In Ep. 148 of the Mullooly Asset Show, Tom talks about how to help your waistline AND your budget. The average American spends over $3,400 a year eating out instead of making food at home. This is hurting not only your budget but most likely your diet as well.

Show Notes

‘This May Be the ‘Single Easiest’ Way to Slash Your Bills – But Americans Too Often Don’t Do It’ – MarketWatch

What Should We Make For Dinner? Reservations – Transcript

Tom Mullooly: In episode 148, we’re going to fix your waistline and fix your budget at the same time. So stick around. Welcome to the Mullooly Asset Show.

I’m your host Tom Mullooly and this is episode number 148. Thanks for tuning in. Read something today and we’ll link to it in the show notes about a big budget buster for American families. One in three Americans, that’s a lot of people, one in three Americans admit that their budget buster is going out to eat. Now I dated a woman in college. The end of the relationship came when I asked her, “What do you often like to make for dinner?” She said, “Reservations.”

According to the Bureau of Labor Statistics, that’s the BLS, the average American household spends $3400 a year eating out. Now think about that. That’s about just under $300 a month just going out to restaurants and we’re not even talking about fancy places. This could be Chili’s. If the average tab for dinner is $65 or $70, that means you’re going out to eat once a week to a restaurant. What the heck? This is easy, an easy way to trim something from your waistline because the food that they get in the restaurant is usually not very healthy and it’s also very expensive. Food’s a lot cheaper if you can buy it at the store and cook it on your own and eat at home or, now that we’re in the summer months, you can grill. Food’s delicious and you’re saving yourself a lot of money by eating at home.

Some money bloggers have actually shown that they’ve been able to save $9000, $10000 a year just by cutting back, not eliminating, but just cutting back on their going out to eat habits. And we won’t even go into picking up a bar tab, that’s really expensive after a while. So a good lesson I’ve always found when talking to clients in food economics, have kids. You’re going to find out very quickly how expensive eating out can truly be. So this is another way that you can save money and it’s almost invisible, in your monthly budget if you can eliminate, if you’re going out four times, that’s once a week. Hey, one time you stay in or you go out two times a month or something like that.

It’s an easy way to trim some of the fat, ha ha, from your waistline, I know I shouldn’t speak, and from your budget as well. So thanks for tuning into episode 148 and we’ll catch you next time.

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