Life can be expensive – well that’s probably the biggest understatement of the century. Life is expensive, especially in our modern world as our ‘wants’ are often blended together as ‘needs’. We have been consumers and the average household consumes a lot. If you figure out ways to minimise your consumption, your house costs will decrease. Many of us would like to save more money, so cutting costs around the home is the perfect way to achieve this. Here are some tips for saving money around the home:

1) Turn Those Things Off
Do you have a bad habit on leaving the lights on overnight, the heater on when you’re not in the room, and the TV on when you pop out for a few hours? Those things all add up and although individually they are only small chunks of power, over a year’s time they can really push up your electricity bill. Be diligent with turning things off when you’re not using them and turning things off at the wall when you’re not using them and you can expect a small drop in your power bil..

2) Cook in Bulk
It might sound a bit boring, cooking up a few day’s worth of food at once, but it is a great way to save money and time. The truth is, food preparation can be quite demanding – it might take an hour or two to prepare a nice family meal for the evening. There’s nothing better than home cooking, but with the increasing food prices it can be really expensive, too. Cooking in bulk allows you to make the most of bulk prices for certain foods all while saving time so you can focus your energy on the things you love.

3) Dry it Outside
Do you own a clothes drier? Do you love how soft it makes your clothes feel? Me too. However I can actually tell which days we use the clothes dryer based on the spikes in electricity costs that we experience. The cost of running a dryer is actually that obvious. If you can’t get past how soft towels feel out of the clothes dryer, then dry them on the line for the majority of the time and then pop them in the drier when they are still a little damp to dry. That way you’re not using as much power, but still getting the same result.

4) Don’t Use Paper Towels
This will be an easy choice for you to make if you care about the environment, because paper towels are just adding more and more crap to landfills. This is also a great way to save money each year too. How much do you spend each week on paper towels? $2? $3? $4? At $3 a week you’re looking at a cost of $160 a year, or $1,600 every ten years.. for paper towels. Is it worth it? Probably not! You can just buy a few clothes and wash and reuse them. Way better for the environment as well as your bank balance.

These small changes will make a big difference to your bank balance, especially if you implement a few of them. Happy saving!