10 Things to Stop Buying to Save Money - Frugal Minimalist Living

1. New electronics

The first thing people waste money on is buying a new phone or new gadget. Upgrading to an iPhone Eleven can cost $1,000. When you look at that as part of a down payment for a house, or $1,000 of paying off debt, you see the opportunity cost of upgrading.

You can get new electronics, just don't buy the absolute best. As opposed to getting something new, get a refurbished one or something cheaper that has the essential functions you need.

2. Memberships

The next one is going to be memberships. Many people, especially around New Year's, get a gym membership. Unless you use it all year long, I suggest not getting a gym membership.Try working out at home. 

3. Subscriptions

There are also other types of memberships called subscriptions. If you have Spotify, Hulu, or Netflix that you don't use, you are wasting money. If you have an Amazon subscription and you ship things three times a year, you're probably better off just paying $10 for shipping and saving that $120 throughout the year unless you use it all the time. 

Go through all your memberships and decide if you need every streaming service or if you can get by with just one paid and a free one for other things. 

4. Kitchen gadgets

The next one is kitchen gadgets that you'll probably use once a year. Maybe it's a bread maker, and you made bread, you got into it for a week, and then it's been sitting in your closet forever. So before you go out and you spend $300 thinking I'm going to get $0.11 loaves of bread because I'm doing this, remember that unless you use it a lot, then you're really just getting five loaves of bread that cost $30

If you're going to buy a gadget and it's going to sit around unused, it's going to clutter up your kitchen, and it's going to make those meals expensive.

5. Clothing

The next thing that people waste money on is clothing. You don't want to get caught up in new clothing trends and buy name brands so that you feel part of the crowd. Getting clothing that's on sale but has a minimalist approach is better. If you have three pairs of jeans that you love and wear, you're saving money instead of buying ten other pairs of pants that you don't wear often enough to justify the cost.

6. Health products

The next thing to stop buying to save money is health products. There are so many scams out there. This can be a lot of different things. 

If you start seeing ads because you watched one fitness guy on YouTube, the next thing you know, every video you watch will have fitness ads.

If you fall into that rabbit hole of health products, you'll believe you need a certain brand of protein to get in shape, and then you need creatine, a pre-workout and a post-workout supplement, a multivitamin, and then a meal replacement supplement.

Next thing you know, you're spending $30 a day on these supplements that don't do a lot to improve your health. Eating healthy food like fruits and vegetables, cooking at home, and working out, you don't need extra supplements.

7. Bad habits

The next thing people waste money on is bad habits. This can be cigarettes, alcohol, or other types of unhealthy habits. It's not really good for you and costs a lot of money. So I spoke to a guy a couple of months ago, and he calculated that he had smoked away over the past ten years about $30,000. 

He missed out on investing that over ten years and turning that into $50,000 or property could have made him $1,000 a month. 

Going out for drinks can be expensive. When you spend $100 every Friday night getting drinks, that can add up. So I would be careful about things that are bad for you and are also really expensive. 

8. Investment costs

Having the wrong mutual fund or financial advisor can cost you a lot. It's much better to go with a Vanguard Total Stock Market Index Fund (VTSAX) that covers the entire stock market. It's almost 0% that you're paying as opposed to going with some of the other mutual funds or a financial advisor where they charge you a few percent of your money. 

That adds up, especially as you start investing more, and they're taking a percentage of that. Read a few books on investing or watch videos. You can find out what will save you a lot of money when you invest. 

9. Gift cards and Groupon 

Next, we have gift cards or Groupon. About 20% to 30% of people say that they have a gift card they have never used or forgot or coupons that will expire. This is a complete waste of money. 

Or, if you get a gift card for $10 and go to the store, you'll probably spend more money than is on the gift card. If you spend $20, it will end up costing you $10. If you hadn't got that gift card, you probably would not have gone to the store and spent that money. 

10. Buying things on sale

Be cautious about buying things just because they're on sale. Stores will offer big discounts like 70% off. If you purchase something you're not going to use often, think before buying it. Did you need that? Is that just going to clutter up your life while wasting money?

Things to stop buying to save money

There are many more things to stop buying to save money, depending on your situation. Look through your budget, see where you're wasting money, and cut those things out. You'll waste less money with a few painless changes in your spending habits.