If you weigh up the average full-time wage of Australian millennials and the cost to rent in our capital cities, it’s easy to hone in on rent as the biggest financial outlay.
Get a housemate
If you can both bear to add a third wheel to your well-oiled dream machine – and as long as your home lends itself to it – taking on a housemate can do wonders for your wallets. Sharing the rent, bills, cooking and chores will lighten the financial, as well as domestic, workload.
Similarly, depending on your rental agreement, you might also be able to rent out your pad when you go away for the weekend (on Airbnb for example), or even rent out your place for other people’s events/meetings/photo shoots.
Share the supper love
Start a bring-a-dish supper club with your friends. Eating out is a sure fire-way of whittling away any spare cash, especially if it’s a regular occurrence. Embracing a supper club with your mates – where everyone brings a dish and you all take it in turns to host – will save you all money.
Create a mood board
Dreaming of a white picket fence in your dream home or desperate for that 10-day overseas holiday you haven’t had in a couple of years? Just having a goal is sometimes not enough to motivate you: Enter the visual mood board! Create a dreamy mood board filled with inspo, whether it be a holiday or your dream home. Hang your board in a high foot-traffic space so you can see it daily; it will act as a wallet-friendly reminder to keep your mind on the prize when you get tempted to splurge on unnecessary things.
Declutter your stuff
Between the two of you, you’ll likely have plenty of clutter clogging up your lives. Whether it’s one-off camping gear you rarely use, tools, snorkelling gear or bikes, even clothes – many of your belongings are assets sitting there waiting to earn you some extra bucks. Hop onto one of Facebook’s many Buy Swap Sell groups, pop your sales hat on and get selling.
Rent out the car space
If you have an unused garage, consider renting it out. Likewise your car and even your curb (check out the handy parking app, Kerb). Car Next Door sets you up with everything you need to rent out your car (or van, convertible or SUV).
Drop those exy lunches
Love eating out and buy your lunch every day? Try to make this a one-off and instead master the art of food prep. Stick some music on, open a bottle of wine and get into the habit of batch cooking on a Sunday afternoon together.
From Monday through to Friday, taking a home-prepped lunch to work is one of the quickest and easiest ways to save money. Just don’t blow all your saved cash on fancy brunches at the weekend!
Get a side hustle
Pool your joint skills and start a side hustle. If your partner is a dab hand in the kitchen why not get them making jams, chutneys or brownies and sell them at local farmers’ markets? Don’t hate ironing? Love Netflix? Combine the two and make money at the same time – you’ll always find people who are prepared to pay for someone else to iron their clothes. And if you both do it: Double whammy.
Surround yourself with a team of professionals who can provide you with ongoing support and expertise in securing your financial future.
The Addisons Team are here to help!
