Losing your job is one of the most detrimental things that can happen to a family’s finances. If you do happen to have money saved, you may be able to buy your family a few weeks or months of shaky ground before things become truly scary for your budget. If you do not have anything saved, things can get pretty hairy really quickly. With over 20 million Americans out of work at the moment, knowing where you can save the most money quickly is one of the keys to surviving financially. These frugal living resources for the unemployed and financial resources for the unemployed are just the start of surviving.
When you first lose your job, it is helpful to sit and make a list of websites,books and other financial helps that can help you to learn how to cut your expenses.
In times of financial crisis, these frugal living resources and budgeting helps will often become your lifeline.
Frugal Living Resources for the Unemployed
The very first thing you will want to do when you lose your job is to learn how to create a crisis budget. Personally, I will tell you that I would not be where I am financially without my own crisis budget.
It has saved my bacon many, many times.
Having a budget that is specifically dedicated to times of crisis in your life ensures that you are ready to live on far less money than normal.
In fact, you may soon find yourself living with no income and if so, breathe because it can be done with enough preparation.
Financial Tips for the Unemployed
But it can be incredibly easy to allow yourself to stop breathing and have a mental freak out.
We’ve all been there.
The mental freak out is the reason I tell you that doing your research and planning as early as you can is the key to surviving. It allows you to have that precious breathing room you will so desperately need when things get truly hard.
Frugal Living Resources for When You’re Laid Off
Before you start looking at these financial resources for the unemployed, realize that your life simply won’t stop because your job did.
You will still need to spend money on necessities your family needs. You will still have bills to pay. You will still need to eat and wash clothes and put gas in your car.
The difference is that now, you will need to watch how much you spend on those things even more than you have been; and you will need to find even more ways to save on those things.
Frugal Living Books to Help When You Lose Your Job
Having a good book to help you learn is always a great idea in my opinion and since I love to read, I love to recommend books as well.
The great thing about frugal living books is that you can re-read them over and over again to help yourself find new tips.
You will find something new every time. Trust me on that.
Obviously, I would tell you that my all time favorite frugal living book is my own – Six Dollar Family– but I may be partially biased on that opinion. It is available on Kindle and Paperback HERE.
A few of my other favorites are
- Tightwad Gazette
- The Complete Guide to Money by Dave Ramsey
- America’s Cheapest Family Gets You Right on the Money by Steve and Anne Economedies
- Start Late Finish Rich by David Bach
Websites for When You Lose Your Job
Rakuten/Rakuten
As I mentioned earlier, even though you have lost your job, you are not going to be able to stop shopping. Your family will still need clothes and other necessities.
To help save as much money as possible, make sure you hve signed up for a Rakuten account.
Rakuten, formerly known as Rakuten, has special relationships with hundreds of stores and marketplaces. As a result of this relationship, they will earn a small commission when you shop through them as cashback.
That’s right; I said they will quite literally pay you to shop.
When you sign up for a Rakuten account HERE, you’ll even be given the option of either a FREE gift card of FREE cash back after you make your first purchase!
Amazon Prime
I love Amazon but I wouldn’t dare shop there without being an Amazon Prime member. Not only does it give me free 2-day shipping on almost everything site-wide, but it gives me access to free TV and movies, exclusive coupons and deals and more.
Plus, if you’re not an Amazon Prime member, you can score 30-days of Amazon Prime FREE right HERE.
Once your 30-days are up, decide if you want to keep it or not. It’s well worth the cost!
Amazon Pantry
I absolutely love finding grocery deals and some of the best deals I’ve found over the past couple of years have been from AmazonPantry.
Not only that, but you can actually save money by having your groceries delivered. Time is saved and you’ll save gas and impulse buys.
Plus, if you’re an Amazon Prime member, you can get 30 days of Amazon Pantry FREE right HERE. Not a Prime member? Scroll up and grab 30 days of it free too!
Amazon also offers deliver of fresh groceries such as milk, butter and produce in certain areas. This program is available to Prime members and is called Amazon Fresh. You can check it out HERE.
Amazon Family
If you have an infant or toddler, Amazon Family will be a great frugal living resource for you after you lose your job (and before!).
It is a great program they offer that helps any parent save money and if you’re trying to have a baby on a budget, that has never been more important.
