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Spending Money Within $300
By: Mary Williams iSnare Expert Author
Do you think this is a joke spending money only $300 a month for the whole
family? With this tight budget, what sort of food would make the list?
Could you save $25 a month on groceries? How about $50 or $100? Possibly you
could cut your bill by almost 50% if you consider some of the following
suggestions:
1. Divide the budget you have into three categories; weekly, bi-weekly and
monthly. Once you have the totals fixed, try to find a way to make it work. If
you budgeted too tight, only then consider how much more you really need to
spend.
2. Identify your WEEKLY needs; milk, bread, fruits. These will be your saving
graces when the troops are hungry. You can load up every week and always have a
healthy snack available. Think about $15/week.
3. Identify your BI-WEEKLY needs; eggs, cheese, vegetables, meat and cheese for
sandwiches etc. These items have a slightly longer shelf life but you will watch
how much you use when you know there's still four days until your next purchase.
Try $20 every two weeks.
4. Get the remainder of your groceries in one place. Use cash to pay (to avoid
temptation of over spending) and work out your shopping list ahead of time. You
only need to do this once as many of the items (Cereal, meat etc.) will need to
be repurchased each time. Other items (sugar, flour etc.) may be substituted
every other month. In this example you have $200 left.
5. Have a schedule of meals that you can rotate. Cheap, healthy meals like stir
fry can be inexpensive as they use less meat than full pieces of chicken or beef
for dinner. Plan to have a meat meal offset by a simpler dish like pasta every
other night. This way your family will not go through 'feast-and-famine' when
they eat like kings the first week and are eating canned chili every night for
the last week.
Always determine your meals based on what you really plan to cook. If you have
easy weeknight staples, try to find the cheapest method of preparing them, or
make do with less pre- packaged affair on other nights when you have more time.
Using items like frozen vegetables can make eating cheap also healthy and
convenient.
Clearly the $300 suggestion will depend on your family, the age of your children
and how much your budget really allows. Whatever your budget, taking the time to
draw up a plan and think about your choices will guarantee that you keep more
cash in your wallet for other important things.
About the Author:
Mary Williams maintains many websites about billing, including
Billing Montana Secrets, Medical Billing Secrets, and Medical Billing Guide. |
