i always thought the just make coffee at home thing was overrated but i forced myself to try it for a month. i added it up yesterday and realized i skipped like 20 trips to starbucks that’s almost 275-300 bucks back in my account without really feeling caffeine deprived, it’s wild how small habits pile up.
Do you have any other money saving tips like this that would be good for a broke college student?
i stopped buying coffee out for a month and saved almost 300 without even noticing
byu/Cutebooty04 inFrugal
Posted by Cutebooty04
27 Comments
Anyone who buys coffee every day is a complete sucker
Always eat at least a little in the morning at home instead of getting breakfast to go, even if you don’t necessarily feel hungry
Wise, I never buy drinks. They cost 10-20 cents and you pay $3-5. Alcohol is even worse.
OMG yes. I went through my bank statements and found $400 on average monthly spent at coffee shops and fast food places. Rarely anything as nice as an expensive Starbucks drink, but once or twice daily $4 charges. That was a big wake-up call.
I’ll be honest here, we’re multi millionaires and the thought of buying coffee out at coffee shop daily would never strike me as something financially reasonable to do.
We do have a pretty nice machine, but nothing crazy and it’s lasted us years. I usually buy a big bag of beans from Costco for $15-20.
What else are you spending a lot on regularly?
That is life, when you cook most of your meals at home u will save another 300
Yup. This is why money management apps exist—logging every expense into them allows you to see where you’re spending your money
Don’t get food delivered. Go pick it up. Ideally you should cook to save money.But don’t add to it by having to tip and have a delivery charge
Coffee is so cheap and just takes hot water
Get an Aeropress. Cheap, fast, easy to clean, and makes even grocery coffee taste great.
Switch to black tea now and you’ll save another chunk of money.
It’s wild to me seeing the people who look down on this and insist it won’t make a real difference in building wealth or that it can’t possibly be the thing that’s stopping them from getting a hold on their finances.
$300 saved every month is $3600 saved per year. $3600 a year invested in an index fund at 10% interest turns into $1.2 million after 35 years.
Never pay retail for drinks.
I have a friend who drinks Cęlcius. At the gas station, they are 2/$5 ($5.41). I got an 18 pack on sale at Costco for her for $17.99 ($19.47). This saved her $29.24.
Or be like me, and only drink water, coffee & tea.
This is a quintessential strategy to save money! I am proud of you very much!
lol
avoid the crappy snacks that are loaded with sugar and fat and get fruits instead it will save you a lot too!
As an European, this is very hard to grasp.
Sure, we do have Starbucks, but you can also can get 1-2$ coffee that will be actually better.
A lot of people leak money out without realizing it. In the budget or debt reddits there’s a lot of people who will post their income/expenses and almost invariably they will say they make 5k and only spend 3k a month, but when I ask how they are 20k in debt they have no answer.
Convenience costs. But doesn’t make sense if it’s something easy and/of if you can do the same or better yourself. Like coffee!
I’m happy to pay for something I can’t do myself or if it’s better outside home.
Take-only here. Never delivery. No need to pay for something that a five minute car ride can pick up.
Am I so out of touch? Because how do you average $15 every single trip to Starbucks. I don’t do coffee, but if I’m on a road trip, need a bathroom, I’ll sometimes drop $5 on tea and a tip to use the bathroom. I can’t fathom spending $15 in one go at Starbucks
If I stopped buying coffee for a month, I’d only save like $6-7. A 2.5 lb bag of Kirkland coffee is $17.
I only buy coffee out if I’m traveling. And even then I will try the provided hotel coffee first.
We have never had food delivered.
We eat out maybe 5 times a year at a select few places we know we like and cook at home the rest of the time.
I like to cook and generally enjoy what I cook more than what most restaurants offer.
Welcome to the club. I figured this out about 10 years ago. Started making my own. Bought a really good stainless steel, double walled travel mugs and Thermos. Cost per day is about 75¢/day for 48 oz of coffee. Before that I averaged 3 large coffees a day from Starbucks or DD.
I’m sorry for my ignorance but what on earth is the cost of one coffee at Starbucks if you’re saying 20 trips would be almost $275-300?!
This has inspired me to really double down on breaking my coffee habit. For me it’s a ritual. I go there, bring my laptop, get some work done. But recently I realized I could just pack my at home coffee in a thermos and go to the library. My library even has a study room where you can bring food and drink (ordinarily you cannot bring food and drink into my library).
So for maybe $5/week, I can have my coffee in a place outside of my home and get work done on my laptop. Versus the maybe $4-6 per day I was spending at the coffeeshop. That’s a huge reduction. I’m also reducing sugar because I pack coffee with creamer, no sugar. But when I go to a coffeeshop I always cave to temptation and get something sweet.
I’m curious, how often were you getting coffee and what was your average purchase amount? $300 / 20 trips to Starbucks is $15 per trip. Were you ordering food too, or a drink for yourself and another person?
I highly recommend hopping onto YNAB. I gave myself a coffee budget because realistically I still wanted to get coffee a couple times a month. Going all or nothing is probably not sustainable in the long run.
I got a Nespresso machine and use that instead. It scratched that itch, and it’s low effort. It’s more expensive than basic brew, but if it cuts down your expenses in a sustainable way, it’s a win.
My wife bought a decent espresso machine last year and it’s already paid for itself a few times over. She can easily whip up a low sugar, dairy-free latte like she likes. I have a cold brew steeper and a cheap pour-over setup and I have never missed takeout coffee.
My tip: print out your card statements. PRINT THEM. Physical print out.
Then take a highlighter color per category. Like, green is must-have expenses such as groceries and utilities. Take a color and specifically designate it as “bullshit” spending. Impulse Amazon purchases, fast food, you know.
Highlight the bullshit and be super honest with yourself about it, do not delude yourself into “I HAD to have new shoes because I was doing XYZ.”
Then take a calculator, and individually add the bullshit up line by line.
I did this in 2021 and it changed how I thought. It really did. Like I printed out my card statement and it was 12 pages long. It was tedious as hell, I had to look up “what did I spend $200 on?? What is that website, what the fuck?” And I became SO FRUSTRATED during this process. By the end I was in disbelief, because 95% of the bullshit purchases I didn’t feel were important or made my life better in any way. Most of them I couldn’t even remember. Isn’t that crazy? So like $3k in bullshit spending that month and I could hardly remember what any of it was.
That was my wake up call and I don’t think it would have been effective to do a digital audit. I needed to hold my Pages of Shame in my hands and go through them with a red highlighter.