In a crisis and a marked increase in food prices, every second person in Russia is looking for ways to save on food. But is it realistic to live without spending more than 4 thousand rubles a month? Experts are sure that this can be done without undermining one’s health. You can read more about how to live on 1000 rubles a week in this article.
Spend no more than 1000 rubles a week: is it real?
Recently, more and more people are paying attention to how they spend their money. Everyone knows the fact that no matter how much money a person receives, he will always find what to spend it on. People who receive large wages start spending it on more delicious tea, gluten-free Italian pasta, better meat, etc. Moreover, the nutritional properties of products themselves often remain at the same level, without significantly affecting health. If you structure your expenses and spend only a certain amount, you can easily save up for a vacation or a new gadget. Many people in Russia even receive wages below the subsistence level, therefore they are forced to approach their budget very rationally. The habit of saving on things and products can greatly help throughout life. Thanks to such savings, after some time you can buy a car or even buy an apartment. The main problem is that when saving money, we rarely see an instant result, therefore we prefer the distant prospect to momentary pleasure.
How to live on 1000 rubles a week? It is necessary to develop principles that you will follow regardless of your desires or mood. You will have to give up many impulses to buy something tasty, and most of the food should be prepared in advance for several days. It turns out that to save money you need to not only know the price of bread and other products, but also be able to manage your money and time in such a way that you can include purchases and cooking in the schedule of the week. The good news is that it’s not so difficult to do it - after some time all these actions will become a habit, and you yourself won’t notice how a decent amount has accumulated in your account.
Savings Rules
To the question "how to live on 1000 rubles a week" there is a definite answer: plan your budget. This simple action will not only allow you to determine the necessary items of expenditure, but also help to save on those things that you did not even think about.
- Keep track of income and expenses. Despite the obviousness of this advice, few have enough discipline even to record their expenses every day. Nevertheless, this will help you see where exactly your money is “floating” and where you can reduce costs.
- Buy clothes only on discount days, and use special applications to search for promotional products. For example, the “Edil” application allows you to track discounts on the things you need in the nearest stores.
- Analyze the need for spending and boldly abandon those without which you can live. At first glance it seems that without a glass of coffee in the morning, life is not nice. But if you save about 200 rubles a day on a trip to a coffee shop, then in a year the amount from such “cups” will reach 73 thousand rubles.
- Do not deviate from the planned budget. Even if it seems that buying a chocolate bar will not change much, thirty of these “goodies” can seriously undermine your savings. Better learn to please yourself with other things: good music or a walk in the fresh air.
- For complete savings, you will have to abandon bad habits: alcohol, cigarettes, food in food courts and purchase various snacks and rolls in stores. All these habits are quite expensive, and do not bring any benefits.
Procedure
The habit of saving is a very useful and valuable skill that can help in any difficult situation. The main thing in saving is a clear and detailed plan, from which you should not deviate a single step. Making a list of products for the week will help you determine your menu for every day. This is quite difficult to do, since you need to consider not only the cost of the products, but also their nutritional value. Nutritionists do not recommend using too many simple carbohydrates, so try to include cereals, protein sources, and seasonal vegetables or fruits.
- Prescribe your preferred meal options. This list will be a kind of "fish" of the future menu.
- Next, you need to find out the price of all products listed on your list. Try to choose the cheapest analogues. That part of them that does not fit into the budget will have to be deleted or replaced with something else. For example, instead of expensive beef or coho salmon, you can substitute whole chicken or inexpensive varieties of white fish (pollock, cod) in the list. So you leave the value of your menu at the same level, but at the same time save a decent amount.
- Create a menu for the week. To reduce its cost, include soups and cereals in your diet. Add enough fruits, vegetables and protein to them. Instead of meat, you can use vegetable sources - lentils and beans.
- If you still have free money, add sweets, coffee or tea, snacks to the menu.
- According to the compiled list, buy all the products you need in the store for a week. If it is difficult for you to carry everything all at once, order delivery from the online store. Thus, you can save several hundred rubles, because often with every visit to the store you just want to buy something you need and need, for which you do not have the money.
