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Grocery prices in America recently saw the biggest single month spike in nearly three years and we are all feeling the squeeze. Just like me whenever Deborah insists on one of her signature side hugs after church. So today I'll be sharing some of my Frugal living tips based on questions you asked, including how to save big when it comes to groceries and food. And this video could not be timelier since Thanksgiving is tomorrow and we're all about to gather round the table, eat too much and pretend we like cranberries. Cranberry sauce, AKA spoiled Jell O that got disowned by its family. You're not part of the family. Homemade or bust. Don't give me that canned stuff. I don't want to. If I see the ridges, I'm out my money. Don't jiggle, jiggle. It folds up. So without further ado, let's hop into your questions. Drock asked. Food is a big issue. We keep busting our budget in some of it is weakness and we give in to cravings. Some of it is groceries we didn't realize we would need. Any thoughts? Sure, I've got thoughts. Drock. Let's start here. Food is a big issue. We keep busting. Yeah, you're not alone there. Food is one of the biggest budget busters. Cause it's the hardest thing to control. It feels so emotional. You never know. You didn't really plan. You're just gonna kinda wing it and see what happens. That's part of the problem. You also admitted great self awareness here. Some of it is weakness. We're giving in to cravings. So what if we got ahead of these cravings? What if we decided ahead of time what cravings we were gonna have and then we decided to crave it when that food in the fridge. That's one way to do it. Groceries we didn't realize we would need. Again, this all comes down to being proactive instead of reactive. Now I'm not asking you to become like a protein bro and like cook for seven hours on Sunday and just eat chicken and broccoli and rice for the rest of your life. But I do think you can utilize, you know, chatgpt and AI to go, hey, here's what I'm craving this week. Give me a grocery list that can help me accomplish this. Give me five, five recipes that will take me 20 minutes or less using one pot that accommodates for a gluten free lifestyle. Whatever it is, it's out there for you and it won't take that long to come up with all of this. And then here's what I do. I'll go to Aldi to do my grocery shopping, to keep it on a budget instead of going to the high priced, expensive grocery stores. And I'll get everything I need, get it home, and then set aside time on the calendar just like you would a work meeting to go. This is two hours of time I'm going to use to prep the meal on a Sunday and maybe you do it again on Tuesday night and Thursday night. You don't have to do it every night. You can prep two meals in advance. And all of this is really gonna help you. And if you haven't already, I would check out the EveryDollar budgeting app. I'll drop a link in the description. It's gonna help you and anyone else listening start to create a plan and go, all right, we're gonna spend 200 bucks on groceries this week come hell or high water. We're gonna get the stuff that's on sale, we're gonna go to Aldi, and we're gonna really trim the fat off this budget. See what I did there? I don't get it. Hope that helps Drock. Best of luck. All right, up next, we've got Parley's World. If I'm preparing to invest in real estate in cash, what's the best way to do so? What's the best way to invest in stocks for it? Period? Why use a period there? Like you avoided punctuation and grammar this entire time and then decided, yeah, we'll end it. We're just gonna go ahead and end that sentence. All right, let me translate this. If I'm preparing to invest in real estate in cash, what's the best way to do so? And thought, what's the best way to invest in stocks for it? Okay, here's my take. If you're going to quote, invest in real estate, you've got to do it with cash. And before you do that, you should have your primary home paid off first. So get rid of your mortgage and then use that freed up mortgage to save up for that next property and start small. It doesn't have to be the biggest, nicest property. Get what you can, start small. Once you have that one property in cash, it's cash flowing beautifully. You can then use that cash flow to save up for the next one. So. So it gets easier as it goes on. But that first one is gonna be the hardest. The second one is gonna be the second hardest, so on and so forth. Now your second question. What's the Best way to invest in stocks for it. I would encourage you to just set up a non retirement brokerage account and just park money and index funds in there. So that way it's not as risky as a single stock and you're gonna make more money than you would in a high yield savings account, for example. But this is only for like a four or five plus year time horizon or which is probably what it's gonna take. Let's say you save up, I don't know, 50 grand a year. If you make a great income, you get the mortgage paid off. 50 grand a year for five years, that's 250k. Let's start small. Get a condo, get a townhome duplex, wherever it is, and just start small in cash and use that index fund in the brokerage account to help you get there a little bit faster. Next up we've got pumpkin spice hedgy. I don't know what a hedgy is. If it's offensive, I'm sorry in advance. How do you convince yourself to spend? We're debt free with a fully funded emergency fund, no kids yet, and a good chunk of a down payment in no rush to buy. Since we live in our church parsonage, we're burning out on work fast. But the thought of spending a few hundred on a weekend getaway makes us both freeze up on some level. I know it's not logical, but it feels scary anyway. So if you look at the Ramsey plan, the plan that I teach on this channel, you're debt free with a fully funded emergency fund. You're saving up down payment. You would be in baby step 3B. So here's the good news. You are done with what we call gazelle intensity. Now you're moved to intentionality. So now we can start planning. Hey, yes. We can start a sinking fund for that vacation and put 200 bucks a