How often do you eat out in The City? City Survival Tip

What do you like to do after work?

If you are like me, you are out enjoying The City most nights. The point of living in a bustling urban center is to enjoy its beautiful energy, right?! This is extremely important to me. It’s such a rush exploring new places, or going back to familiar ones with loved ones. On any given week, my typical routine includes a run in the morning or on my lunch break so that I can enjoy The City life after my day job. I work over a metro stop, so I can pretty much head anywhere in the area for a drink and bite. Let’s explore some City Survival Tips.

I live in the San Francisco Bay Area, so most of my money spent out is on wine (my wine club is the coolest) and diverse cuisine. You can find amazing options here, but then again everyone probably has the best taco shop, the best Laotian stand, the coolest underground pub in their city. What’s your favorite spot to explore in your city? I’d love to join you!

I look at my financial picture on Personal Capital every day. City Survival Tip #1

It has amazing tools to deep dive into spending habits, income, and investment gains. Over the last three months I realized something scary. I’ve been spending way too much going out at night. This is an issue because exploring The City is linked to my happiness.

In January, February, and March, I spent nearly $4,000 on food, beer, and wine at restaurants. That’s over $1,300/month, $328/week, or $43/day! And that doesn’t even include breakfast and the meals I eat at home. Yikes! I feel like an idiot.

The snapshot above shows some of my other spending. I realized that I also spent $1,251 over three months on groceries, and I am always throwing food away because it goes bad. I need to change my habits. What I really need to do is save more money and invest in my future! I am not saving enough for retirement, let alone for more immediate investments like a house down payment. Real estate is one of the fastest growing investments in cities right now. We will explore ways to save for a down payment in future posts (I was able to buy a condo with 10% down, but I’m looking to upgrade to a house).

I started to think about how I can change my habits without compromising my interests and happiness. City Survival Tip #2

Last year, my fiancé and I stopped drinking for the month prior to running a marathon. We saved so much money. In fact, looking back, we saved $1,000 that month compared with other months. We did not go out after work, nor did we have any other aspect of a social life since we were training. It was hard, but we did it and kicked butt at the marathon. BUT, I do not want to have to do that again to save money. It was miserable. Yes, I dropped 10 pounds and felt ridiculously healthy, but we were not fulfilled. We were paying an arm and a leg to live in The City, but we were not enjoying what it has to offer.

Here is my challenge to myself. A month of eating at home and not drinking is too long to maintain my social life, but I think I can go one week a month. I’m still going to go out with friends, but I’m going to cook and eat dinner at home. A week without a rose or IPA will do me good as well.

According to my calculations (thank you Personal Capital),

I can save $300 per month, all while maintaining a reasonable degree of social and city interaction for 3 weeks, and cutting back on eating out for one of the weeks. Check back in on May 1^st to see how I did!

What am I going to do with this extra $300? City Survival Tip #3