Tips to Save Money and Make Your Autumn More Comfortable

• Author: Bryan Miller
• Posted: 2024-09-22

As the COVID-19 pandemic and its delta variant continue to rage, there is more uncertainty in the economy than there has been in many months. As the weather slowly begins to cool and summer comes to a close, there are some financial steps to take to prepare for the fall season. Here are some personal finance tips to get ready for the end of summer comfortably.

Save Money at Home

Since the virus situation has considerably worsened since the beginning of summer, many people may not feel comfortable continuing all the regular activities that they had resumed doing after vaccination. If you feel unsafe eating in indoor restaurants, for example, you could save money by cutting back on eating out. Buying food from the grocery store is a much cheaper and COVID-safe option, as you never need to be indoors without a mask. On the basis of prices per meal, you will save drastic amounts of money because cooking at home cuts out all the middlemen. Instead of spending your extra disposable income on restaurant food, you should deposit it into your savings account to be able to be prepared for the future.

Cut Unnecessary Subscriptions

If you find yourself at home with nothing productive to do, you might default to watching a streaming service. However, if you subscribe to several different services only to watch minimal content from each, you should consider consolidating your monthly fees into just one or two subscriptions. There are some services that you may deem indispensable because they have shows you cannot go without, but if you have subscriptions that do not meet that standard, consider canceling them. Paying for streaming services you do not need only wastes money that you could be saving.

Lower Your Transportation Costs

Since buying and owning cars has become so expensive, finding ways to cut costs is important. Intersecting factors caused by the pandemic's economic effects have caused a perfect storm of car shortages and rising prices. Additionally, the price of gasoline has spiked since demand has risen so suddenly from the depths of the economic crisis. However, the one price that has remained constant is the fares to ride public transportation. Ridership is still much lower than it was in the year 2019, which means that crowds are hard to come by now. There has been a lot of documented evidence proving that public transportation is not a major vector for the spread of COVID-19 as long as normal precautions are taken, so it is not nearly as unsafe as people make it out to be. Using public transportation frequently can save you vast sums of money over an automobile, and the time you sit on the bus or train allows you to be productive during your commute. This money can be saved for your emergency fund or future plans.

Buy Less Expensive Smartphones

The truth of everyone needing a smartphone in today's day and age has been established. However, not everyone needs the latest new flagship release every year. Smartphone manufacturers charge inordinate amounts of money for new flagship devices for which they have a loyal market. Do not be duped. Many companies make reliable and easy-to-use phones outside of Apple, so before you buy a new phone, you should glean all the information you can on how you can buy a cheaper and more valuable device. Companies like Motorola and Samsung make several smartphones that rival their exorbitant Apple competitors with their features. It is worth saving several hundred dollars by taking a slight camera and performance downgrade. Moreover, these less expensive phones tend to last longer because their manufacturers do not purposely slow them down to entice you into buying a new one.

Avoid Taking on New Debt

Debt is something that you should typically try to avoid. In order to stop yourself from accumulating any new debt, you should be very careful to avoid making pricey purchases that you are not one hundred percent sure that you will be able to pay back. Going into the economic recovery with too much debt can hamper your ability to save money for a rainy day, so prioritizing paying off existing debt is also essential. As your debt load dwindles, you will have more money to save for the future and make purchases now.