Frugal challenges: Location and circumstances

photo by trialsanderrors
Often, frugal strategies simply won’t work well depending on where you live or personal circumstances. For example, some people can’t hang clothes out to dry on a clothesline because of neighborhood restrictions, but you can still dry indoors.

Although you might not be able to apply some frugal tips, there are still plenty of others you can use, so don’t give up too soon. Instead of focusing on what you can’t do, concentrate on what you can. You can live within your means, separate your wants from your needs, pay yourself first and not spend money that you don’t have. You can’t hide behind excuses. For any negative situation, there’s a positive spin.

The following are popular challenges and a few solutions.

LIMITED STORE OPTIONS
CHALLENGE: Living in a rural area limits shopping options. Maybe there aren’t discount stores within 25 miles, grocery stores don’t double manufacturer’s coupons, or the city is too small to have decent thrift stores.

SOLUTION: Try gardening. See whether any of your neighbors garden, and find out whether you can all share your harvests for a greater variety. You can shop garage sales, frequent your library (some libraries will mail books or provide a bookmobile to rural areas), meal plan, cook from scratch, use leftovers, take on do-it-yourself projects and make homemade gifts. You can still take advantage of store sales, even if they’re limited. You can also be more organized and plan all your errands in one day.

PEER PRESSURE
CHALLENGE: Living in a large city where style and fashion are more important and costly social events are more common.

SOLUTION: Try borrowing high-end merchandise from Web sites such as www.bagborroworsteal.com, www.frombagstoriches.com and www.borrowedbling.com. They offer less-expensive alternatives to paying full retail. You can try progressive dinner parties, too. One advantage to living in an affluent city is that the secondhand stores have great merchandise. Plus, there’s plenty of competition between stores, and there are a plethora of free local arts, music and cultural events to enjoy.

You might live in a location where you can car-share through companies such as www.zipcar.com, or use public transportation so you don’t have to pay the high cost of either car payments or maintenance. You have ethnic stores you can shop at that can help you make less-expensive meals. There isn’t any reason why you can’t be different from your spendthrift peers. You could also downshift by moving to an area with a lower cost of living. Your frugal options are wide open.

BUSY CAREER
CHALLENGE: Too busy working to apply frugal strategies that are time-consuming, such as baking bread or clipping coupons.

SOLUTION: Instead of taking time to save money, you can spend money and save time. For example, if spending extra money on hiring a lawn service saves you time, then you have some extra time to spend as you want. You might not want to spend the time baking bread, but you can go to bread outlets and save. There are plenty of frugal tips that don’t take a lot of time, such as making homemade cleaners. It probably even works to your advantage that you’re too busy to have as much free time to overspend. You’re still able to make smart choices, such as simplifying your wardrobe, being less wasteful by reusing items and recycling. You can pack a lunch, use a slow cooker, enjoy frugal weekend activities, have a change jar and conserve on utilities. Simply place your biggest efforts into your biggest gains.

Don’t get bogged down with frugal activities that don’t seem feasible to implement. One frugal shoe doesn’t fit all, so try methods that will work for you.

Posted by Sara Noel on November 22 2008. Filed under Frugal & simple living.
Sara Noel owns Frugal Village, LLC and is a nationally syndicated columnist with Universal Uclick. Bio, Follow me on Twitter, Join us on Facebook