How to save money – 8 frugal habits to practice

Long time readers will remember that our investing strategy boils down to these four simple steps: 

1. Earn income
2. Spend below our means
3. Invest savings 
4. Increase our earnings-saving gap

What does spending below our means, or living below our means really signify? It simply means spending less than what we earn. One way to do that is to practice frugal living. 

Practicing frugal living may seem harder than it sounds, especially with the cost of living on a steady climb thanks to inflation. For many people, it is getting harder and harder to keep expenses in check. 

Are there ways to save money?

Thanks to today’s mentality of convenience, many of us have gone away from practicing time-tested frugal habits. Not only do these frugal habits save you money in the long run, they also often help us protect the environment. 

Here are some frugal habits that I believe we should all practice to help us save both money and the environment. 

1. Repair things, don’t replace them

Do you get the sense that things aren’t built to last for as long as they did a decade ago? 

I sure do!

Many appliances and electronics are built to last a couple of years before they need to be replaced. Not only is buying-new-every-couple-of-years a costly habit, but it also creates a lot of unnecessary waste and increases a person’s carbon footprint. 

Take our KitchenAid stand mixer for example. Last year in January, while mixing bread dough, the mixer arm stopped spinning. Then a few weeks later while making sausages, the mixer just wouldn’t spin. The motor worked but the arm would get stuck when there was a slight resistance. 

When I contacted KitchenAid, I was told that the stand mixer typically only lasted about five years. If you consider the stand mixers cost about $500, that seems to be a lot of money to spend every five years or so. 

As it turned out, the issue was caused by worn-down gear. After a bit of research, I was able to order the part from Amazon for $20 and fix it myself with only about 30 minutes of work. 

We not only avoided spending $500 for a new stand mixer, but we also avoided needing to throw out the old stand mixer, which would have created unnecessary electronic waste. 

So if something breaks down, ask yourself – Can I fix it instead of replacing it with a new one? 

You’ll be surprised that most of the time the answer is yes. 

2. Grow your own food

We are very fortunate to have a good-sized backyard garden. Mrs. T is a bit sneaky in the sense that each year she expands the backyard garden slightly which allows us to grow more produce. On the other hand, it means we have less and less lawn. 

Although it costs money to buy seeds and plants, we do save money by growing our own food. The best part is that we know exactly where our food comes from and we get to enjoy the fruits of our labour. Furthermore, it is a good education for both kids to learn where food comes from and the work required to grow it. 

Even if you don’t have a backyard, you can grow plants in planting pots and leave them on the balcony. Herbs, tomatoes, lettuce, and spinach can all be grown easily in a pot. 

To reduce food waste, it is a good idea to preserve excess food by freezing or canning it so you can consume it later. We have many bags of frozen berries in the chest freezer in our garage. We also have many cans of pickled vegetables and jars of fruit jams in our pantry. 

3. Walk and carpool more 

Here in North America, we tend to drive everywhere, regardless of whether the place we’re going is close or not. I have seen people drive for less than five minutes to get to places. 

One way to save money is to walk more. Walking is not only good exercise for our bodies as well as being beneficial for your pocket, it is also good for the environment.

Another good frugal habit to practice is to carpool more. If you have co-workers who live close by, why not consider carpooling to work? Carpooling can reduce traffic and pollution, it also allows you to use the HOV lane, potentially saving commute time.

4. Cook your own meals

Eating out and using food delivery services like Uber Eat and DoorDash are convenient but the cost can add up quickly. This is where cooking your meals at home is advantageous.

What are the key benefits of cooking your meals?

1. It’s significantly cheaper than eating out or using food delivery services
2. You get to decide the ingredients to use. You might even cook with organic food items if you want to
3. You have control over salt and spice level, as well as the quantity of the meal itself.
4. You can cook a large portion and eat the leftovers over a few days
5. You can also use leftovers for other dishes, for example, using leftover turkey meat for sandwiches or soup

We probably cook 90 to 95% of our meals at home and eat out only once or twice a month. Thanks to this frugal practice, we have kept our grocery expenses comparatively low for a family of four. We also eat mostly organic to ensure we fuel our bodies in the best way possible. 

5. Embrace second-hand or passed-down things 

If you look at our kids’ clothes, about 85% of them are either second-hand or passed-down clothes. The crazy thing? A lot of the clothes looked completely new when we received them. Mrs. T and I also have many second-hand clothes in our closet. 

There’s nothing wrong with wearing second-hand or passed-down clothes. They not only save money, they also help reduce your carbon footprint.

In addition to clothes, you can also buy used items like books, furniture, tools, or even electronics. You can often find excellent deals at garage or yard sales. 

6. Sell items or donate them away rather than throwing them out

Similar to the previous point, if you have an item that you no longer need, it is a great idea to try to sell it or give it away instead of having it end up in a landfill. 

There are a lot of online places where you can sell used items like Facebook’s Market Place, Craigslist, and eBay. You can also have a garage or yard sale and sell these used items. If you are thinking of a garage sale, my best tip is to organize one with your neighbours and advertise it so you can get as much traffic as possible. 

If you fail to sell these items, you can donate them to local thrift stores so again you avoid throwing them out. 

7. Focus on quality 

When buying things, I often use price as the sole determining factor on whether I buy it or not. But using price as the sole buying decision is often a bad choice.

Instead, we should all focus on buying quality. If an item is of higher quality and can last longer, it is usually better to buy this item at a slightly higher price than buying a similar item at a lower cost but needing to replace it sooner. The old cliche, “You get what you pay for” is totally true.

Is it better to buy a pair of hiking boots for $25 that fall apart after a couple of hikes? Or is it better to buy a pair of hiking boots for $150 that last you for three years or more? 

It’s easy to see that it is substantially better to buy the $150 hiking boots. Not only will they last longer, they will save you money in the long run, and once again, create much less of a carbon footprint. 

8. Maximize the lifespan 

Before you replace an item, ask yourself, are there ways to extend the lifespan of an item so you can avoid replacing it? It is typically cheaper to try to maximize the lifespan of an item. 

When it comes to clothes, it can be easy to patch up elbow or knee holes to make them last longer. Alternatively, you can cut clothes into smaller pieces and use them as cleaning rags. 

Rather than buying another car, can you maintain and repair your existing car to get another year or two out of it? 

If your cellphone or laptop battery drains quickly, perhaps consider replacing the battery instead of buying a new phone or laptop. 

We can all do better in improving the “throw away get a new one” mentality.

Summary – 8 frugal habits to practice 

By practicing these 8 simple frugal habits, I truly believe one can save a lot of money in the long run. Furthermore, by reducing and reusing, you can reduce a lot of carbon footprint and help the environment. What’s not to like? 

Always remember the three “R’s” – reduce, recycle, reuse! 

Do you have any frugal habits that I may have missed?