Sign up for 30-days FREE right HERE and you’ll score 20% off diapers, wipes, formula and more.
InstaGC
If you’ve lost your job, you’ll want to do everything you can to increase the amount of money your family has.
A very quick and easy way to do this is by completing surveys and offers for cash or to earn free gift cards.
One of my favorite ways to do this is with InstaGC.
When you sign up for InstaGC HERE, you’ll instantly be able to start earning free Paypal or ACH cash or FREE gift cards. They are paid instantly – after your first withdraw – and can be a huge boost to your family’s income.
I have been a member since 2008 or so and still use it to to earn free Amazon cards daily.
Swagbucks
Swagbucks is another place you can complete offers and do surveys but it has a twist. You can also earn points by searching the web as you normally do, watching videos, printing coupons, playing games and SO much more!
It’s incredibly easy to earn with and one of my all-time favs!
You can check out Swagbucks HERE to get started.
Grove
I love to make my own homemade cleaners recipes and DIY beauty products, but sometimes I just want an easy and quick option.
That’s why I love Grove!
I can buy certified organic and all-natural household, beauty and family items at great prices!
Even better for those that have lost their job is that they will give you a FREE 5-piece Mrs. Meyers cleaning set when you make your first order of $25 or more!
You can score the free cleaning set and sign up for a Grove account HERE.
Thrive Market
In addition to Grove, I also love to use Thrive Market as well! They sell gluten free groceries, organic groceries and all-natural foods – including meat and seafood – at great prices!
When you sign up for a Thrive Market account HERE, you’ll not only be able to shop for groceries, but you’ll also score a coupon code worth as much as 25% off! The actual amount will vary depending on what their current promotion is.
Quickbooks Self Employed
As you navigate the waters of being unemployed, you may find yourself starting a new business to bring in more income for your family.
And with a new business, comes taxes and bookkeeping.
Quickbooks Self Employed is a great tool and asset for helping you stay up to date on those books while preparing you for tax filing as you move through the year.
What makes this a great frugal living resource is that Quickbooks Self Employed is built just for entrepreneurs. It even allows you to easily track mileage!
Plus, as of the time of this posting, you can save a massive amount of money by signing up for Quickbooks Self Employed right HERE. You’ll pay just $1.00 per month for an entire year or get 30 days FREE!
If you don’t see the $1.00 a month option, click the “Self Employed” tab at the very top of the page.
ThredUp
Buying clothes used is a great way to save money on them provided they are great quality.
My own favorite place to buy secondhand clothes is an online consignment store called ThredUp. I have been buying not only my clothes, but my kids clothes from there for over 5 years now!
ThredUp is great because not only do they offer great women’s clothing but they also sell kiods and baby clothing, shoes, accessories, designer handbags and more!
They even have designer names if that matters to you!
Plus, if you’re new to ThredUp, you can sign up with THIS link to score a $10 or $20 credit. The actual amount of the credit will depend on their current promo when you sign up.
Zenni Optical
Does someone in your family wear glasses? If so, you’re very likely spending far too much on frames and lenses.
What we do is use Zenni Optical.
Zenni is a great site that offers frames starting at $5.99 each! Even after addding lenses and any extras, you can score a pair of glasses for right around $20.00!
I’ve used Zenni for my own glasses for around 4 years now. I They’re so well made that I still have my very first pair of frames and they’re in great wearable condition!
You can check out Zenni Optical HERE.
The Great Courses Plus
With a lot more people homeschooling these days, great educational videos and movies can be both overwhelming and hard to find reliably at the same time.
That’s why we loved using The Great Courses Plus when we were a homeschool family. They offer a huge variety of topic – mostly geared toward middle/high school ages to adults – that form lessons on their own.
You can learn everything from How to Draw to Gardening, History and more!
Head HERE to sign up for The Great Courses Plus and you’ll also score a month of unlimited videos totally FREE!
Trim Financial Manager
We all have forgotten about a subscription we no longer need, a free trial we meant to cancel and other wasted expenses.
Trim Financial Manager is just the frugal living resource to help with that!
In addition to giving you access to a free personal finance dashboard, you’ll also get free spending alerts, bill reminders, overdraft detection and more.
The great thing Trim does though is find and cancel old subsdcriptions you no longer need or want. For FREE!
