What’s one small thing you could give up that would save you a LOT of money long term?!

[early30smum]

Coffees in London are around £4 now. I definitely don’t get one myself every day, but between me and my husband we definitely average out at spending this per day just on coffee. We just worked out, spending £4 a day on coffee every day, is almost £1,500 a year. Just on takeaway coffee. Insane. Over 20 years, that’s just under £30,000…

Buying drinks and snacks from petrol stations

Holidays - we spend between 10 and 15% 0f our income on lovely holidays.

I have given up buying lunch everyday - saved a fortune. When I start wavering I remind myself of how much I enjoy a stay in a beautiful hotel.

Pets - I’d probably be rich!

Followed by:
Chocolate / snacks, I spend far too much on this. I’d not only save a lot of pennies but be skinny too - bonus!

Alcohol : gave up three years ago. £1000

Is that per year? So you were spending about twenty quid a week on alcohol? And you felt that was worth giving up?

If we gave up, we'd probably target an aspirational idea of reducing our alcohol expenditure to twenty quid a week.

I mean, if that's all you're spending, why give up?

Yes, it is crazy expensive. I had never died my hair before and this hairdresser specializes in blonde and she was the only one I dared to try with. And then the result was amazing, and incredibly low maintenance (I mean I changed shampoos but that's it) and grows out supernaturally, and so I stuck with her and with it.

On the plus side, I literally think about how much I love it every single time I look in the mirror so it is definitely worth it to me. But it's the only thing I do or buy where I told my DP we are going to do "don't ask don't tell" on the cost.😅

Same

£20 could be 5 bottles of cheap plonk! And alcohol isn't necessary and it's actually bad for you. Anyway, it's £20 spare to spend on something else which some people might prefer.

Yes, they're quiet because people post irrelevantly in AIBU!

Yes, I suppose they might. That's me told.

Incidentally, if you know where to get wine at £4 per bottle, let me know. Not that'll I'll drink it. But those kind of prices for the cheap stuff kind of implies you can get really good stuff for a tenner. In which case I'd be prepared to give up something else. Something that I considered unnecessary. Like the car.

Wine, fags and burgers

Carbs. But I just can't stop

Small things
Prob podcast subscriptions. Could live without and at £7 each a month.
We also have netflix/disney/amazon prime. Although I don't count prime as I rinse it on the free delivery.
I also paid £40 for a year's worth of add free Channel 4 plus and all that jazz. I reckon that money well spent when you add up the 15 mins every hour on adds you can't skip!

He's called Danny and he's the most beautiful boy. He has a life of a prince whereas I resemble a scarecrow 🤣🤣

Agree - even a 'meal deal' mounts up so much - I think I save at least over £75 pm by taking stuff from home - don't even miss the 'meal deals ' - usually picked something random just to make it into a 'deal'.

oh TV!
An absolute fortune every month, we have it all.
I rarely watch it but DH does.

Actually, DH also spends a lot on subscriptions, some he doesn’t use much. Gym, Strava, Audible, Zwift.

Aldi. I believe they have one at £3.89. As you say, it's not great. But they do have a very passable French Sauvignon Blanc for something like £6 and a very nice NZ Marlborough SB for under £8ish. They have a wide range and often have some offers so it's worth a look. I tried doing without a car for a while. It's possible but inconvenient. I'd rather give up something else.

I don't have any TV subscriptions - just my TV licence. I record stuff on my Humax and I can pause or whizz through the ads. There's loads of stuff to watch on the Freeview channels and hundreds of films on iPlayer and Channel 4 catch up. I'm not mad keen on sport so I've no need for any subscriptions.

I think that's very sweet, I treat my dog extremely well but decided he doesn't need a hairdresser when I don't have one either.

He does get a professional manicure though so he's still up on the deal.

The drive through car wash. I really love just driving through and the thingies do their thing.

However the price went up recently from £3.50 to £4.95 and I was ranting to ds that it had literally doubled in price.

He said 'er, well no it really hasn't, I could show you what the increase is as a percentage'. 'IT HAS DOUBLED' I said. We both understood.

Doubled but not 'literally doubled'?

Me too. I wasn't smoking that much, but I suppose it must have been that amount every two or three days.

Not the point of the thread (quite the opposite!) but where do you order the posh coffee beans from? Would be a great gift for DH ☺️

It had neither doubled nor even literally doubled 🤣

I think people use 'doubled' in the same way they use 'decimated'.

Ha ha ha.
Aww, lovely 😊