How to save money on your household expenses

Running a household is extremely expensive and you may find all the money you earn goes straight back out on bills after payday. However, if you want to leave a little extra for you to enjoy yourself, read on to find out some tips on saving money on your household expenses.

Find a good mortgage deal

Your biggest expense every month is likely to be your mortgage, with this typically taking a huge chunk out of homeowners' wages. Therefore, if you can find a way to get a better home loan offer, you can drastically improve your financial situation.

After the term of your mortgage has come to an end – typically between two and five years – you can shop around for a better deal. Generally speaking, this is when your loan provider may hike up your mortgage costs; therefore, it is worthwhile finding a new package that offers low rates before you have to begin paying more every month for your house or flat.

There are several mortgage calculators on the internet you can use to determine what loan products are available to you, depending on how much equity you have in the house, your income and what variety of mortgage you want.

Shop around for bills

After your mortgage, bills such as gas, electricity, water, internet and phone eat away at your income. Therefore, anywhere you can save a bit of cash will, no doubt, help you greatly.

It is worthwhile to shop around for better deals every so often. You might think it is time-consuming to do this research, and it is certainly easier to remain with the same provider for years on end. However, it is likely you won't be getting the best rates by doing this.

If you periodically change provider, you will benefit from better packages, and you may find that your current supplier will lower your bills if you simply suggest you're planning to move.

Save money on your car

While most of us can't live without our cars, there is no doubt that owning a vehicle be very costly. As well as the general expense of buying a car, you need to consider the running costs, taking out car insurance, road tax, MOT and paying for repairs every so often.

You can cut down on how much money you spend on your car by reducing how much you use it. Simply by opting for public transport or travelling on foot every once in a while may significantly cut down on how much money you spend on fuel, and it will also slow down the wear and tear of your automobile, saving you garage costs.

It is also worth looking on price comparison sites for cheap car insurance deals when yours is due to expire. You may find better packages or more cost-effective insurance policies offered by other suppliers, so never remain with the same provider without looking around first.

Make cutbacks in the home

You can look around for the best deals possible, but if you're not being sensible with how you use your gas, electricity and phone in the house, you will still find your bills are steep.

The best way to see savings is to reduce the time you have your heating on for, as this consumes a lot of energy and may make your gas or electricity bill very expensive, especially during the winter months. You can wrap up in warm clothes and use thick duvets at night.

For more long-lasting solutions, consider getting your loft and pipes insulated as this will slash the amount of heat lost in the house. It is also worth fitting double-glazed windows if you don't have any.

With regards to your communications bills, control the amount of data you download on the internet and try not to make too many outgoing calls – particularly international ones.

Look for BOGOF deals

Where many families spend a lot of their cash is in the supermarket, as it can be very expensive to feed a lot of children. Therefore, it is important you look for any way you can to cut back on the amount you spend on your weekly shop.

This includes looking for deals, including buy-one-get-one-free (BOGOF) offers. If you can get two for the price of one, you can save on your food bill, but be careful you don't end up buying surplus items just because they're on promotion.