month in this account. Well, that's 2,400 bucks by the end of the year that we have to go on this vacation. And then because you've earmarked it, you don't feel guilty about using it. But when you just have it all in this down payment fund and then you go, ooh, should we pull out of that to go on vacation? It's going to feel bad because you feel like you're robbing from this other goal. So what I do, I just split the goals up. You can even create a separate savings account for the vacation fund and a separate savings account for the down payment fund. That has really helped me to let go and actually use the money for its intended purposes instead of having it in one big pile. On top of that, doing the budget to where you have the line item for fun, just put it fun money for pumpkin spice, hedgy, and then you have 100 bucks set aside. You don't have to feel guilty instead of robbing it from some other category of the budget. So that's something I've done as someone who, you know, can feel emotional and illogical and want to hit one goal at a time, split it up. In this stage of life, there's gonna be seasons. You're gonna get there. It's okay. I am concerned about the work burnout in the church parsonage. What are they? How are they? Are they running you ragged in this church? That's scary. Next up, we have a question from Java junkie. How do you know when you're financially ready to successfully move out of your parents house? What are some steps that can make the transition easier? Love this question. Financially ready to successfully move out of your parents house? Hmm. I don't know how old you are. Like, are you 14 or are you like 30? I think there's a big difference here. What are some steps that can make the transition easier? Um, I moved out when I was 20, moved across the country, finished college, had roommates up until I was married in different apartments. And so I would start with a budget and go, okay, what can I actually afford based on my income? If I make $4,000 a month and I'm living at home, well, I could afford 1,000 bucks a month toward rent. And if rent is 2,000, well, that means I need to get a roommate to be able to afford an apartment in that area I'm looking to live in. So I think looking at the facts really helps. But my general stance is that if you are out of college and you have a full time job, it's time to move out. I have found that you do better when you have that independence. You mature faster, you excel in your work, and there's a piece of me that goes, your growth is gonna be a little bit stunted if you just continue living at home out of comfort and ease. I think we are wired to be a little bit uncomfortable in order to grow. And so for that reason, I would get out as soon as you can where you go, all right, what can I afford based on a quarter of my take home pay in rent, and how many roommates do I need to get there and how far out do I need to move in? Order to afford it. So the transition's gonna, it's gonna be a little bit clunky. Make sure you have a deposit saved. You got a little bit of money for some furniture. Maybe mom and dad can help you move or some friends. But I think you'll find that you very few people go, man, I wish I was still living at home. That would have been a way better quality of life. It's just not as much as I miss my mom folding my undies. My best mom. All right, next up we've got JThomas72. Hey George, what do you define as an emergency that would require you to use your emergency fund? I love this question, Jay. A lot of people assume whatever's going on in their life is an emergency because it feels chaotic and hectic. But the girls trip to Maui, not an emergency. So here's the three questions to ask yourself before dipping into your emergency fund. Is it unexpected, Is it necessary and is it urgent? If you can say yes to all three of those things, go ahead and use the emergency fund and don't feel bad about it. We will replenish it later on. But right now we have an emergency that needs to be dealt with. And we don't want to go into debt. That is the goal. Can we cash flow this with our future income and through our emergency fund to avoid going into debt? That's what it's there for to protect you. It's insurance against going into debt. So life's going to happen. So get that emergency fund in place. Once you're debt free, three to six months of expenses is what you're aiming for. A good 10 grand, 15 grand, 20 grand to protect you against all the things life is gonna throw at you. What bougie or frivolous expenditures has 48 year old George made that would surprise younger George? Are you assuming I'm 48 or are you saying when I'm 48? Why 40? That's such a random specific number that makes me think you think I'm 48. Did you Google me? Because I'm not the Jesuit priest who was born in 1926 or whatever you found on GOOG? I promise you that. But let me answer this as if it is true that it is future me thinking what has surprised younger George bougie or frivolous expenditures? I would say he would be. You'd be shocked at everything. 48 year old George would be shocked at what he's comfortable spending on his family, on vacations and splurges and things he'd be shocked at how much he's giving to organizations he loves and to his church. He'd be shocked at the way he's investing. But a surprise. I don't know. I don't know if anything surprises me as a planner. I just think the way I'm living now, it'll just slightly, hopefully get a little bit more each time. You know, as I get older and build more wealth, every area of my life will expand with it. I'll spend more, I'll save more, and I'll give more. So nothing I don't think would, like, shock me unless I decided to have a midlife crisis and got a Mazda Miata. That would absolutely shock me. If I got into like Dungeons and Dragons and I'm super into sports. That would also be a huge shock to the nation at large. But an expenditure which. Great use of expenditure there. Yeah, I guess if I spent a lot of money on a hobby that I never thought I'd be doing, like pickleball or chess or. I'm like, I'm really into fixing up old cars. You know what I mean? That kind of stuff would shock all of us. But that's