There’s a new challenge going on in the personal finance blog community.  I learned about it from Get Rich Slowly, but it originated at I Will Teach You To Be Rich.  The challenge is to save $1000 in 30 days (the 30 days of November).  Each day, I Will Teach You… will post a new task/suggestion with which to save money.

 

This sounds intriguing.  I’m not going to sign up officially, but I’m going to see how far I can get towards that goal.

 

I already save $500/month, not including what I put into my IRA each month.  I’m not sure I can save another $1000 on top of that.  So I’m going to shoot for $500, for a total of $1000 (again, not including IRA).  If I do better than that, great!

 

The first task, for Nov. 1, was to pack lunches for the rest of the week.  I already do this.  I’m going to be out of town Friday, so I may have to eat out for lunch that day.  Otherwise, I should have no problem packing lunch for the rest of the month.  During a normal month, I probably eat lunch out once, at the school cafeteria.  So packing lunches would only save me $7.00.  I have an alternate idea – don’t spend any more money on making lunch for this month; only make do with what I already have in the pantry.  I should be able to do this.  As a matter of fact, I didn’t have to buy groceries this weekend, so I can challenge myself to eat totally out of the pantry for the rest of the month.  All I should have to buy is milk, eggs, and any staples I might run out of.  I spend about $150 on groceries per month, so I should be able to save about $125 of that.

 

The second task, for Nov. 2, was to turn the thermostat down 3 degrees.  Well, my heating system is off.  I don’t anticipate having to use it all month.  I budget $100/month for electricity.  My bill when the system is off can be as low as $30.00.  Let’s say I can save $65 this month on electricity by not turning on the heat pump.

 

Yesterday’s task was to sell something on eBay.  I’m not sure what I have left to sell; I’ve decluttered and downsized pretty thoroughly.  I’ll look around, though, and see what I can find.  I’ve never used eBay, so that would be a new challenge in itself.

 

Whatever I do save in this challenge will go towards the emergency fund.

 

It’ll be fun to see what each day’s task is.