The Biggest Money Drains In the Home…And How To Solve Them
There’s no getting around the fact that home ownership is expensive. Try as you might, there’s always going to be those bills just stacking up on top of one another! However, while it’s impossible to slash all of your costs, there are some bills that most definitely can be reduced, just by taking a few simple steps. You could feasibly save up to 15% of your bills if you make the changes! Below, we take a look at eight of the home’s biggest money drains, and also offer advice on how you can minimize their impact.
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Heating the Birds
You’re not going to be comfortable inside of your home without heating, especially when the winter chill kicks in. But when you begin to crank that heating, it’s worth considering who and what you’re keeping warm. If you’ve got poor insulation in the house, then the hot air you’re pumping out will head straight through the walls, and drift away into nowhere. You’re not paying all that money to keep the birds warm! Look at installing the best, most modern insulation in your property, and that hot air will be able to stay where it belongs – inside.
Faulty Appliances
Your appliances might seem like they’re working well enough, but are you sure? If things like your AC aren’t serviced regularly, they might not perform as well as they should. And that means they’ll be running longer to do less work, and you’ll end up paying much more than is necessary. Look at working with a company that specializes in AC repair, and get your machine working at full capacity. If your appliances have been working overtime for a long time in your home, then it might be time to upgrade. To keep the cost of running them down, buy products that have been endorsed with an Energy Star.
Washing and Drying
If you’ve got a large family, then you probably don’t want to know how much you’re spending making sure they’ve always got clean clothes to wear. It’s one of the biggest energy-related expenses there is! But of course, you need to have clean clothes, so what are your options? If you have the time, look at handwashing your items. People were doing this for a long before the invention of the washing machine, and it’s really not that all that difficult. For your drying, you can’t beat putting your clothes on a line outside – either in terms of cost or freshness
Standby Mode
It’s not always the energy that you’re using that leads to high energy bills. And even if it is, at least you’re getting something for your expenses. What about the money that is being spent on nothing but a moment’s convenience? Leaving the TV on standby might make it easier to turn it back on when you sit back down on the couch, but it’ll be sapping up energy – and costing you money – all the while. When it’s not in use, switch it off. It’s good for your wallet, good for the environment, and might just make you less likely to sit down in front of the television at the first sign of boredom.
Throw Away Food
The amount of food that ends up getting throw away in the US is staggering. It’s somewhere in the region of a third of all food produced! So take a look at your food practices. Are you eating everything that you buy, or does a large amount end up going out of date or scraped off the plate into the bin? If it’s the latter, then have a quick look at your weekly shopping bill. Then divide it by a third. Couldn’t that amount of money be put to better use? To waste less food, it’s better to avoid massive shopping trips, and make it more of a “buy as you go” type of deal. You’ll also be well-served by being less committed to certain meals, and more committed to making meals that incorporate whatever ingredients you have in the kitchen.
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Services You Don’t Need
People make fun of the people who invest in a gym membership but then never end up going, yet many do more or less the same thing with the services in their home. Take cable. It’s useful to have sometimes, but is it worth the price? Probably not: how many channels do you actually end up watching? If people are getting more switched on to the lack of need for cable, they’re becoming more blind when it comes to the internet. Most people do not need to have super fast internet. If you’re generally just browsing the web and watching videos, then the midrange level will be more than enough. Don’t break the bank just to have the fastest internet available. Odds are, you’re not using all that much.
Surprise Expenses
It can be tough to keep on top of the home expenses that you know are coming, but what about the ones that spring out of nowhere? Those surprise expenses can badly affect your personal finances. There are two ways to reduce the threat of these new expenses. The first is to stay on top of your home’s maintenance, and the second is to tuck some money away in case of an emergency. It’s not that exciting to save that money, we know, but you’ll be grateful for it when, say, the basement floods.
Empty Bedrooms
The bigger the house, the higher the expenses. It is as simple as that! So is your home bigger than you need? If you have bedrooms that aren’t in use, then you’re spending money on rooms that aren’t being used. For this, you have two options. You can “shut down” the room so that it’s not using up any resources, or you can take in a lodger and get some help with the bills.
A home will never be cheap, but as we’ve shown above, it doesn’t always have to be quite as expensive as you might expect!