Ya’ll how many times have you paid for something you didn’t need because you forgot. Be real.
It happened to me last month.
They do offer a paid account that – depending on your financial situation – can be very worth it. Paid features include bill negotiation and a simple savings account.
Sign up for a Trim Financial Manager account HERE to get started finding those wasted expenses.
Ibotta
Ibotta is sort of an oldie, but very much a goodie. You buy groceries, right?
Why not get paid cash back to buy them? You’ll be able to do just that when you sign up for an Ibotta account HERE.
Ibotta offers you rebates on things you normally buy in the form of cash back. You add the rebate first, then buy the item.
Once you’ve purchased, scan your reciiept and get your money!
Cash out when you get to $20 for Paypal or a free gift card!
Woodspring Suites
Housing is the biggest expense that most will ever have. In times of financial crisis, you may find your family in need of a downsize.
I did this myself in 2017 and have never regretted it.
What I did was move into a hotel full-time. Yes, a hotel! We lived in a WoodSprings Suites hotel for a few months while we -ultimately – ended up traveling for a bit.
Woodsprings Suites is a great option if you’re looking to downsize in a way that offers a cheaper cost of living with all the regular amenities that your home has.
You can check out Woodsprings Suites HERE and if you’re interested in what my own budget looked like while we were living in a hotel, you should check out my post on how to live in a hotel full-time right HERE.
Tiller Money
I am very basic with my budget each month and prefer to use spreadsheets, but I absolutely hate havint o import them into my spreadsheet budgets.
That’s where Tiller Money comes into play.
For less than $5.00 a month, Tiller Money automatically imports my banking transactions to my spreadsheets for me.
This makes it a fantastic frugal living resource for the unemployed because it will help keep you from overspending.
When you don’t know what you’re spending your money on, it’s easy to spend it without thinking about things.
Head over HERE and you can give Tiller Money a try FREE for 30-days. At the end of the 30-day period, if you decide to keep it, you’ll pay just $9.00 a year ($4.92 a month).
Money very well spent in my opinion!
Acorns
Just becauyse you lost yourjob doesn’t mean that you can’t still save money or build a solid financial future for yourself. Acorns is a very easy way to do that.
When you sign up for an Acorns account HERE, you’ll be investing your spare change from your bank account into stocks.
What’s better than building solid foundation for your finances without even realizing you’re doing it?
Sam’s Club
For anyone looking to buy in bulk and do it cheaply, Sam’s Club is a great option. Sam’s is great because not only can you find great prices on bulk items, but regular sized items as well.
A lot of the time Sam’s is cheapest for me when I buy regular milk (although my family primarily drinks raw milk these days) and they olften have great prices on ground beef as well.
When you sign up for a Sam’s Club membership, you’ll also have access to exclusive instant savings offers and great coupons! I personally prefer /the Sam’s offers more than I do Costco.
For instance, right now, you can join Sam’s Club for FREE basically! You’ll get $45.00 off your first purchase of $45.00 or more! That pays for your membership fee! Click HERE to get that deal.
Side Note: If you would prefer to join Costco instead, they have a membership offer going on right now as well.
When you sign up for a Costco membership HERE, you will get either a FREE $10 or $20 gift card depending on which membership option you choose.
Honey
If you’re going to be shopping online, you might as well use a coupon. However, looking and digging for online coupon code can be incredibly tedious.
That’s why I love the Honey browser extension! It does all the hard work for you!
Not only does Honey scour the net for the promo codes you need, but they also offer a price watch wish list that will notify you when prices of your wished for items drop, an Amazon best price finder and a rewards program to earn FREE gift cards with! It doesn’t get much better than that!
You can download the Honey Chrome Extension right HERE 100% FREE.
Looking for more frugal living resources? You may like these:
Do you have holey towels? Don’t throw them away! Use the ideas in this post to find new uses for old towels! These ways to use old towels might just shock you and help you save a little money at the same time!
Can’t get to the store right now? These 24 meals that stretch are all easily made into cheap pantry meals! Feed a crowd with what you already have on hand!
Have you ever used Fels-Naptha soap? It’s so much more than a laundry soap that these 52 ways to use Fels Naptha might just shock you! In fact, I think you’ll love these uses for Fels Naptha so much it will be a new favorite!