Our nation, over the last three decades, has been on a consumer credit binge. The thought of saving, of investing for the future, has more or less become pass. How many items have you purchased, knowing that you’d be disposing of it in a year or two? Cell phones, laptop computers, cars - the consumer driven economy is built to consume things, and it’s not built to save or invest in things.

This needs to change; but change cannot come from the national front, it must begin at the grass roots level. It must begin with you. The advantages of living a more frugal and thrifty life, while antiquated, are never really out of fashion. The following are some things you can do to help reduce your expenses during this tough economic time:

You cannot begin the process of saving until you know exactly what you are spending. So take a good look at the amount of money that you are spending every month. Keep your receipts from everything that you purchase over the course of a month to six weeks. Then look and see what the essentials are in your expenses and pick out the items that are not essential. Things like shopping, eating out, drinking Starbucks coffee, etc.. are not essential to your survival and they really add up. Cutting out Starbucks coffee, for example can save you over $720 a year if you drink a cup a day during business days.

By contrast, if you make a habit of eating in - of packing a week’s worth of lunches on Sunday and putting them in the freezer, you can often feed yourself for a dollar per meal - and eat healthier as well. We’re not saying cut out all the fast food, but thrift and frugality starts by doing for yourself rather than paying for others to do things for you.

Also, you should take a look a your credit report. Many times people find items on their credit reports that are not accurate or correct. These things effect the interest rates that you receive on credit cards and other credit products that you uses. The items on your credit report can effect how much you are paying. Since this is money you could be saving, it is a good idea to make sure that everything is accurate.

If you own things that are getting old and are worn out, it’s time for you to learn to make do, or learn to fix them. There is absolutely nothing that a little wood glue, super glue, or Windex can’t fix. Reuse everything in your home and re-purpose it so that you get the most use out of it that you can. If you are driving an older vehicle, you should drive it until it dies and you can’t fix it any more. Anything is better than having to get yourself involved in another car payment.

Learning how to cook is an amazing way to save money, and there are plenty of public domain cookbooks from the 1920s and 1930s that were written when being frugal and thrifty was a matter of survival, when butter was a luxury, and being able to afford meat for the cookpot was a once a week thing.

Dorthy Weatherbush takes her personal finances very seriously. That’s why she uses Legal Zoom to make sure that her financial house is in order. She used Legal Zoom to make sure that her will was filed so that her kids would get her life savings.

categories: savings,saving money,credit,Personal Finances