All the little bits add up & shall see us debt free sooner.
1. Laundry savings. I wash the boys school clothes weekly. Seems harsh yet unless they haave been playing in a wet school yard they don't really come home dirty. We have more than one set if they do & I check it, work on any marks & wash it (inside out) once a week. My hope in doing this is that the uniform we have shall see son 1 through primary school and son 2 most of the way, without having to buy anything else. Our school has also began a regular stall of 2nd hand uniform, which is awesome. That means anything we no longer wear can be donated & I can buy what we need cheap. I also wash everything else in 3 loads a week. Prevously I was washing about 10 loads a week & would look for things to fill the machine. I'm hoping that I have effectively cut my laundry work in half! I only line dry & use our home heating to finish off clothes in the Winter, no clothes dryer unless it is absolutely necessary.
2. Appliance replacement. Our home is older & we are 14 years married this year both of which mean things shall need replacing now or soon. This last month we replaced our dishwasher, we bought a $299 one from Aldi & it works well. Then our oven element burnt out & we have replaced it with a $150 2nd hand one from Gumtree. I replaced our electric frypan yesterday, ours died when we moved here just over 2 years ago. I expect to have to replace more items & had begun saving for them this year.
3. Turning everything off or unplugging it. A seemingly small thing that can save us lots! We have a pedal switch on a powerboard that hubby uses in his office yet the TV & set top box need to be done manually. So I walk around each evening (or morning) & unplug, pick up (off the floor so things are not broken) and turn off.
Just looking back to June 8 2012 from my New Direction post.
I had the following goals
1. Build our emergency fund of 10K done October 2013, it took longer than expected yet it is such a huge acchievemnet for us & I have great pride in saying it is still intact.
2. Have a buffer amount in our offset account. Finished 2013 with one & it has gone to already in 2014, hence the strict refousing on 2014. We have had some health challenges that keep on costing $$.
3. Throw all extra cash at the mortgage. Begun this in January 2014 & though it hasn't been smooth it is definately priority. I have redirected the payments from the surveys to go to the mortgage, its something every month & makes a difference.
4. Keep up the house maintenence & repairs, but delay all else. This is where we are at right now!
This means we are on the right track & need indeed to "keep calm & save money". I'm tracking the progress we make with our mortgage each month and keeping myself alert to anything else we can do to save a little here & there.
It is tiresome at times not to have any spare funds for impulse buys yet I enjoy the forced creativity of working on a goal and we sure do appreciate what we do & have.
This month we are taking the family to see a production, that will be a treat for the whole family.
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