Of course you already understand that it may be more comfortable for you to work from home. More comfortable clothes, your favorite chair, having loving interruptions from your family pet... But did you ever think about how working from home could save you and your family money?
What if you don't work from home? Take some of these ideas and use them to save money as it suits your life right now! Or, use them as inspiration to fulfilling your dream of working from home.
By working from home - or in my case, wherever I happen to feel like working - I save money on clothing and dry cleaning. If you work a job requiring suits and business-wear, you will appreciate the savings from not having to buy and frequently dry clean your work week wardrobe. Wearing a 3 piece outfit five days a week requiring dry cleaning, since prices vary, we'll call it $50/wk. Not to mention the cost of the items in the first place! With two weeks of vacation, that's about $2500 per year in laundry costs. By working from home, and potentially needing fewer trips to the cleaners and more casual wear - you could save quite a bit of dough!
Lunches out, at $5-7 a pop really add up, too. When you are making your own lunches at home, they can be much more nutritious than what you get from a trip through the drive-through. And they tend to be cheaper by a few dollars. That's a potential savings of $1000!
My inspiration for this article, however, was today's trip to the gas station. Gassing up, even my economy car, hurts, these days. A lot. I imagine it's much the same for you. At $3.60 per gallon, my former commute is a pleasant thing of the past. Try this exercise on for size in your own life:
1. Calculate how many miles you drive to and from work. Let's say 10 miles each way. So you put about 100 miles on the car each week just for going to and from work. (We'll leave driving to and from lunch out of it, for simplicity sake.)
2. Now look up your car's gas milage, if you don't know it. Let's say 25 miles to the gallon, for easy math. You're using about 4 gallons of gasoline per week, for work.
3. Multiply that times the price per gallon at the pump. 4 * 3.60 = $14.40 per week. Times 50 weeks (we'll give you a 2 week vacation!) - that's $720.
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Need even more help in making the transition from the corporate world to working from home? I'm Business Coach Meg Meyer & I'm accepting applications for only 2-4 new clients. If you are really ready to invest in your work-at-home success - Contact me today!
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