Use Supercook to find recipes that can be made with ingredients you have on hand — an important requirement for a new recipe used on no-spend weekend!
Catch up with old friends: Send emails or make phone calls to people you haven’t talked to in a while. If weather doesn’t permit that, do some simple exercise in your house or apartment — this one from Dr. Ditto if you split costs with a significant other in the form of “you pay this time, I’ll pay next time” — you’ll just end up making up for you lack of spending at a later date. If you live with or spend significant time with someone, and have commingled your finances formally or informally, you’ve got to both do this together to reap the benefits.
Keep spending normally once the weekend is over: One of the reasons that I advocate doing this for just a weekend, rather than days or weeks at a time, is that you shouldn’t really feel deprived after just 2-3 days without spending. If you really want to make someone’s day, write a letter — but only using paper you already own!
Clean: Spend some time getting things in order around your house. Maybe you are already over budget, or close to it, and the month isn’t over. Dust, mop, vacuum, and do anything else that you’ve let go just a little too long.
Really clean: If you’re really having a hard time filling up your time, do a full weeding-out of your possessions.
Sometimes you just need to stop spending money for a few days. You can invite friends over and have fun spending time together at no cost to any of you!
Watch TV/DVDs or catch up on DVR: If you are a TV person (and I recognize that some people aren’t), a no-spend weekend is a great time to catch up on some of your favorite shows. CDs: Where to Keep Your Money in 2010?”>Savings Accounts vs. I can’t eat out, so I’ll do it Thursday.” The best thing is to decide Thursday, or even Friday — and challenge yourself to make do with the food and entertainment you already have.
Get the rest of your household to do it too: If you spend no money, but your spouse does, it kind of defeats the purpose. Package things that can’t be sold and donate to Goodwill or a charity of your choice. You are not allowed to reproduce the content within this feed in any manner.
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If you take public transportation and have a pre-funded fare card you can use that too.
No-spend weekend musts
In order for a no-spend weekend to truly have an impact on your bottom line, you have to follow some ground rules:
Do it spontaneously: If you plan a no-spend weekend too far in advance, it is likely that you will end up spending money in advance in order to prepare for the weekend — as in “oh I can’t buy groceries next weekend, so I’ll do it this weekend. If you normally do a big grocery shopping on Monday, that’s fine — do it. Then sell the rest on Craigslist or Ebay — if you’re lucky, your no-spend weekend could end up making you money!
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spending money, bottom line, budget, no-spend weekend, earned dollars, savings, cut spending, savings goals, Budgeting
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This post was written by admin on February 5, 2010
