Savings series: 7 ways living a more sustainable life can save you money

I'm planning a series of weekly money saving posts. Saving money is occupying a lot of my time at the moment as I'm on maternity leave so we are living on The Chippy's (hubby's) wage and our savings. However, I'm also trying to live more sustainably. Sometimes there's a bit of a misconception that living sustainably is an expensive way to live for the average family. This is probably true of things like organic food, renewable energy, hybrid cars and the like. But there are also plenty of ways the average family can actually save money by making sustainable choices.

So, to kick off my savings series; here are 7 ways I think living more sustainably can save you money, and one sneaky bonus at the end.

1. You focus on reducing waste: When you focus on reducing waste, you buy less and use what you have more efficiently.

• Food: Focus on only buying what you need, storing food properly, prioritising produce that needs using up first and eating or freezing leftovers. You wouldn't throw $20 in the bin, so why throw out the equivalent in uneaten groceries every week?
• Petrol: Shopping less often, combining multiple errands in one trip or taking the bus or walking short distances will reduce your environmental impact and save money. 
• Packaging: Avoiding overly processed and packaged foods means cooking from scratch with real ingredients which is cheaper since you're not paying someone else to make if for you or for the packaging. 
• Electricity & gas: When you monitor your usage and try to use less, the added benefit is, you save money on your bill. 

2. You're happy with 2nd hand and DIY: Whether it's clothes, homewares, furniture, kids toys or something else; 2nd hand saves money and the planet. Plus upcylcing and DIY is kind of addictive.

Know your prices though. Op shops can sometimes be expensive (especially for clothes unless you're lucky to stumble on brand name items, which I have often found brand new). Other options include baby & kids markets, Freecycle, ebay, Gumtree and Facebook buy swap sell pages or pay it forward pages.

Giving away or selling your used items on these avenues might also make you a bit of cash and saves landfill.

3. You no longer view shopping as a hobby: When you stop shopping for something to do rather than things you need you consume less resources, save money, free up a whole lot of time and avoid unnecessary clutter.

Find a free hobby or one that saves, or even makes you money. Learn a useful skill. Baking, cooking from scratch, reading, blogging, running... The possibilities are just about endless.

Learning to sew has saved me money as I can do simple repairs and make basic items so I don't have to pay someone else or replace with a new item. It also makes me enough money to give my kids some pocket money as I do some sewing for a local mum and make some basic things to sell via Facebook and ebay as a hobby.

4. You choose better quality that lasts longer: Recently I read a quote that went something along the lines of "If the best thing about an item is the price, you don't need it". Don't buy stuff just because it's cheap or on sale. Buying something because it is cheap is often false economy.

Choosing the best quality you can afford can save money in the long run since it likely needs to be replaced less often. This also leads to less consumption, less strain on our resources and less landfill.

5. You use less meat: Let's face it, meat is expensive. With every drought, and with more mouths to feed on the planet with the same finite amount of land, food can only get more expensive. Most people eat far too much meat and according to the OECD graph in this article, Aussies are the top offenders http://www.1millionwomen.com.au/blog/china-wants-people-eat-less-meat-and-planet-will-benefit/.

Now my name is "Mum. In moderation". I'm not here to advocate for the whole world turning vegan (but good for you if you want to!), because I think getting several billion people to suddenly stop eating meat all together is an unrealistic expectation.

But, luckily, living more sustainably by eating a little less meat in each meal or eating 1 or 2 meat free meals a week can also help ease the burden on your grocery budget. We've implemented meat-free Mondays here. I'm learning new vegetarian recipes and The Chippy and kids are yet to complain (in fact, I'm not sure they've even noticed). I also stretch out meat in most recipes like spag bol, taco mince, butter chicken and the like by adding lentils, beans, chickpeas and veges. The added benefit is it's healthier too!

6. You embrace home-made green cleaners: Making your own cleaners from simple grocery items like vinegar, bicarb and borax reduces the amount of chemicals going down the drain as well as processing and packaging. Happily, they are also really, really cheap!

7. You mend and make do and are content with what you have: Button falls off a cardigan? No need to buy a new one, it's a 5 minute fix. Screw loose in a chair? You can fix that easily too. We don't need to replace and update things all the time when what we have is perfectly adequate. Learning to be content with what you have instead of worrying about what the people next door have will probably save you the most money and avoids unnecessary consumption.

The bonus tip? You avoid plastic kids toys with flashing lights and noise that need batteries; the biggest benefit of course being to saving your sanity!

By the way if there's a particular area you'd like to save money on, leave me a comment and I'll do my best to come up with some ideas.