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Pack Your Own Lunch

July 12th, 2015 at 11:29 am

How do you spend your lunch hour?

Lining up in a cafeteria queue? Combing the streets for food?

Or are you the type of person who brings your own lunch that you prepared the night before?

In a budgetary sense, the obvious choice should be to take your own lunch to work. In some ways you miss out on the mystery of having a different meal prepared for you each day, but the savings are huge.

I would imagine, for simplicities sake that most people would spend on average around $10 on lunch. If you buy a $2 salad or some other bargain like that then keep going, you are on to something good! Most people, however, would say that $10 might even be a little on the conservative end.

The maths looks like this:

$10 per day x 5 working days in a week x 48 working weeks = $2,400 per year.

Want to hear something crazy? Doing this over a 45 year working life equates to $108,000 of after-tax, hard earned income!

This one simple change could potentially pay off your home loan.

A few important considerations however is that you should still occasionally go out with your peers on occasion. Don’t be a Neville Nofriends (apologies if your name is Neville).

The other factor is to consider though, is that if you were to do this every day, it would lose that special feeling. Things done repetitively can quickly lose their sense of excitement.

One way to physically see the change is to put the money you save each week in a jar. After a month, count it out and bank it. The financial momentum you gain will make the change you made seem worth it.

5 Responses to “Pack Your Own Lunch”

  1. VS_ozgirl Says:
    1436702570

    I love to buy lunch on a Friday but it's a good idea to work out what some cheaper options are available too. (For me a couple of sushi rolls is around $5, a salad roll also around $5. A treat is lasagne or a nice focaccia, both around $8.50. Also soup & roll I managed to get for around $5). I couldn't buy every day and I also never buy coffee, I make it at home and have it before I leave.

  2. scottish girl Says:
    1436711971

    I try to pack my lunch most of the time, although I sometimes get something from the vending machine.

  3. Butterscotch Says:
    1436713012

    I'm terrible about buying lunch every day. I easily spend $50 week on morning coffee and lunches combined. I wantt o stop, but I'm addicted to the convince!

  4. My English Castle Says:
    1436720373

    MY DH gets lunch free at work. It's a great benefit and has saved us tons.

  5. BudgetBrilliance Says:
    1436762180

    Free lunch would be an incredible perk, so long as it's healthy. If you can get it cheap that also helps. Occasionally I'll take one of those Aldi microwave meals by 'Health and Vitality'. They work out to be around $2.41 USD. Make a convenient dinner too.

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