Most financial advice is built around the same idea; save money, spend less. It’s a straightforward concept, if you save money, then you’ll have plenty lying around to help in difficult financial situations. Well, what if I told you that some monthly expenses may actually help your family in the long run.
That’s right, spending money may be a great way to help your family remain financially stable and organized, as well as allowing you to handle other aspects of life too. So, here are some expenses you may want to start making:
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Subscription Food Services
This is a very contemporary expense as it’s not something we’ve seen until recently. Basically, it refers to these online subscription services where you order meals, and the ingredients get delivered to your door. It’s a bit like ordering groceries online, only you get the ingredients for meals and nothing else.
Right away, I can see you wondering how this is a good expense to make. Well, think about how much money your family wastes on food every day. How many things are you constantly throwing away because they don’t get eaten? Even simple stuff like tins of pasta sauce of vegetables gets chucked because you bought too much. I saw a report on CNBC earlier this year that stated we waste an average of $1,500 on food every year!
Therefore, if you subscribe to a service that delivers set meals with the right amount of ingredients, you’ll minimize food waste. This is good for the environment, but also good for your family's bank balance too!
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Hiring Help Around The Home
The modern family is different to families of the past. Nowadays, both adults in the family work and the children go to school, etc. The result is a family that’s rarely in the house during the day. You also end up with a hectic life, which means things like home maintenance take a back seat. As a result, you could end up with a very messy home that makes you feel stressed as you never have time to clean it.
Now, this is where my idea comes in, as it may benefit your family to hire some help. Whether it’s a gardener or a cleaner, they can assist you with household tasks while you’re at work. This ensures your home stays well maintained, which can relieve so much stress and improve the quality of your life. There are things to consider when hiring someone, mainly their track record and the legality behind their work status. There are law firms out there like Davis & Associates that can help you with the legal side of things, to ensure you don’t accidentally hire illegal workers. As for their track record, consult families they’ve worked for before to be sure they’re trustworthy and do a good job.
It may seem like a needless expense, but this can benefit your family in the long run. It gives you time to focus on more important areas of your life; like working and looking after your kids. Plus, if your house is well maintained, then it means there’s less chance of problems occurring that lead to expensive repairs. So, it could theoretically save you some money even though you’re spending some.
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Credit Card Payments
A credit card can be beneficial for your family. You might not think this is an expense, but I’m counting it as one because you will have to pay off your balance every single month. For me, it’s a very smart way of controlling how much money you spend from month to month.
You see, when you get a credit card, it’s ‘loaded’ with a set amount of money. This is your credit limit, and you can’t spend more than it in a month. A good idea is to set yourself a limit to ensure you’ll never spend more than you’re bringing in. Then, use your credit card like a normal debit card and pay for things.
Hopefully, this should help you become more aware of your spending habits as you always have the limit in the front of your mind. It can prevent you from going crazy and spending loads - which you might do if you had a debit card. At the end of each month, you simply pay the credit card balance in full, and you’re good.
At first glance, these expenses may seem like luxury things to spend money on. However, when looking deeper into it, you realize they can help your family in many ways. Whether it’s reducing stress, saving money, or avoiding waste; there are benefits to making a few regular expenses.
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