Expert Advice
What do experts want to save?
- Buy "multiple products." For example, in stores, the chicken breast or thigh is most in demand. But you can buy the whole chicken, cut it and use it for cooking different dishes.
- In addition to the cost of food, it is often necessary to take into account the cost of travel and utilities. There are ways to save on these budget items.
- Utility rates are unchanged. But you can reduce your spending by installing meters for water and light.
- Days of discounts are in the off-season and before the New Year holidays. This is a great opportunity to purchase expensive things that you have long needed - for example, warm jackets, household appliances.
- Use the bonus points that are available in most stores, and always carry discount cards with you. Some banks give cashback for purchases, it is enough just to pay for products using their cards.
- Loans can significantly aggravate your financial situation, so try to avoid them.
- Go to stores as little as possible. You should not test your willpower and tempt yourself with inaccessible things - most likely, you still can not resist and gain something, especially if you are in a depressed mood.
Budget menu
The basis of an economical budget is a menu in which there will not be too expensive products. Nevertheless, for many people, the item of expenditure on food is the largest, so they are trying to optimize it in the first place. What can I cook for lunch inexpensively? Below is a sample menu for the day for one person. You can change the components so that the food is not monotonous, but the essence remains the same: no frills and frills in the form of seafood or sausages, which you can easily do without.
- Breakfast can consist of cereals cooked at home. Oatmeal, barley or buckwheat will let you stay full for a long time. You can add a boiled egg to them or an inexpensive fruit - a banana, an apple, berries. The cost of such a dish will be only 50-70 rubles.
- If you are not a fan of cereals, you can replace them with sandwiches. Bread is the easiest and cheapest to make on your own - it is not necessary to have a bread machine, just knead the dough and bake it in the oven.
- A hearty and tasty lunch can be made from whole chicken. You need to chop the chicken, freeze the breast and hips, and boil a rich broth from the back. It will be enough to add rice, noodles or potatoes with spices, and a delicious soup is ready. Wings and legs can be baked or fried - this will be the second dish. As a side dish, you can boil pasta or any cereal.
- As a snack, seasonal fruits, cottage cheese, a sandwich with tea are suitable.
- An ideal solution for dinner is scrambled eggs with salad salad. All you need to cook it is vegetables (potatoes, beets, carrots, onions and pickles), a few tablespoons of vegetable oil, as well as a couple of eggs.
It’s quite possible to live a week for 1000 rubles. True, you will have to save on many familiar and convenient things. It is necessary to exclude household chemicals (say, instead of detergent for dishes, take mustard powder), expensive meat and natural farm products. But this does not mean that you will starve or eat tasteless.
A universal list of products for a month (per person or per family) cannot be compiled, because everyone has their own tastes and needs. But we will give general recommendations a little later.
Living wage
How to live on 1000 rubles a week? It is enough to just buy products included in the cost of living. This is the minimum amount of money that a person needs to live. The cost of living includes not only food, but also the purchase of necessary things, payment of utilities and travel. Since 2018, its size in Russia is 10,300 rubles. At the same time, the cost of living for an adult, a child and a pensioner are different. For pensioners, its value is set at 8700 rubles. The cost of living also depends on the region of the Russian Federation - in large cities where life is more expensive, a large amount will be paid.
The right to surcharge are those people whose salary or benefit is lower than the PM. Indeed, in this case, living on such a meager amount is almost impossible. I also have the right to supplement low-income families, families with many children, people with disabilities, and pensioners. In order to apply for benefits, you must contact the social security authorities of the population or the center “My Documents”.
Consumer basket: composition and price for a month
Is it possible to live on 1000 rubles a week without changing the principles of healthy eating? Experts are sure that it is possible, even if there is no excess of fresh fruits and vegetables in your diet. The Government of the Russian Federation approved a consumer basket, which allows you to leave the prices for most essential products at a low level. What is included in the consumer basket? Half of it consists of food. The rest is spent on expenses for KU, clothes and transportation. The government used food consumption data and WHO data to compile the list. For example, for a whole year an adult in Russia eats about 200 kilograms of potatoes, 120 kg of other vegetables and fruits, 60 kilograms of meat. Based on these data, the following product basket was compiled:
- bread;
- sugar and sweets;
- fish and meat;
- Fruits and vegetables;
- potatoes;
- margarine;
- salt, tea, spices;
- eggs
- dairy.
