Surviving on one income can be tricky in this day and age, especially if you live in a high cost-of-living area. But, rest assured. Many people are making it work for them and their families.

Whether you are making the choice to quit work to stay home, or if the choice is being made for you through job loss or loss of a spouse, there are ways to survive the financial pinch of one income living. Here are 10 tips and tricks to make one income living work for you.

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1. Change Your Attitude

First things first… make sure you have the proper mindset. Cultivate an attitude of gratefulness and contentedness. Stop comparing your life, house, car, vacations (or lack thereof) to others. If you are not content with what you have, no number of frugal living tips will ever be enough for you.

2. Create a Budget and Stick to It

There really is no way around this. Everyone, regardless of income, needs a budget, but even more so if you only have one income earner in the house. There are numerous ways to organize a budget, but some of my favorites are:

Dave Ramsey Ramsey is, of course, the guru of money management. His system uses baby steps focused on getting out of debt. If debt is not an issue for you, this system might be overkill for developing a simple budget. His path to financial freedom is summed up in his often repeated saying, “live like no else, so later you can live like no one else.”

You Need a Budget (YNAB) This is a popular app created by a millennial, for millennials, but it also scores high marks outside of that narrow demographic. The premise of this system is to assign a job to each dollar from every paycheck. YNAB is a handy way of organizing and tracking your budget on your phone. There is a monthly fee of about $7, but they claim the average user saves $200 in their first month.

How to Manage Your Money When You Don’t Have Any by Erik Wecks. This book, unlike some others, does not focus on building wealth, but rather on the everyday expenses of life and how to organize them. There is a workbook that goes along with the main book, so you can plan and implement his strategies as you read along. The reviews on Amazon sing the praises of Wecks and his system.

The One Week Budget: Learn to Create Your Money Management System in 7 Days or Less by Tiffany Aliche. Known as the Budgetnista, Aliche has created a unique system of budgeting that takes advantage of automatic draft payments for monthly living expenses. This book teaches Aliche’s system and also includes workbook pages and daily assignments to complete as you follow along. This is a good program for those who feel overwhelmed by the constant influx of bills arriving in the mail daily.

3. Learn the Difference Between Wants and Needs

This may seem obvious, but you would be amazed at how easy it is to justify a want as a need when you are faced with giving it up.

We all know Netflix is a want, but when faced with the very real possibility of needing to cancel it, we start arguing that it is only $14 a month and “it’s the only entertainment we have!” This said even with a huge backyard to play in, or a library right down the street, and a shelf full of board games in the living room.

Guard against justifying a want.

4. Go Down to One Car

I know, I know. This seems completely unrealistic and rather extreme – especially for suburbanites. I, too, scoffed at the idea of having to survive as a stay-at-home mom by (gasp) staying at home without a car.

But, I did it. And if I can do it, anyone can.

This does not have to be seen as a long-term lifestyle choice, but downsizing to one car for a year or two can have a monumental effect on your finances.

Benefits include paying less for car maintenance, gas, and insurance, as well as ditching a car payment if you had one.

Selling one of your cars can go a long way towards establishing an emergency fund. Not having the means to run to the grocery store at any time of day for some little odds and ends actually saves you money as well.

True, going down to one car takes planning. I sometimes drove my husband to work and picked him up just so I could have the car during the day. But, it is more doable than you think.

5. Meal Plan

There are several posts on this blog that mention meal planning. I am a huge believer that meal planning is one of the simplest ways to save money. To find out how I use meal planning, check out my post How to Use Meal Planning to Cut Your Grocery Budget.

6. Negotiate Your Utility Costs

Did you even know you could do this?!

Most electric, gas, phone, and internet providers offer ways to cut your bills, or at least make them more manageable. All you have to do is call and ask for a discount. For example, some utilities offer a discount for going to paperless billing or automatic draft. They sometimes provide discounts for using certain pieces of equipment, such as a programmable thermostat.

In many cases, you can shop around for other providers in order to lower your costs. Also, flat rate pricing can help you stick to a budget better by equalizing your bill every month.

To learn more about negotiating your utility bills, check out my post How to Negotiate Your Utility Bills.

