Weddingbee boards

I started doing the same thing when it became apparent my company was having layoffs - and I'm so glad I did, as I was laid off yesterday!  I manage all of our expenses in an excel spreadsheet, so I started looking for areas to cut.  Some things I found: 

 Netflix - it takes us forever to watch the movies, so I cancelled the subscription

Life Insurance - rates have changed considerably since I got my original policy, so I reviewed my options and was able to get more coverage at a lower rate (though it did require a lot of paperwork)

 Coffee - I was a daily Starbucks girl at one point in time - noticed huge savings when I cut that out (obviously)

Cell phone - took a look at what I was spending per month vs. minutes used - turned out their was a better plan for me (though my company used to cover part of it, so this will actually not be a savings when you factor in my paying for all of it now)

I also started cutting coupons and paying attention to grocery sales much more than I used too.  Started finding Lean Cuisine on sale and bringing them to work (and unfortunately left a few there, didn't think to grab them when I was escorted out). 

we went full throttle and cut off my insurance for my car...meaning it is basically insured to sit in my garage - but it saves us about $300/month and i now take the bus.  also we eat in most of the time (except our ritual sunday brunch).  funny - we added netflix to save money - we felt we were spending too much 'on demand.'

Thankfully the recession has not hit hard in terms of job loss in the city that I live in and we are very thankful for that. In any event, we have always lived in a way which we hope will keep us safe if one of us were to lose our jobs.

We bought a house with a mortgage that we can carry on only one of our salaries. My name isn't even on the mortgage as we wanted an amount that one of us could qualify for on our own.

We have a family plan with 2 cell phones and no landline.

We share one car that we bought together using cash. No car payments and because we are always planning how we are going to get places as we have to share we end up driving together a lot and saving gas.

We never buy anything on credit. With the exception of our mortgage and my student loans (which are now paid off). Even if it's 0% interest we pay cash instead. If you cannot pay for it in cash you cannot afford it.

We bought a lot of (good) used furniture instead of buying everything brand new. Often people are trying to get rid of quality furniture that is relatively new and you can pick it up for a fraction of the price of what it is worth.