According to Federal Law No. 227, this kit is enough for the full development and functioning of the human body. The Decree of the Government of Russia determined the average figures of products per year and divided them for each month. And so it turned out a grocery basket, whose cost at the moment is an average of 6500 rubles per month. At the moment, it contains the most flour products, such as pasta, bread and various sweet products. The reason for this is largely how much pasta and bread cost. They can be purchased at any store and they are very satisfying. Their price ranges from 20 to 50 rubles, so people who want to live 1000 rubles a week often include them in their diet. However, the nutritional value of such products is very low, so nutritionists are seriously concerned about the health of people who consume mainly flour.
Cost of main products
The grocery basket includes not only the cheapest products, but also meat, milk and vegetables. How much does it cost a person to set up everything he needs for a month? In general, the cost of the entire basket can be equated to 6-7 thousand rubles. The cost of the main products included in it will be as follows:
- Flour - 35 rubles.
- Potatoes - 23 rubles per kilogram.
- Milk - 70 rubles per liter.
- Tea (packing) - 100 rubles.
- Vegetable oil - 100 rubles.
- Chicken (whole) - 184 rubles / kg.
- Fish (cod) - 400 rubles / kg;
- Buckwheat - 80 rubles.
- Eggs - 45 rubles.
- Apples - 66 rubles.
- Cabbage - 15 rubles.
- Bread - the average price for a bun is 25 rubles.
- Sugar - 35 rubles.
This is the minimum set of products that an adult needs to live in Russia. As you can see, it does not include convenience foods, sweets and household chemicals, but such a set is quite enough to prepare a full breakfast, lunch and dinner. How much are pasta according to this list? Their average price is 45 rubles. Therefore, it is pasta that can replace bread or other flour products.
How much do utilities cost?
Like food prices, apartment service tax continues to rise. Housing and utilities make up the majority of the cost of living. How much do utilities cost? Their cost depends on several factors: the number of officially registered people and the area of the apartment. The location of the apartment and regional laws can also affect this amount. On average, the cost of a receipt for a cash register is 5 thousand rubles. For studio apartments, this amount may be less - only 3 thousand rubles. But if the apartment is three- or four-room, and the whole family lives in it, then the expenses will be higher, and receipts will come already in the amount of 6-7 thousand rubles. Therefore, the question often arises of how to reduce the tariff for utilities. You cannot directly affect their cost, but it is quite possible to reduce electricity consumption:
- Turn off the lights and electrical appliances while you are not using them. The advice is banal, but still effective.
- Replace the old wiring with a new one.
- Also, get rid of old household appliances that are 10 years old or more - as a rule, they have a lower class of energy consumption.
- View discount information. For example, some companies give a discount on the use of electricity at night.
- Make compensation for housing services. Poor, large families and people with disabilities have the right to do so. The state compensates from 20 to 70% of the amount of utility bills.
- Set the dishwasher. Oddly enough, this will save you money, because with this device you can reduce water use by almost half.
- Take a shower, not a bath.
- Close the taps. Even a small leak can seriously affect the account at the end of the month.
- Quality windows and doors can reduce heat leakage and lower heating costs.
- If possible, use gas, not electricity. Electric stoves are much more expensive than gas stoves, although the latter are less safe.
Directions
Public transport fares must also be included in weekly expenses. If you live in a big city, then you need some way to get to work. You will have to refuse the car right away - gasoline and maintenance will cost you too much. Traveling by public transport is difficult to enter into 1000 rubles, given the cost of food. The most optimal solution would be to purchase a bicycle or scooter, with which you can get to work or study. If you live too far, then in this case it is worth buying a ticket, which will give the right to pay for public transport at a discount. In St. Petersburg, such a card is called "Plantain", and in Moscow - "Troika".