There's a point where budget advice goes from helpful to exhausting, like you know, clipping coupons, tracking every coffee, meal prepping seven days in advance. Some habits sound great in theory but just don't survive real life. And honestly, they are just annoying.
So what's actually worth keeping when time is limited and energy is low? What budget habits did you try that ended up being more effort than they were worth and what actually stuck?
What budget habits did you used to live by that you don’t do anymore?
byu/PaycheckWizard inFrugal
Posted by PaycheckWizard
7 Comments
I went from hard-core budgeting to very loose zero sum budgeting back to hard-core budgeting. Hopefully one day I’ll get back to loose budgeting again.
I will never meal prep, cook the food, and then eat that food 5 days later. I also don’t like the way a lot of things re-heat when they are cooked and then frozen.
Instead, I chop veggies and marinate meat once a week, then cook it as needed. Since everything is ready to cook, the actual cooking only takes about 20-30 minutes.
Your time is money also. If it takes you four hours to do something or you could pay someone or for a convenience, sometimes it’s worth paying for it rather than doing it yourself. Obviously only you can determine what is worth doing yourself versus paying for. But it has helped me make a lot of decisions regarding what I want to spend money on.
I won’t skip going to the dentist and I won’t live off microwave meals.
Yes, time is money. I’m not driving 15-20 minutes out of my way to save $0.10/gallon on gas. Juice isn’t worth the squeeze. I don’t budget. My standard bills are as low as they can do. I have amounts for groceries, eating out, etc. my banking app categorizes all spending so I just check that. It’s just me in household so I keep things simple.
Selling an app?
“Every dollar has a job,” tracking every purchase. I’ve never had overspending issues, so it just stresses me out without helping.