• Home
  • CONTACT ME
  • Start Here
  • Store
    • Email
    • Facebook
    • Instagram
    • Pinterest
    • Twitter
    • YouTube

Frugally Blonde

Real life, simplified

  • Cleaning & Organizing
    • Homemade Cleaners
    • Kitchen
    • Bath
    • Organizing
    • Cleaning Hacks
  • Household Tips
    • Simple Tips
    • Fun With Kids
  • Smart Money
    • Living On Less
    • Budgeting
  • Recipes
    • Freezer Cooking
    • Slow Cooker
    • All Recipes
FREE 7 DAY DECLUTTERING CHALLENGE
jumpstart your decluttering in just 30 minutes a day!

Budgeting Smart Money

5 Tips to Lower Your Fixed Expenses

This post may contain affiliate links. Please see my full disclosure policy for details.

Save for later

205shares
  • Share 7
  • Tweet
  • Email

Last year my husband and I sat down and took a long look into our budget. Everyday, we were doing great. With the envelope system we were doing awesome on our day to day. We were doing a good job of planning ahead for any foreseeable expenses.  We had included everything we could think of needing in our budget. But we noticed so much of our money was going to our fixed expenses. Sure, I can buy less at the grocery store but I can’t control the cost of our fixed expenses like internet, heat and insurance.

It was so frustrating to me, especially when we had noticed how much some of those expenses had risen in the past couple of years. So, I sat down and decided to try to lower the expenses. To my complete surprise it was very easy. I saved over $500 in just 1 hour. It turns out that those fixed expenses can easily be lowered. There are some tips and tricks to lower your fixed expenses.

Lower Your Home & Auto

I think this is one of the easiest places for me to save. I have noticed that every couple of years our homeowners insurance jumps up. It went up 30% last year. So, when I saw a big jump like that I called and ask if they can lower it. If they can’t, then you can always shop around and find a better rate. I found a rate that better than what I currently had. It’s easy enough to make the switch to save money. Just call around to a couple of places to see what rates you can get.

Another way to save is home and auto is to have your deductible raised. If you have a $500 deductible see how much you can save to have it raised to $1000. We have never used our homeowners insurance, so I don’t mind having it at $1000. We have enough in our emergency fund to cover the thousand dollars.

Ditch The Service

If it’s not a necessary service you can just ditch it. We stopped getting cable a couple of years ago. It was just too expensive and the rates just kept going up. I also stopped getting the newspaper and lawn service. We decide for the cost we could either do it ourselves or do without. Go through your budget and see if there are any services or bills that just aren’t really necessary anymore. Eliminating just a few services could save you big money every year.

Save On Utilities

You may not be able to call and negotiate a lower bill on your utilities, but there are a few things that you can do to save on your utilities each month. Making sure that your house is energy-efficient can help save money every month. You can put in low flow shower heads and use fans instead of air conditioning. Check out these tips for saving money on your winter heating bills. Even just doing a few things each year can go a long way in lowering your bills.

Check With Competitors

Getting a price quote from a competitor can be a great way to save money. It doesn’t take much time to search on the internet for competitors prices. I did this with our phone, internet and alarm bill. I found a couple of places that had better deals for phone and internet then what we were currently paying. I now knew that I could either switch to a new competitor for a lower rate or try to negotiate with my current provider. There are so many places out there that will give you a quick quote, it doesn’t take a lot of time and can save you a bundle.

Negotiate The Bill

I read that it is cheaper for most providers to keep their current customers than it is for them to find new ones. So it makes sense that they want to keep you happy, even if it means lowering your rates. Once I check with competitors I than call my current provider and tell them what rates I was offered. They not only offered to match it, but in one case gave me an even lower rate then the best competitive rate. Plus, I didn’t have to go to any work to change companies.  With just a few minutes of your time you can call your providers to check on a better rate. The worst they can do is say no.

Lower Your Interest Rates

Lowering your interest rates takes a little more work than just a quick phone call. But, in some cases it may be worth the time that you will spend to refinance. We have refinanced our home twice since moving in 9 years ago. Both times the interest rates dropped low enough that it was worth the time and the refinancing fees. If you are wondering if refinancing is a good option, check out this article. You can calculate if this is right for you.

