How to cut costs in a crisis? 7 effective tips

Now more than ever, it is important to take care of money, because no one knows how long the quarantine will last and what consequences it will lead to for the economy. Together with our financial advisors, we have prepared for you a list of simple, but at the same time effective tips that will help you reduce costs in a crisis.

First, you need to determine the most expensive items of your expenses and find out whether they are really so important. You may find yourself buying too much takeaway coffee or not saving on light and water. Anatoly Protasov, an expert at the National Center for Financial Literacy (NCFG), recommends optimizing these costs by changing habits. For example, instead of buying coffee, you can take a hot drink from home in a thermocup, and also try to reduce your electricity consumption.

Now the most reasonable solution is to give up bad habits like smoking or drinking alcoholic beverages. In addition to reducing costs, this is always important for health, says Olga Senokosova, an expert at the NCFG. It is better to save the saved money for food or medicines.

Find out how much you spend on food, utilities, mobile communications, internet, and so on. All these are necessary expenses, and the rest of the family budget items can and even should be reduced. For example, online shopping or paid subscriptions to various services. Agree, now this is not the most important thing.

If you still have a need to buy some equipment or furniture, let it be used things, advises the expert of the NCFG Luiza Kononykhina. With the purchase of new things now it is better to wait, even if you are very attracted to discounts and promotional offers. Moreover, with a little effort, it is easy to turn old things into "new" ones. Here are some examples.

It always makes sense to buy more profitable products. For example, instead of a box with five bags of cereals, you can take 900 grams at once, and instead of single-use sticks of coffee — a large pack. With this simple life hack, you can save several hundred rubles a month, says the expert of the NCFG Lyubov Palacheva. The amount is not too large, but you can spend this money on more necessary things — paying for mobile communication or the Internet.

Yes, yes, you didn't think so. And it really has to do with saving. Often on the far shelves you can find things that you have long forgotten about-from the office to the wardrobe items. It is quite possible that these findings will help to avoid buying the same new things. In addition, unnecessary items can be sold on ad sites, and the proceeds can be spent usefully.

Experts have been talking about the need to make a shopping list for a long time. And we hope that everyone adheres to this recommendation. And indeed, going to the store with a pre-prepared list (where, as we remember, there should be only the most necessary things), you will spend much less money than if you go shopping at random.