Think Thrifty Thursday-major Cutbacks
When I first decided I wanted to stay at home, I knew there’d have to be some major cutbacks in our spending. This was 4 years ago, so the economy was different, but the concept was the same-we were going from two incomes to one and didn’t know if we could do it.
When I was 4 months pregnant with my first, I took a leave of absence from my job. I wasn’t making that much and we figured the best way to find out what our budget would be could be best found out BEFORE the baby came. We knew this was a big chance to take but we wanted to set a budget and see what we could afford without the added stress of taking care of the baby.
This is what we did-
- Sold one of the cars. Ryan worked within 5 miles of the house. If I needed a car, I drove him to work. That saved us the car bill, car insurance and extra gas because I went out less often
- Started clipping coupons, if you’ve read any of the posts in this category, you’d see how much you can save there.
- Got rid of the home phone and only used one cell. Ryan is at work if I need him and otherwise was with me at home. We only needed one actual phone for us and the house.
- No cable. I know it. US. No cable. We figured everything we watched was on the free channels anyway, so it was worth the extra cash to get rid of it.
- FREE INTERNET. Ugh. Makes me sick thinking of it but 4 years ago you could get free dial up *vomit* so you can still check your email and blog (thank goodness I didn’t then, I honestly have to have the Internet now but it was a sacrifice we made then), it just takes hours to do (which you won’t have anyway so nix the net lol).
- Stopped eating out. Use those coupons to get your food. Look for triple coupon weekends if your town stores run them, you CAN cook and save hundreds a year.
There were other little things we did but this was how we lived for the first year of Jake’s life. Since those days (he’ll be four next week), we’ve worked out ways to get all these things back and more but it really helped to make sure we could afford to have me stay at home with the boys.
I know these things aren’t feasible for a lot of people but I have women tell me all the time how they wish they could stay home and want to know how I did it. We’re not rich, we just know how to save. What ways do you save to stay at home? If you don’t stay at home (understandable, sometimes I miss work but that’s another post), do you have any money saving tips for your family? Write up a blog post and link to Mr. Linky or simply leave us tips in the comments, we’re all trying to save and can use all the help we can get!
10 Comments
RSS feed for comments on this post | Create your avatar
Good post… we did some of the same when I quit working my f/t job to stay home w/ the youngest… We also cut back on how many trips out we made trying to make weekday trips minimal and do all errands if we could on a weekend day as a group. Another thing we did was looked for cheap ways to entertain the kids, parks, library lap time for stories, mommy playdates where you take turns at other mom’s houses… simple changes make a HUGE difference!!
BassAckwards Mom’s last blog post..Wordless Wednesday – the new do
All of your suggestions are great!
BusyJulie’s last blog post..Thrifty Thursday
Great post, Julie! We did something similar when I was on my 3-month maternity leave – I knew in the back of my mind that I was going to stay home, but we wanted to see how our budget would fare with only one income vs. two. We cut way back on eating out, and put together a spread sheet of our bills so we could plot and plan accordingly – we did eliminate our ‘land line’, since we both had pre-paid cell phones and communicated with out-of-state family members by email regularly instead. Worked really well for me, since I’m not a phone person! (grin!!) By putting all our bills into a spread sheet, it helped us figure out what was ‘necessary’ and what wasn’t, so we eliminated the unnecessary expenses and whittled down our outgoing expenses effectively.
After my maternity leave was over and I finalized my decision to stay home permanently, I sold all of my business suits and shoes on eBay to put that money in savings for emergencies. Anytime either of us needs any extra cash for something frivolous, we’ll get rid of something we no longer want/need on eBay so we can get what it is we’re jonesin’ for without dipping into our emergency fund or savings account…
Stacy (the Random Cool Chick)’s last blog post..Thousand Words Thursday
I am planning on having my wife stay at home with our first child. We’re still working on it but we should probably be pregnant in the next couple of months. It is going to be hard to keep our lifestyle as it is but I think we’ll be spending more time with the baby and less time out on dates. I’m actually looking forward to it. Thanks for your comments and blog.
BMWmotorcycle’s last blog post..Late February/March Pictures
We are working on having our first kid and I’m also worried about money when my wife stops working. I’m glad to see that it is possible. Maybe I’ll get her blogging. SHe is a very good writer and currently works in PR..
Paunchiness’s last blog post..New Prostate Studies – What Do They Mean?
We came out ahead by having me stay home too.
No extra car, insurance, gas etc (no way could we share with DH in nursing)
No extra wardrobe costs for business attire.
I’m home, so I can cook instead of convenience food.
And the big one, no daycare fees!
Storm’s last blog post..Thrifty Thursday: Keeping Vet Bills Low
We pretty much do all those things already. We were making it work just fine with one vehicle but hubby’s parents felt “sorry” for us so gave us a car. Um…thanks. There was a REASON we only had one. Sigh.
Keely’s last blog post..I bet we left a shotgun there, too
Sounds like you were really sensible – well done!
Annette Piper’s last blog post..Dads
When I decided to stay at home I had to start before the baby came too. We stopped eating out…that was a big part of our budget. So I cooked every night and started shopping at Costco and Trader Joes to save money. Couldn’t cut much coupons because it was actually cheaper to shop at TJs. I stopped shopping for things for me and just made due with what I had…sounds easy, but took some training. Had to start asking myself…do I need this or want this?
Lots of helping tips on how to save money..so good to read this kind of blog.
great!!