With a little bit of work you can get those fixed expenses down and be saving even more money month to month. If the idea of trying to deal with lowering all the bills is too overwhelming just pick one every week or two to deal with. Before long you will be seeing some great savings for just a small amount of your time. I was so happy to get some of the bills lowered. We used the extra money I saved every month to put extra toward our mortgage. Hopefully, with some work that is one more fixed expensive we can eliminate.

What tips do you have to lower your fixed expenses? I would love to hear them.

 

Julie's Signature
P.S. For more cleaning tricks and frugal tips delivered to your inbox subscribe here!

Save for later

205shares
  • Share 7
  • Tweet
  • Email


« Amazingly Easy Way To Remove Armpit Stains
13 Money Saving Kitchen Tips »

Comments

  1. Allison @ Frugal on the [email protected] says

    February 9 at 10:09 am

    We JUST negotiated our internet bill. And by “we” I mean my husband. He sat on hold forever, was transferred back and forth between people, but eventually got them to lower it. It’s jumped almost 50 dollars since we signed up two years ago. I don’t know if that’s good or bad but we just don’t want to pay that much more when new customers are getting lower rates than loyal customers.

  2. Mandy says

    February 11 at 8:20 am

    I agree! They can’t do anything for loyal customers but for new ones there are discounts and freebies all over the place.
    It’s easy to just let those subscriptions run without taking the effort to see if there are more interesting offers.
    Must put this on my to-do list!

  3. Emily says

    February 11 at 8:29 am

    Great tips! Calling around to get Auto and Home quotes isn’t always fun, but it can be a relatively quick way to save 100s of dollars.

    Ditching the service is a great idea too. Sometimes it’s easy to forget the recurring expenses if they are automatically withdrawn from our accounts. We don’t watch too many movies and don’t watch TV, so it’s much easier for us to just pay $1 each time we watch a movie than pay for a subscription service.

  4. Kat says

    February 21 at 12:02 pm

    tips are great, but what can you do when you dont have the option of competition? I’ve called my utilities, satellite, landline/internet etc. and they arent interested in lowering my bills – I’m on fixed income= it doesnt go up but the bills sure do! we live in an area where there IS NO competition on one provider, so they know that we have to stay with them and pay their prices.

    • Julie says

      February 21 at 12:13 pm

      You can check and see if people that are new to sign up get better rates. You can always drop things like satellite, landline and internet and get the new introductory rate. For things like utilities you can see if they have any programs. I signed up for our Cool Cents program. I save an extra $5 a month. It’s not a lot, but every bit helps.

Welcome

Photo of Julie
Welcome to Frugally Blonde! I’m Julie. I love sharing the best cleaning hacks, organizing tricks, & money saving tips. Read More….

Join the Challenge

Success! Now check your email for next steps.

There was an error submitting your subscription. Please try again.

Popular Posts

envelope system

How To Create A Cash Envelope System

How To Clean Your Dryer Vent Like A Pro

How To Clean Your Front Load Washer

get rid of toilet stains

How To Clean Toilet Stains Like A Pro

DIY Upholstery Cleaner

Copyright © 2021 · FrugallyBlonde - Privacy Policy

Copyright © 2021 · Divine Theme on Genesis Framework · WordPress · Log in

Privacy Policy
7 Day Cleaning Challenge
Name:
Email:
FREE MEAL PLANNING PRINTABLE
_____________
Tired of dinner time chaos? Use this free meal planner to save money and your sanity!
YOUR NAME:
YOUR EMAIL:
FREE 7 DAY DECLUTTERING CHALLENGE
jumpstart your decluttering in just 30 minutes a day!
FREE 7 DAY DECLUTTERING CHALLENGE
jumpstart your decluttering in just 30 minutes a day!
Tired of a messy home?
_______________________
I can help! Clean your home in under 30 minutes a day with this free weekly cleaning printable.
YOUR NAME:
YOUR EMAIL:
TIRED OF CLUTTER?
_________________________________________
Sign up for the free 7 day decluttering challenge. Jumpstart your decluttering in just 30 minutes a day!
YOUR NAME:
YOUR EMAIL: