■
smarter with our money,
but what's the best way to get started?
It's the question we all want answers to.
Bank of America Market executive
Lena Cormier Evans is here withe
simple changes to save money onr
everyday expenses and end the year with
more savings than what you star.
That's right, this is my
New Year's resolution.
So I've been looking at all
the ways to save money.
But it's really comes down to
some of the simple things.
And you say you can start with
things like making your own cof,
having lunch at home instead of going out.
But how much money are we really talking
about? So believe it or not,
you could be saving a lot of money. OK?
There's a lot of money out thern
the table, and we don't even realize it
because we're just getting the business
of life and everything like tha.
The average household weighs abt
$640 in food every single year d
spends about $2700 on meals out,
which is a lot of money.
That's a lot of savings up for grabs,
New Year's resolution stuff, ri?
So let's dive into how to keep
that money in your wallet.
And let's start at the grocery store.
OK? So First things first.
You don't want to look at the overall price,
you want to look at the unit.
You know, price per unit, right?
That's really going to give you the best
idea of how much something actually costs,
right?
Also, sales and discounts are g,
but you really need to be strat.
Often stores will offer incentis
for items that people don't
actually normally buy.
That's me. That's me.
Yes. Yeah. Make sure that you'rt
buying stuff, things you don't ,
simply because they're on sale.
OK, that's that's a big thing we
really get into the habit of,
oh, this is on sale. I'm a big.
I'm a big oh, it was for sale,
which is not not good.
Don't do that. Don't do that.
We talk about this all the time.
Make a plan. Make a shopping li.
Right. Plan out your meals for the week.
Challenge your family to eat one
additional meal at home every se
week and see if you can get see how many
meals a week you can get through there.
Eating at home, you know,
that includes the making coffeed
taking your lunch and breakfast
and stuff like that to the offi.
This will help you eat up all of your
groceries, which really reduces waste,
which is really, really importa,
right?
And then also it'll help you get
really creative with your lefto.
You know, he's good with that as Mike
rating the pantry and see what's left
and what he can make out of tha.
We could all be better about th.
Alright, what about household c?
How can we keep those household bills down?
So thanks to dads across the wo,
we already know that turning off lights and
unplugging gadgets is a great place to start.
So those are great baby steps.
But many people may not know that a lot of
utility companies charge more during peak
hours when more people are using electricity.
So doing your dishes and your
laundry in the middle of the da.
Can actually be a bit more expensive than
doing things like that late at night.
So think about when you can
kind of get off peak hours,
hit that dishwasher right before
you climb into bed, you know,
doing laundry overnight and
that kind of thing.
You average household will save
about 6% on your utility bill
over the course of the year.
If you make that a consistent practice,
just the time of day can
really make a difference.
All right, what about transportation?
We know we can't control
the price of gas, obviously,
but is there a way to ease the burden?
So this is where technology.
Comes in handy right?
So there's a lot of apps and
websites out there that will
tell you what gas stations in
your area have the cheapest gas.
So just by doing a little,
you know, pre work and research,
you can look at saving up to $30
a year before you even pull up o
the pump because you can look ad
see what gas stations near you.
And if you're hitting the road,
same thing, plan ahead,
look and see what gas stations
prices are along the way.
Also, when you're hitting the r,
planning ahead for activities
will help you prevent.
You know, spontaneous,
spontaneous meals out, you know,
planning ahead and all that kind of stuff.
And honestly that can end up
being up to if you sit save $40
a month on spontaneous meals,
that's $480 over the last year,
which is a lot. It's a lot.
So we are not anti fun, OK,
we are not anti spontaneous fun.
We love fun. We're all about the fun but.
It really does pay to take timeo
figure out where you're spending money
and where you are willing to cut back,
do a little bit of planning.
That's right. Always about the .
It sure is. Lena, thank you so .
Alright, we have to take a quick break.
We'll be right back after this.