Best Family Budgeting Tips: Bills, Shopping

Although it takes some planning, organizing and self-restraint, running a household budget might not be the easiest thing in the world, but it can be simple. Here are some of our best, time-tested suggestions for keeping costs down while raising a family.

Bills

• Use a financial organizer like BillMinder on your phone or computer. It sets alerts in advance when bills are due. Have as many bills as possible set up with the bank for auto-pay.

• In our family, we have three different bank accounts—one for me with a weekly budget; a joint account for bills; and rainy day funds set to three months in advance and my fiancé's own account. 

• Every six months we sit down and review bill history to find ways to eliminate cost or lower our household bills as well as upcoming costs.

Shopping and Dining

• We shop for groceries at Costco once a month and buy bulk items like rice, meats, toilet paper, laundry detergent and water. They have great prices for bulk products and their return policy is unbeatable. You can basically return pretty much anything at any time, no questions asked. We shop at a nearby grocery stores and non-chain markets for miscellaneous things and fresh produce.

• Browse through weekly ads for dining deals, including restaurant coupons.

• If we have dinner leftovers, they are eaten as lunch the next day or revamped as a new dinner for another night.

• For a husband-wife date night, we visit restaurants that offer coupons (i.e. buy one dinner get one free). If we don’t have a coupon for a certain restaurant that usually serve large portions, we just share our plates.

• Sometimes we cook for a relative's birthday instead of going out to a restaurant or buying an expensive present.

Other Money-Saving Tips

• Our water heater is turned to medium instead of high heat.

• We put on jackets on bearable cold days instead of turning on the heater. If we do turn on the heater, it’s at 68 degrees max.

• We take shorter showers.

• We have learned to unplug household appliances like the microwave and turn off lights where they are not needed.

• Instead of going on yearly vacations, we have settled for enjoying camping with our family and close friends throughout the summer.