The No-Spend Challenge

Are you ready for a completely new ‘financial you?’ Are you ready to supercharge some financial goals at the same time? 

Join me, Sarah Catherine Gutierrez of Aptus Financial, for the “Back to School No-Spend Challenge” on August 15. 

For one month we will say “no” to frivolous spending, mindless Amazon carts, spontaneous Venmos and Cashapps. What we really need we will figure out workarounds. What we don’t really need we will say “no for now” and see if we still really want it a month later. 

Why in the world would we ever want to do this? The answer is: it is the best way to break spending patterns. To get back to what spending brings value, joy, and fulfillment in our lives, we have to stop all spending. Then the spending that is mindless, habit, or even aligned with other people’s values rather than our own (hello, social media!) can stop long enough for us to realize we don’t need or miss it.  

The month after the no-spend is exciting. You love the money in your bank accounts and also love putting those daily or weekly luxuries back in your life. Only this time, you only add the ones you miss. The spending you don’t add gets to go somewhere else, most likely to a financial goal, like toward a big trip you are planning, or savings for a home purchase or remodel. It could even be with the goal of increasing your savings rate at work as part of your goal to retire one day. 

The no-spend will work like this. Anything you must spend money on, like bills, groceries, gas, medications, etc. you keep spending money on. But your goal is to see if there is a way to spend less. Can you do an energy audit (they are free!) to see if you can lower your electric bill? Can you find any subscriptions or memberships that you can cut because you don’t use them anymore? Are you using that FSA for your prescriptions? 

Everything else that you spend money on? This is where you decide. You can go all the way and stop all spending on discretionary items and services, or you can choose a modified no-spend. 

An example of a modified no-spend is to limit one spending category, like Amazon. Let’s say you know Amazon is the only budget leak you have. In fact, you can even name your pattern. Sunday scaries keeping you up. You head over to Amazon, and minutes later you own a third blender. In every other area of your life you have control over purchases and your budget, and this no-spend will break the Amazon pattern. 

But most people I talk to just feel powerless in general on spending. In fact, that’s how I have been feeling the last couple of years. It’s why I am going full-in to the no-spend month and want to encourage you to join me. 

For one month wandering into stores as a fun pastime? Gone, unless you love torture. That $250 trip to Target when you went in for a tube of toothpaste? Gone. Dining out because you forgot to meal plan? Leftovers. 

Ok, I see your panic. Deep breaths. Stay with me. 

It’s just one month. August 15-September 14. One month.  

My last no-spend month was 5 years ago. I remember going into it thinking “Are you nuts? This is going to be terrible!” But in the end the experience was tremendous, and our budget benefited for a long time from some of the patterns we disrupted. 

Get this. I used to buy lunch 3-4 times per week just for myself. I pick up lunch for myself now, maybe once a year. It was a pattern I nearly eliminated once I realized that the cost of picking up lunch was just too high and that I also enjoyed eating my own food better. It is healthier and makes me feel better in the afternoons than eating a heavier lunch that can make me feel sluggish. 

If the average cost of lunch was $12 at the time, that is nearly $2,500 in savings derived from breaking the old pattern and creating a new pattern that I prefer. 

One evening during the no-spend, my dinner club met at a restaurant. I had a choice—join them and have water, or don’t go? I went, and my friends ribbed me a bit and rolled their eyes at my strict adherence. I had to sheepishly accept their donations of wine and portions of food from their plates.  Gosh, I felt like a total mooch, but in the end it was funny and made for a great story. 

But guess, what? Lesson learned. Dinner with the girlfriends is a BIG priority. It’s worth every last dime I spend on it.  

If you approach a no-spend month with an open mind then it’s not about deprivation, but rather it’s about learning more about yourself and what spending brings happiness and fulfillment and what spending could disappear literally unnoticed. It’s spending that then gets reassigned to areas that will bring more happiness and fulfillment. 

For me, I think about that experience. No Amazon purchases. No trips to Target. No impact to my personal happiness. What??? Over the months that followed, I was able to look at my impulses to spend urgently on items and call it a lie. I didn’t need them, no matter how hard my brain tried to convince me. 

We talk to so many people in our financial wellness programs who dine out multiple times a week for lunch or dinner and who could get a huge head start on goals by breaking that habit alone. If this is you, could you find some alternatives? Aptus’ Tessa Buckley has found her alternative to this expensive habit, and it’s picnics in the park. Maybe the same food as you would eat at home, but changing location could make it feel special.  

In crazy sports season time, do you get nickel-and-dimed by the sports drinks at the facility or gas station snacks? Think about the savings from just having the sports drink powder on hand and remembering to fill up an insulated jug before you leave. Have a bin of snacks ready to grab on your way out the door. The no-spend might take a little planning on the front-end but the time and money savings on the back-end could be significant. 

Which brings us to financial goals. What’s the one thing you want really badly right now? For me, I want to help out a friend going through a tough time. If you could wake up after this month and have money in your account, where would you want to put it? 

As many of you have probably seen, we have been teaching our “Pay Yourself First” budgeting system. It’s a system that encourages you to get savings safely deposited into important accounts first and leaving what’s leftover for bills and discretionary spending.  

Over the last 6 months I have transitioned my savings accounts associated with Step 2 of our “Pay Yourself First” budgeting system from my bank to the Elevault app, created through Southern Bancorp. Every month I have a lump sum auto transferred to Elevault from my bank and distributed to my different savings vaults (Home repair, home renovations, auto, clothing, gifts, health, pet).  

By moving them away from my main checking account I am less tempted to easily transfer the funds. And the app is made to encourage you to hit specific savings goals in each of the accounts. 

Bonus—the savings in each of the vaults is FDIC insured, and as of this date (August 1) is paying 4.6% interest! 

While it is not a requirement to use Elevault to participate in the no-spend, I will share my own Elevault app and teach anyone interested how they can use it, as well. 

Now for the details. You can participate in this no-spend by clicking the link right here. This registration for our kickoff meeting on August 15 at 3 PM CT will let us know how to stay in touch with you and encourage you during this one-month period. If you aren’t able to make the initial meeting but still want to participate, no worries. We will email you a recording. The kick-off call will be to answer questions and share with each other our excitement and concerns. And you will be invited to a weekly check-in to share your experiences and troubleshoot fun workarounds to immediate spending needs.  

Let’s no-spend together. It’s so much better with friends.