In today’s economy trying to make ends meet can be a real challenge, especially for families with several kids. But there are a good many things you can do to help stretch the family budget. You may already be doing some of these, but you may not even have thought about some. Here are five ways your family can stretch its budget.
Avoid Eating Out
You may be saying to yourself, “This one is easy. We never go sit down for a meal at a restaurant.” And while that may be true how often do you grab a $1 burger for the kids while running around? Dollar burgers and drinks can add up real fast especially when you are buying for several people. Take snacks from home with you or keep some in the car for the kids and avoid the fast food trap. It is amazing how much money fast food can steal from you budget.
Keep a Spending Diary
One great way to see exactly where your money is going is to create a spending diary. For one week write down everything you buy whether it is a coke or just a cookie. Have the whole family take part – even the kids. Your family will be shocked to see where money goes, and often for the little things.
Enjoy the Free Things in Life
Take advantage of the free things that are available where you live. Instead of spending money on movie tickets, take in a concert in the park for free. Go to story hour at the library. Instead of a day at an overpriced amusement park, spend the day playing miniature golf. Most neighborhoods have plenty to do if you simply look.
Decide What’s Important
Cutting everything out but the bare basics may seem like a good idea but often it is not, except for very short times. This is where you have to decide what is important to your family. Your daughter’s piano lessons may be very important to you and her. See where else you can save so that she can continue to do those things. Have her take part in the action. She can take piano but she may have to pack a lunch for school instead of buying. Apply the same thing to yourself. If you enjoy lunch out with friends, pack your lunch each week and only go out to lunch on Fridays.
Talk About It
This may not seem like much of a budgeting tip but it may be the most important one of all. Discuss your family’s budget and needs with your children. There is no need to make things sound worse than they are but at the same time they need to understand the reality of your situation. Many times kids just assume the money is there to spend. When you discuss the family budget together everyone can have an input into what can help make those dollars stretch.
I really agree with involving the children as mentioned in the “Spending Diary” and “Talk About It” sections. I think making ends meet will be a less stressful endeavor if it is viewed as a shared family objective rather than just the responsibility of the parent(s).
In fact, as counter-intuitive as it may sound, I find giving kids (small) allowances can really help keep spending in check and reduce stress. If you replace the word “allowance” with the word “budget”, it makes more sense. For example, you can sit down with your teen and plan out a monthly or yearly clothing budget. Once agreed, grant that money to your teen as a “clothing allowance”. You don’t actually have to hand over the cash each month/year, just keep track of the running clothing balance as purchases are made. Let your teen make the decisions (for the most part unless some family value is being violated with a purchase) and have the one requirement be that they must stay on budget.
It turns out kids are a lot more careful about their spending when they feel they are spending their own money and not Mom or Dads. The collaborative and formal arrangement of the budget/allowance also virtually eliminates the all-to-common arguments around purchases. The situation changes from the teen begging the parent for a purchase (“Mom, can I have that? Why won’t you buy it *for me*?”) to a less emotional assessment by the teen of the current balance (“Do *I* have enough to buy this?”).
there are useful ideas in this article–never realized how how much I spend on fast food or coffee