarket to make sure it accepts online coupons), the Women in Red Message Board on www.moneycentral.msn.com (a phenomenal resource in and of itself) has a huge thread devoted to grocery shopping, and there are lots of online menu planners. I wrote an article recently listing websites that have menus planned out for you as well as tips for eating on a budget. Read that article here.
- Find resources to help keep you motivated. There are hundreds and hundreds of personal finance blogs that discuss everything from frugal tips to budget cooking to discussing the author's personal struggles with getting out of debt. Reading other people's stories not only helps keep me motivated, but I can pick up a tip here and there that I never thought of (and some that I think are great but I can't bring myself to use. For instance, I still do not use my crockpot when I am not home. I am terrified of starting a fire).
In addition to this list, check out the money saving tips on websites such as www.frugalfamily.com and www.thriftyfun.com. Parenting websites like www.parents.com and www.parentdish.com have entire sections devoted to saving money.
The light at the end of the tunnel seems so far away that it's more of a spark than an actual light. No one seems immune from the effects of the ecomony--not even the rich and famous (at least, not the ones who invested with Bernie Madoff). But if you start using some of these tips, the trip down the tunnel may not seem as long.
