The Daily Tip Jar

Do you buy all the lipstick because it’s on sale, just to find three unused tubes stuck in a drawer a year later? Or catch yourself shopping online late at night for luxury pens you don’t really need, only to regret it the next day? You can break those habits and streamline the way you spend.

Investigate your bank account. Make a note of every time you shopped for fun throughout the month, each time you’ve eaten at a restaurant, or any time you bought something that wasn’t really essential. Identify what’s draining your account and what you can do to fix it. If you’re buying $10 salads every day for lunch, adding up to $50 a week, try packing them to work instead. Check the smaller purchases too. You’d be surprised at how much cash your daily coffees can add up to. If you see that restaurants are eating up your dollars, budget a few times a month for eating out and dine at home the rest of the days.

If you discover that late night online shopping is the account draining culprit, plug your phone in before bed and read a book or watch a movie on your television instead. When you do shop online, try adding items to your wish list, rather than your shopping cart. After a week or two, go back and decide if you really need that vintage 90210 poster from eBay, or if you think you can delete it from your wish list.

Stop using credit cards to buy things you don’t have cash for. According to magnifymoney.com, Americans are on track to pay over $122 billion in credit card interest in 2019. If you pay off those credit card balances and exercise a little patience to build up your savings, you’ll have money in your account to purchase those items, rather than relying on credit cards that charge you interest. Don’t pay extra money just to buy something.

Sales often entice us to buy things we weren’t even looking for, many times in bulk. Sometimes buying five packs of $2 hair ties just feels like a great bargain, but that doesn’t mean it is. Before throwing those scrunchies in the cart, do a quick online search to make sure you’d really be saving money. While we could all use more hair elastics, don’t let a sale on an item you’d rarely ever use draw you in. Maybe you can pass up that $600 silver cake server, even if it is marked down to $100. Be careful of going-out-of-business sales and always check regular going rates to make sure you’re actually getting a deal.

Breaking bad habits doesn’t require you to make a major life change, just identify your typical monthly spending habits and then cut the things you can live without. Your wallet and your junk drawer will thank you.

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