An investment like homeownership is going to come with a certain level of expense, whether you’re buying a new home or trying to maintain the one you have. However, there are things you can do to make your home life a bit cheaper for yourself. Here are some money saving tips you can use to stay frugal with your home spending.
Location
Location is the first thing you want to consider when it comes down to home costs. Not only are certain areas more expensive to live in, but depending on your town or village, you may be able to benefit from some public utilities. For example, more than 21 million households in the United States use septic systems — not a public sewer — to trap and filter their toilet waste. Depending on the monthly fees for the public sewer, one scenario may be cheaper than the other. This is something you should consider when deciding where to live.
Not only that, but some cities or towns will also offer discounts for electricity. You’ll have to decide if living in the city or living in a more rural area will be cheaper for you. Trade-off decisions like this will be common for someone who wants to live as frugal as possible.
Energy-Efficient Home Living
One of the best ways to keep your energy bill low is by capitalizing on energy-efficient practices. While solar panels are a bit of an investment up front, they will drastically decrease your monthly energy bill in the long run. Similarly, a huge portion of a home’s heat and energy is lost through cracks in doors and windows. Replacing your windows more frequently and upgrading to energy-efficient windows will help to lower costs here as well.
Additionally, residential LED products are expected to use at least 75% less energy and last up to 25 times longer than traditional incandescent lamps. Changing the bulbs you use may be the easiest thing you can do to live a bit more frugally.
Here are 10 Simple Ways to Save Money and Energy at Home!
Invest in Real Estate
Another way for folks to live a bit more frugally is to invest in real estate. As many as 96% of Millennial investors are interested in making a real estate investment, showing a greater interest than their Boomer counterparts at 83%. This can be beneficial for a few reasons.
First, your mortgage payment can cost less than what you would be paying for rent. Even with the cost of maintenance and taxes, typically, properties gain value as time goes on. By the time you’re ready to sell, even without any major renovations, the house will likely be worth more than what you bought it for originally. This is exclusive to property-owning — renters will not gain any monetary value from the property they rented.
That said, if you spend some time and money renovating in certain key areas of the home, you can also increase your return value by a substantial amount. And if you choose to rent the property out instead of selling when you’re all said and done, you will have that much more monthly income as a result of your investment.
Daily Tips to Spend Less
Aside from the actual investment in a property, there are other money-saving advantages you can adopt to live a more frugal home life. For instance, you can start cooking from home more often than eating out. If you’re a gym rat, putting exercise equipment in the basement rather than paying for a gym membership can also save you at least $20 or more monthly. Even planting a vegetable garden and relying on your own produce can help lower your monthly grocery bill.
When it comes to deciding where you want to live and how to spend your money, consider these money saving tips for living a more frugal home life.