How many times have you complained about not making it to the end of the month? Your friends want to go to a bar, but you’re not sure you can give away $10 for a Blue Moon that’s only $3 in Walgreens. How can they even afford a drink at this point when they’ve been clutching a Starbucks cup every day of the semester?
Well, my friends, they clearly uphold a very lavish lifestyle. Yet you’re not alone. College students typically do not manage their own income. Most of us, are all financially dependent on our parents. And for those who aren’t, well you’ve got your life put together.
So until that friend of ours with a stable job decides to give us all a workshop on how to remain mentally stable while being fully enrolled in college and juggling a full-time paying job, we’ve got to budget. And here are 3 ways you can slim down on your spending while keeping up with all the benefits of a healthy social life.
1. Try Cooking!
Don’t be afraid to turn on a stove. We’ve all burnt the occasional veggie, melted one or two kitchen utensils or even set off the fire alarm at some point. I’m pretty sure even Ivy League students have had to finesse their way out of making a college dorm evacuate.
Truth is, cooking can be a great way to save! Investing 50 USD in Trader Joe’s can feed you for about two weeks. And no one needs extravagant Gordon Ramsay cooking skills to open a can of tuna or cook up a cup of rice.
A hand-full of websites that can give you a jump-start are:
2. Uninstall Uber
Trust me, you can live without it. A fifteen-minute walk really isn’t that bad. And you get the added bonus of exercising while you’re at it!
Now, if you very much despise the idea of walking, and the cold is just not letting you pull through, then use the subway! Replace Uber with CityMapper, it gives you every form of transportation possible. Not only that, it shows you when the next two or three buses/trains are coming which, trust me, is not something to take for granted.
3. P R E G A M E
When I first got to New York, going out was clearly an activity of the 1%. 15 dollars for a drink? It better be laced with 14 karat gold. I genuinely doubted whether they had sneaked a roofie in there and had the indecency to even charge me for it.
But there’s a simple and clear solution to this: pre-game! Suggest you and your friends meet up earlier at an apartment to grab a couple of drinks. This way, you’re already litty by the time you get to the club, and you save yourself fifteen to thirty bucks.
Stop by Trader Joe’s, get their amazing Riesling seven dollar wine, and you’re good to go. Here’s the Reverse Wine Snob list for Trader Joe’s best affordable wines; you’re welcome.
Coming up next: Reverse Wine Snob List Tested, the College Student Top 10 collection.
There’s no need to pass on that Sunday Brunch you planned for Galentine's Day, just stick to these 3 basic tips and you’ll be cutting back your spending without even trying. Okay, maybe that 15-minute walk will require a bit of physical exercise from your part, but you’ve been sitting in classes all day, let's burn a few calories.
