Raising children is not an inexpensive task. There are plenty of estimates out there that usually total the average price of raising a child from birth to adulthood to cost hundreds of thousands of pounds in total, not even including the possibility of exorbitant education costs or unforeseen medical circumstances. For families that do not have a considerable amount of money lying around, or for families who want to instil good financial practices, this prospect can be startling at first.
Thankfully, there are plenty of ways that you can practice living a frugal lifestyle, even if you have multiple children to raise. With that being said, living frugally with multiple children will generally become easier over time, not only because you will have hand-me-downs, but also because you will be able to learn how to manage each child as they grow up.
However, before you can begin learning about how to live a frugal lifestyle, you will want to have a good understanding of what it means to do this. It is important to understand what the definition of frugal living is, how people employ it in their daily lives, and how you can work on it through various situations.
What Does it Mean to Live Frugally?
Living frugally, by definition, means that you live a frugal lifestyle. Frugal is often the equivalent of other words, such as sparing, thrifty, or prudent in an economical sense. Living frugally can cover a particular area of expenses that you do not want to waste money on, such as vacations and luxuries, or it can cover how you handle the entirety of your finances.
For families that are trying to do their best financially while raising young children, living a frugal life will often mean practicing frugal spending in all aspects of life aside from purchasing toys for very young children.
In a sense, living frugally means that you do not spend more than you realistically have to. Of course, there is a spectrum to everything, and in some extreme cases of frugal living, that might mean having almost no material possessions. In other cases, and in the majority of them, it often just means that you look for clearances, pre-owned items, and that you do not care about the brand-name of most items.
Living a frugal lifestyle generally means that you are trying to be as efficient with your money as possible so that you can have a strong savings account in place for college funds, potential emergencies with children, or simply to have more than enough money if you eventually need it.
Ways to Live Frugally as a Family
There are many, many different ways that you can practice frugal living. One aspect that applies to almost every category of life is going to be shopping at stores that you may not consider to be your first choice. These stores can include consignment shops, other forms of pre-owned stores, thrift stores, and so on. Here, you can generally get what you need without having to pay considerable prices for the label on a piece of clothing.
If you're lucky, you may actually find brand-name clothing at one of these stores, offering your children a chance to have something special without it costing you too much. Many families report saving £50-100 per month on clothing alone by shopping secondhand.
Another key idea of living frugally is the fact that you will generally not be loyal to any brand-name products. Of course, if there is a fundamental difference between an off-brand product and a brand-name that makes the less expensive alternative impossible to use as a replacement, then you may have to stick with the brand-name. But, for the most part, you are going to want to try and go with the less expensive off-brand variant of items in stores and online.
This especially applies to grocery stores, where the store-brand is almost completely the same as the name-brand, but at a fraction of the price. You could save £30-50 monthly just by switching to own-brand groceries.
Finally, another way that you can cut down on excess spending is simply not spending nearly as much on personal products. This might mean using a store-brand of makeup or other beauty product rather than a famous brand-name, or maybe not even wearing makeup. This might mean waiting to purchase the last generation of electronics if you suddenly need a new phone, rather than buying the newest one on the market.
Practicing Frugality Online
With online shopping becoming as much of a monolith as it has today, it is even easier to live a frugal lifestyle. When practicing frugality online, you will usually balance out the potential shipping costs (although it is best to search for shops that offer free shipping) with the various online deals that you can get.
There are plenty of rewards lists out there as well as reviews that you can scour for and research to ensure that you are getting the most for your money. On top of all of this, there are plenty of websites that are designed to gather usable coupon codes for discounts on most major online retailers. While these may not always work, the possibility of getting a good discount on an online order is something that you shouldn't ever try to pass up.
Use cashback sites like TopCashback and Quidco to earn money back on purchases you're already making. These can add up to £50-100 per year. In addition to the coupon codes and discounts that many places offer alongside memberships, email lists, and the like, many places will also offer cash-back deals. While it may not help you save a portion in the moment, cash-back programs pay themselves off over time and are worth checking out if they cover places that you shop at regularly.
Shopping online also helps to reduce some of the temptation that comes with seeing items you want on the shelves in the store. Instead, you can simply search for the specific items you want and not spare any time looking at potentially distracting items. This can help you save a good amount of money on your purchases – around £20-30 monthly for many families.
Living Frugally with Children
Practicing a frugal life with children is going to be more difficult than without, but as you get better at practicing frugality and your child becomes old enough to properly understand "no" without throwing a tantrum, it will become easier in time. The hardest parts of this are going to be when your child is too young to understand what it means when they cannot get what they want the moment they ask for it, as you will not be able to effectively explain it to them.
You should still try to work on building the foundation of "No means no" when you say that you will not buy something so that you can get a head start on reducing the tantrums from disappointed toddlers. One way that you can also help to combat this, when your child is a little bit older, is to allow your child to make one purchase of their own in a store. This helps to teach them the importance of choosing items they want, and when they grow old enough to understand what it means to manage an allowance, it will help with this as well.
Teaching children frugal values early can benefit them for a lifetime, and it puts money back in your budget right now – potentially saving £200+ monthly across all categories.
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