The Sustainable Millionaire
Having a healthy budget can allow you to retire early and save the earth!
It’s true! A healthy budget can contribute to a healthier earth. If everyone thought a little harder about buying that bottle of water and instead use a refillable bottle it would put less plastic in the environment. Or, if we decided that buying the newest fast fashion could wait we could divert millions of shirts from ending up in landfills. In each of the above examples, you positively influence your environment and keep more money in your pocket.
I would like to think that because we are an environmentally focused family, that focus has propelled us to early retirement and hopefully lessen our footprint on the earth. Right, I know, turning off the lights will not make you millions, but small money adds up. Each small thing we do to conserve may have a huge impact on our savings over time. In addition to seldomly buying coffee out, here are a few of the things my family does to reduce our carbon footprint while increasing our savings rate. .
Thredup.com - Spoiler alert - Thredup currently only has clothes for women…but we women are the biggest offenders of fast fashion purchases. Thredup offers an easy-to-use way to search for the perfect outfit, save money and reduce waste all in one spot. Most of the clothes I buy from Thredup.com have tags still on them. The discount compared to new store-bought items I find is 85% or more. Thredup has recirculated over 100 million items! This means energy was not used to make new clothes, gas was not used to ship the clothes, and perfectly good clothes are now not sitting in a landfill in India. Click here to find our how “dirtry” your clothes are!
Goodwill - I go to Goodwill for all our kids' clothes. It does get a little hard to find pants for boys over 5 years but just this summer I found 4 pairs for my 8 year old and they had the tags still on them. Sports equipment is another great item here. Instead of buying a new bat for a boy who has never played, I buy it from Goodwill for $2. This way, if he does not end up loving baseball, my expense is not that much. If they end up loving the sport then, investing in new items could be a need. Men pay attention: Goodwill has great clothes for me too! Most goodwill have a “designer section” where they have pre sorted the more popular clothes. You pay a bit more but $15 for a pair of designer jeans is really good.
Buy Nothing - If you are on FB, there is a group called Buy Nothing. Here you can exchange items that no longer have a use for you, but may be much appreciated for your neighbor. Upcycle your items you don’t use anymore.
Hot Water Heater - If you need a new hot water heater check out tankless heaters. We installed one from Navien and it is amazing. Also many cities may provide you a rebate if you install tankless heaters because of their energy efficiency. In the US you can save around $200 per month over your 50 gallon water heater. This is based on Energy Guide cost estimates using $1.09 per therm of natural gas and in US dollars. One last bonus the US gov is providing rebates for changing over to tankless. Currently it is $300 of purchase price.
One-Car Family - We live in an area where the buses are a great way to get around the city. We also have ride-share cars, Uber, bike rentals and more. There are so many ways to avoid the expense of a car and save the earth. To try this out - limit your family to a single car for 2 months. It will be hard at first but soon you may find that it is doable. If it works - then SELL your second car. The earth will be happy for less driving and you will save hundreds each month.
The Library - There is a crazy place that loans you books for free. Well not free, you pay for it in your taxes. You check them out, read them, then return them. Nuts!! And here is the kicker: you can get the Libby app which allows you to read digital books from the library.
Summary: Reducing your monthly spending each month can of course increase your savings but it can really make a huge impact on the environment. If everyone on earth made small changes in their spending, we can collectively make a significant impact on our planet.
Photo by quokkabottles on Unsplash
