Budget Mondays

Monday – 4/14/2014

It’s Monday – a painful day for most people, yours truly included. Sometimes it is made even more painful as we remember just how much money we ended up spending over the weekend.

Budget

It’s one word that can make people cringe, angry and sad all at the same time, a rare occurrence indeed. There are plenty of reasons for this – people are told at work that their budgets are being cut, their ideas cannot be funded because they are not in the budget, and in our personal life, our budgets don’t usually quite match up to our desires.

After the beautiful weather this weekend, almost everyone has made the transition from winter mode into spring mode. As we have been discussing for the last several weeks, there is no reason that spring time, or spring cleaning, needs to break your budget. Cleaning up the front yard, watering all of those plants you are buying (as well as your yard), and prepping the backyard for entertaining are all common things that go on during this time of year. There is, however, one task that takes up a large amount of time, and expense during this time of year, but does not receive large amounts of attention.

Laundry.

Doing laundry is something that might go unnoticed during most budget planning processes, but higher water usage can really eat into your budget during this time of year. Washing bed sheets, summer clothes, blankets, and all sorts of tablecloths and outdoor wear that has been boxed up since the fall can really add up. Let’s look at a few ways to cut your water spending:

•Buy store brand detergent in bulk
•Wash cold water only
•Wash only full loads
•Clean the dryer’s lint filter
•Take advantage of off-peak hours (if available)
•Use high-speed spin cycles

Happy Reading!

http://money.msn.com/saving-money-tips/post.aspx?post=110a64b8-5485-466b-a0a4-52618b6367ae