7. Cut Out the Little Things

Almost every article about frugal living will include a tip about not spending $5 every day at Starbucks. Just about everyone rolls their eyes when they read that. Well, duh. Of course, that’s an easy way to save money, but only if you are actually spending $5 a day at Starbucks anyway. I never made coffee shop visits a part of my daily routine, so that advice really does not help me.

But, the general idea here is a good one.

Maybe you aren’t in the habit of buying an iced mocha chia vanilla no whip soy froo-froo drink from Starbucks every day. Maybe it’s a pack of gum or pricey mints in your purse that you rely on daily.

Maybe it’s a gut buster 64-ounce soda from the gas station or a weekly trip to the ice cream shop.

Perhaps the spouse who works outside the home eats out a few times a week for lunch, or maybe you like to get your nails done and foil highlights in your hair.

The point is, find what your “thing” is and consider cutting it out of your budget. Be honest with yourself. In a first-world country, it is easy to have “things” that we justify as needs that are really better classified as wants.

A dollar here, or five dollars there… it really adds up over time.

8. Find a Side Hustle

When I was a kid, my mom had to work outside the home. She would often say that her working meant the difference between living in a house with air conditioning or without. But, it was more than that. Her income made a huge difference for our family growing up. She even out-earned dad a few years.

Although I always knew I would stay home when I had children of my own, I don’t blame my mom for doing what she had to do. She never had the opportunities that stay-at-home moms have today.

The internet has changed everything.

I quit work in 1999 when my eldest was born and I have still managed to contribute to the household income in a myriad of ways. I have earned anywhere from $10,000 to $30,000+ a year with side hustles from home.

It started around 2004 when I began selling the kids’ outgrown clothes on eBay. Eventually, this grew to include items I found secondhand that I could flip for a profit. I even reached Power Seller status without really trying. Once Amazon took off, I started selling toys there, as well.

At some point, I dipped my feet into content writing mainly through the old content mills like Demand Studios and Textbroker. That business model has now all but tanked thanks to Google’s changing algorithms, but it was what it was back in the day and it paid quite a few of our bills.

I’ve also contracted with various companies over the years as a Search Engine Evaluator and a Social Media Evaluator. Both positions provide an hourly pay rate that might be lower than what corporate America can offer, but the ability to earn $9-$15 an hour from home while the children nap makes these jobs attractive as a side hustle.

Many of my mom friends have had success with Multi Level Marketing companies like Plexus and Pampered Chef. Of course, for every success story in the MLM world, there are numerous stories of failures. If you have a strong social network to market to, then MLM might be a good opportunity for you.

Of course, now I blog to make extra money, but it’s more than that. With blogging, I get to discuss what I want to and convey what is really on my heart. The Multitasking Moms Club blog is a blessing to me (and hopefully to you, as well).

To learn more about side hustles, check out these posts:

How to Earn $1000 a Month as a Social Media Evaluator

How to Earn $1000 a Month as a Search Engine Evaluator

9. Implement Frugal Living Hacks

There are numerous ways to hack a frugal lifestyle. Saving a dime here or there definitely adds up over time. You don’t need to be a complete miser, but everyone can find ways to save money.

Don’t get discouraged by the fact that a particular frugal living hack only saves a few pennies. The key is to stack your hacks so the savings add up.

If you can save $5 a day by adjusting your thermostat, or by making your own laundry detergent, or buying generic at the grocery store, that would add up to $1825 a year!

If you can save $100 a week by using frugal living hacks, you can save $5200 a year. It truly is up to you how much you want to hack so as to maximize your savings.

For a list of frugal living hacks, check out 101 Frugal Living Life Hacks to get you started.

10. Don’t Panic

Dropping to one income is doable as long as you live, shop, and budget intentionally. There may be times you need to implement every single frugal living hack there is just to survive.

My family has seen a few of those stressful seasons (think market crash of 2008). In this, my 20th year as a stay-at-home mom, our financial life is fine. Even in times of plenty, I still meal plan and adjust the thermostat to save money. In time, these actions become habits.

No matter the income amount, we should all be good stewards of what has been entrusted to us… our time, our talents, our material possessions, and our money.

And always, always, always be thankful for what you have.