Life has a horrible habit of being expensive – sometimes unsustainably so. This is when people might turn to loans and credit cards to help them though, and although these financial options have their place, when it comes to everyday items it shouldn’t be necessary. Before you start to look at alternative ways to finance what you need to buy, why not first find out whether you could save money in other ways, which would help to make life easier?
Bulk Buy
One fantastic way to save money is to buy in bulk wherever you can. You can find some great deals in your local shop meaning that if you buy more items, you pay less for them. The key point to remember is not to just buy everything you see that is on offer in this way; if you do this, you will spend more than you would have done on a standard supermarket shop, plus you’ll have lots of items that you just don’t have a need for. What you should do is only buy those items that you are going to use, and that you have room to store. This is how you will save money on bulk buying. Plus, if you are low on funds another time, you’ll have items already in your home that you can use.
Switch Your Utilities
After food and household essentials and your mortgage or rent payments, the next biggest thing that most of us need to pay out for each month are utilities such as gas, electric, and water. This can get expensive, but you can certainly do something about it.
Firstly, look at what you’re paying for – do you need everything? Are you paying out for subscriptions for services you don’t use, or wouldn’t miss if they were gone? If so, remove them. Next search around for better prices for your utilities. You can make it easy on yourself and use a price comparison website which will do all the changes for you.
Finally, look at some long-term solutions such as home solar systems from Solar Electric Panels. Saving money over a longer period is going to help you in the future, and you’ll be glad you made the changes now.
Re-mortgage
If you have a mortgage, then you have a little power when it comes to saving yourself some money on your everyday finances. Speak to your lender and determine whether you are eligible for a re-mortgage deal – after a certain amount of time (particularly if you are on a fixed term mortgage), or when you have paid a specific amount of money, you can look at new deals and you might find one that means you are paying less per month. Make sure the term of your mortgage isn’t extended in order to lower the monthly payment (unless you are happy for that to happen, of course).
Don’t despair if you rent and think you can’t lower your monthly rental rate. If you are happy to move home, then look around for somewhere cheaper which will help your finances immensely. If you don’t want to move or you can’t find anywhere to go, then speak to your landlord and let them know that you need to pay a little less for a while. They might not be able to help, but taking a lower rent for a few months while you sort out your finances is usually going to be less of a hassle than searching for a new tenant would be.
