How to Complete a No Spend Challenge to Save Hundreds
How to Complete a No Spend Challenge to Save Hundreds
If you are looking for a way to save money, a no-spend challenge is a great option to consider. Often people immediately dismiss no-spend challenges because they believe it will be too difficult to do. In reality, though, you are already probably spending waaaay more on needless things than you think.
Consider this statistic from a USA Today article:
“The average adult in the USA spends $1,497 a month on nonessential items, according to research commissioned by Ladder and conducted by OnePoll. All told, that’s roughly $18,000 a year on things we can all do without. And that’s a lot of money, considering the extent to which Americans are letting their savings and other crucial goals fall by the wayside.”
That number is staggering!!! Almost $1,500 a month? Imagine what an additional $1,500 per month would do to your debt payoff, savings, or investing goals.
Now, before I get a bunch of naysayers, “But, Kate, I barely bring home $1,500 a month!” Let me say this: Even if you don’t come anywhere near to saving that much, no matter what you save by embarking on your no spend challenge is worth it! Don’t believe me? Give it a try and see!
My First No Spend Challenge
I completed my first No Spend Challenge in February of 2018. It was toward the end of the month, and I decided I was going to get serious about finances, and not spend any money for the last 10 days of the month. None. Whatsoever. I didn’t put any thought into it. I didn’t put any planning into it. I just decided to do it.
And Y’all.
It. Was. Hard.
I completed the challenge, but man was it a lot tougher than I thought it would be. And I pretty much hated every minute of it.
The next month, I decided I would change things up a bit to make the challenge easier to complete. And I’ve done a No-Spend Challenge every single month since then. With success. Here’s how.
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1. Set Your Own Rules
When I post about my No-Spend Challenges on Instagram, I always get a lot of questions about what the rules are. First let me say this: YOU are in charge of your money. YOU get to decide what works well for you and what doesn’t. For me, not spending for 10 straight days in a row was next to impossible. So, I set my own rules. Here are the rules I use:
No Spending Money for 15 Days of Each Month. For me, this is soooooo much easier to do than trying to do 10 days all in a row. I love doing 15 days each month, so by the end of the year, I can say I went 6 months without spending a thing! But you don’t have to commit to every single month, just try it for a month and see how it goes!
Necessities Don’t Count. You have to pay things like your mortgage and utilities, so for me, the days I pay required bills don’t count as spending days. It’s the unnecessary mindless spending I’m trying to get rid of here, so anything else is fair game. Things I don’t count include: groceries, mortgage and utilities, gasoline for the car, and other required expenses like life insurance premiums or medical prescriptions. Anything else is fair game!
Other Rules to Consider. You may want to decide that if you purchase anything with a gift card, that it doesn’t count. Or you may decide that if you sell something and use the proceeds to make a purchase, that doesn’t count either. The whole point is to craft a challenge that will be challenging—yet not impossible—to stick to, so you actually complete the challenge and save money! You get to make the rules for your challenge!
2. Track Your Progress with a Habit App or Just Pen and Paper.
I don’t know about you, but I am so much more successful with a goal when I constantly monitor my progress. You can’t expect to succeed at a no-spend challenge if you just go about your normal life, and then look, at the end of the month, to see how many days you didn’t spend. You need to be constantly monitoring your progress. You need to know how many no-spend days you have left to reach your goal at all times.
I love tracking my progress with a habit app. The one I love is called Habit Share (not a sponsored post—I just really love this app). It lets you set a goal and then provides a calendar for you to mark in green for success or red for failure.
Here’s a screen shot from May 2018, one of my more successful months—20 no-spend days!! I use this app to track my spending each and every month, since I do a No-Spend Challenge every single month. I can go back in time and tell you exactly how many days I spent money over the past year. For me, if I am about to make a purchase, knowing I have to put a big red mark on my calendar helps to keep me in check.
This app also lets you make notes. So for each of my spend days, I make a note and write down what I bought. With this app, I can review everything I spent money on for the entire year!
You can also see the % at the top of the app, in this case 52%. That means I have not spent any money 52% of the days I’ve been tracking. Better than half!
3. Be Accountable
Share your progress with someone who will hold you accountable. It doesn’t even have to be someone you know in real life. I share screenshots from my no-spend app on my Instagram stories all the time. Knowing I have thousands of followers who will be interested in my spending habits, and whom I am trying to inspire to manage money well, keeps me in line.
4. Keep a List of Everything You Want to Buy
Focusing on all the things you want to buy during a No-Spend Challenge may not sound like the best advice, but stay with me here. I came across this idea from one of my favorite books, Soulful Simplicity by Courtney Carver. (Side Note: Highly Recommend!!)
As you go about your No-Spend Challenge, keep a list of everything you want to buy and how much it costs. But don’t buy it. At the end of the challenge, add up how much money you would have spent if you just splurged on every single thing you wanted to buy. Then ask yourself this question: If someone handed me that amount of money right now—would I go out and buy those things, or would I rather just have that cash? Chances are, you’d rather have the cash.
I made this free little printable if you’d like to use it on your No-Spend Challenge.
Note: If you’ve ever downloaded this tracker before, and you sign up again, I’ve heard reports that it won’t work. If you don’t get your tracker, email me at info@livingthatdebtfreelife.com, and I will personally make sure you get a copy!!
Keeping this list is a great way to find out just how much you saved on your No-Spend Challenge. If you go out to lunch on work days every day at $8/day, that’s $160/month. Do it only half the time and you’ve already saved $80. Grabbing at $5 cup of coffee each weekday morning totals $100 in coffee alone! Cut back your coffee habit to half the time and you’ve saved $50! That’s $130 monthly savings on just coffee and lunch—and you still get to have coffee and lunch!
I love this 15-day method for beginners, since you still get to enjoy some splurges. But the savings to be gained from cutting back your spending half of the time really do add up! Send that extra money to debt to propel yourself to debt freedom even faster!
Have you ever completed a No-Spend Challenge? How did it go? Do you think you could do this 15-day version?
Want to find out about the other methods I used to help us pay off $68K in debt last year alone?
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You may also be interested in these other posts about saving money:
Five Things We Cut To Save Over $3,500 a Year
Three Simple Tricks to Avoid Fast Food and Still Get Dinner on The Table Fast
