Greta Lawler, 25, managed to save £5,000 in just a few months with two simple tricks: a no-spend challenge, which saved her £1,300 in one month – and batch-cooking her meals in advance.
The pharmacist from Liverpool hasn’t always been good with money, but was forced to boost her financial confidence and up her savings midway through university, when she needed to save for a car to do her placement year.
Worried there was no way she could save up enough with just a part-time job, Greta got serious about her approach to money, picking up extra shifts and banning any non-essential buys. She managed to reach the savings goal by the end of that year.
‘That really changed my money mindset and motivated me to save more,’ Greta tells Metro.co.uk. ‘I realised I was just living to my means and spending any money I got instead of spending it wisely and saving along the way.
‘I have been really into budgeting and spending responsibly. I have also been really interested in educating myself on money – I never realised how much there was to learn.’
Since then, Greta has stuck to a tighter budget and picked up saving skills along the way.
In February 2020, she took on a new challenge to boost her savings: an entire no-spend month.
The rules of the month were simple: Greta wasn’t allowed to buy anything that wasn’t completely necessary.
‘For me my main rules were: no online shopping, no takeouts or eating out in restaurants (including not buying lunch at work or buying snacks when I’m out of the house), no buying coffee out of the house, no new plants, and no new candles,’ Greta explains.
‘These were rules that I wrote out on a whiteboard and kept in plain sight throughout the challenge to motivate me to stick to my rules.
‘However the overall goal was to not spend any money unless it was on bills, essential food items or petrol.’
By the end of February alone, Greta had put away £1,300.
She now recommends everyone gives a no-spend challenge a go, and shares her advice for trying it on her YouTube channel.
Greta's top tips for doing a no-spend month:
- Put your goals and rules in plain sight – this reminds you why you’re saving the money and also helps motivate you to stay on track
- Delete shopping apps for the time that you’re doing your no-spend challenge. The constant notifications about sales and new in items are not helpful when trying to save
- Unsubscribe from shopping emails, again for the same reason above. I found that by unsubscribing from the emails whenever they came through prevented me from being drawn in to the sales etc as I had a different purpose to scroll to the bottom of the email, which was to unsubscribe.
- Don’t go window shopping – try to not go into the city centre for a stroll around the shops or to accompany a friend, as this may lead to unnecessary spending. Instead go on a walk somewhere where you’re not going to spend money e.g. the park
- Plan your meals – write a list before going to the supermarket and stick to it!
- Try to analyse your purchases more, question whether it is something essential or whether you could do without or if there is a cheaper alternative available
- Join online communities to find other people who are doing similar challenges. There are lots of Facebook groups and Reddit threads of people who are doing various savings challenges who share lots of support and advice for others.
‘My goals for my no-spend month were to save as much as I could to put towards saving for my first house, to analyse purchases that I make, and to use up items that I already had, such as food items in the cupboards,’ Greta tells us.
‘I basically only spent money on my bills, petrol and the food bill. Even for these I managed to cut the cost down by buying cheaper alternatives for food items, walking instead of driving where possible to save on petrol and by trying to cut down on using electricity.
‘On weekends my partner and I will usually use a lot of electricity, for example by watching films and TV series, so for our no-spend month we tried to find alternative things we could do to cut down, such as having games nights on the evenings and going on walks/hikes in the day.
‘Also instead of spending money on eating out or getting takeaways, we would try to recreate our favourite restaurant dishes at home. For example we bought a whole chicken from ASDA and a Nando’s seasoning and recreated a Nando’s at home for a fraction of the price.’
Greta believes the benefits of a no-spend challenge go far beyond just the month, as going through weeks of questioning whether purchases are really essential makes sticking to a budget a habit.
Since February, she’s saved £5,000.
‘I find that each month I am managing to put more and more away because I now realise that some items that I thought were “essential” initially are either no longer something I’d consider essential or there are cheaper alternatives available, usually reusable items,’ Greta says.
One habit she’s continued from that one month is meal-prepping; which involves buying discounted food items, making meals in advance, then freezing or refridgerating them to eat throughout the week.
This not only saves money, but also time in the evenings when she might be tired after a long day at work – and takes the thinking out of what to have for dinner every night.
Having a planned meal already in the fridge also helps to tackle those takeaway cravings.
‘I no longer buy any food at restaurants, at work, or by getting takeaways, which was one of my larger expenses until recently,’ Greta notes. ‘I definitely save the most money on food shopping as I plan all my meals and meal prep to ensure nothing is going to waste.’
Greta plans to keep up these habits so she eventually put away enough money for a deposit on her first home.
She urges everyone to get more comfortable with the basics of budgeting and personal finance, and encourages us all to take on mini challenges, like a no-spend month, for those quick savings boosts.
‘It’s so easy to get wrapped up in the mindset of having to get the newest of the new and spending your money on materialistic things because you think this will make you happier,’ Greta says.
‘The idea of a no-spend challenge is to basically cut out any unnecessary spending to help you save more towards your savings goal.
‘You create your own list of rules by identifying where you’re spending the most money and by setting yourself a savings goal so you know how strict your rules need to be to achieve this goal.
‘I really feel that the challenge improved my mindset so much that by the end of the month there wasn’t anything I really wanted. Now I’m more interested in how much I can save rather than what new items I can spend my money on.
‘I think it’s important to remind young people about the importance of living below your means in order for you to be able to save for the future. I think it’s very common for young people to live to or above their means as money education isn’t taught in schools, therefore when we start to earn a monthly wage its easy to get into a habit of spending everything we earn to keep up with the latest trends.
‘It’s important to have an emergency fund, putting some of your income aside for emergencies can be really helpful when unexpected expensive bills pop up or your car breaks down etc.
‘Getting into the habit of saving when you’re young will really help you in later life when you have more expenses, as you will already have money saved up and it will become second nature to save before you spend when payday comes around.’
Greta's top tips for boosting your savings and getting better with money:
- Always live below your means to allow room for saving each month
- You don’t need to keep up with the latest trends – this is costly and unnecessary
- Always have a savings goal to work towards – even if it’s something small, having a goal will help keep you on track
- Analyse your purchases more – question if you really need the item, whether there is a cheaper alternative and think of better ways the money can be spent (or saved!)
- Educate yourself on personal finance as much as you can as there is so much to learn and there are lots of resources available online. Even if you’re someone who isn’t good with money it doesn’t mean that you can’t learn more and change your money mindset!
If you want more tips and tricks on saving money, as well as chat about cash and alerts on deals and discounts, join our Facebook Group, Money Pot.
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Get in touch by emailing MetroLifestyleTeam@Metro.co.uk.
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source https://metro.co.uk/2020/09/11/woman-shares-how-she-saved-5000-by-doing-a-no-spend-challenge-and-meal-prepping-13251514/
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