a fun question to think about. Thank you for that. Next up, we have Mike Monson. Is it worth it to repair a car if the repairs cost more than the car is worth? Sorry, I sound like Dr. Seuss. You absolutely sounded like Dr. Seuss. What a great little riddle wrapped in a rhyme. I will answer this in a Dr. Seuss like fashion. If the car is worth 2 grand and the fix will cost 3, then paying that price is as dumb as can be. Three never beats two because that math's not a thing. Remember, debt is dumb and yes, cash is king. Don't let clunker McThunkers destroy all your pay and nibble your nickels all night and all day. Sell the old sputter for scraps with a smile Then start stacking cash and save for a while soon you'll wind up with a paid for delight and then once again you can sleep well at night. I'll hold for applause at this point, that could have been a one man show off Broadway, I'll tell you that much. But yeah, all that to say if the repair is gonna cost more than the car is worth. You know, if it's gonna cost you two grand to repair and it's not gonna increase the value by at least two grand, I wouldn't do it. I would just sell it for what you can get for it. But see, that wasn't as fun, was it? It wasn't as fun as giving you a little riddle. Next question from Camaroso 94 for a short term savings goal less than 5 years, where's the most practical place to put that money? Excellent question. Well, for a goal like that, I would put the money in a high yield savings account with a competitive apy and I would do it with Fairwinds Credit Union, one of the sponsors of today's video. With Fairwinds Smart bundle, you can get a high yield savings account to save for short term goals and a no fee checking account on top of that. And these guys are the real deal. I've gotten to spend a lot of time with their team lately and they are ridiculously committed to their customers winning with money. They're huge fans of the plan that I teach on this channel and they want to see you all become debt free and build wealth the right way. So get started today@fairwinds.org Ramsey or use the link in the description. And before I get back to answering your questions, allow me to ask one do you ever feel like the Internet knows way too much about you? Like that one time you googled best spatula and now you're getting ads every single day for cookware, cooking classes, a trip to Tuscany with Gordon Ramsay? Well, that's where Delete Me comes in. A sponsor of today's video, Deleteme scrubs your personal data off hundreds of data broker sites that make money selling your info to spammers and scammers. And once they've done the hard work of deleting your information, they'll send you a custom report showing you what they've cleaned up. It's like a digital maid service minus the tiny soaps. So protect yourself by going to joindeleteme.com George for 20% off their annual plans or just use the link in the description below. All right, let's get back to some more questions. This one is from Car Questions answered. Well, you're asking me a question, so maybe I should be Car Questions Answered. What's the cheapest car you've ever driven? Cheapest car you would drive too? The cheapest car I've ever driven. See, 2017, I bought a car in cash. It was $6,000 and it was an.09 Honda Civic that had seen some things, but it was the exl, so it had the heated seats, sunroof. That was the nicest car I had driven up to that point in 2017. So that's the cheapest car I've Driven before that. My first car was a Chevrolet Cobalt that I got when I was a senior in high school. My dad bought it for me, paid cash. It was like the standard edition, like the roll down windows, you know, like no frills. Barely, barely drove, but it worked. You know, I drove that thing for a good decade, so it served me well. So, yeah, cheapest car I would drive today. I mean, I would drive anything that got me from A to B. I would drive an 09 Honda Civic. Again, I don't mind that cars are very utility to me now. I've upgraded in cars over the years for fun, but I'm not like a, a big car guy in that sense, so I would drive pretty much anything. I have no shame. You can't shame me more than I can shame myself. I hate to flex. Thank you for that question. Car questions answered. Next up, we have Lindsay E. My husband and I have no kids and no one to leave money to. So we're hesitate to do the full 15%. We'd rather do 10% then give the rest away to places and people. Now if there's no one to leave all that money to get. Is there a point? Wow, this got existential real quick. It was like, what's the point of life? All right, let's go back. So you guys, I'm going to assume the way you're talking, you know about the Ramsey plan, the baby step. So baby step four, once you're out of debt with a fully funded emergency fund, we tell people, invest 15% into retirement accounts. Now that is outside of just giving, we suggest people give all the way through the baby steps. No matter where you are, give a little until you can give a lot. Make giving a priority. So. So this has nothing to do with your investments. So let's separate that out. Giving and saving, two different things. But you're asking, should we do 10%, give the rest away to. No, I would do 15%. Cause you guys still have to like retire one day and we don't know what that day will be. We don't know what your expenses will be. So I'd rather you have too much money than not enough because you did 10%. So if you want to give money away to people in places now, do it. If you want to give a bunch of your wealth away when you guys pass away, you can do that too. But I would not change my investing parameter in order to do something differently now. Great question though. All right, next up we have Jalen, who says I'm currently in baby Step two, which means he's trying to pay off some consumer debt. When would it make sense to start a sinking fund for a fishing boat? Thanks. All right, for starters, don't love seeing the word sinking and boat so close together. Not a fan of that. You're in baby step two, trying to pay off debt. I would not start a sinking fund now. The right time would be once you're debt free, you got a fully funded emergency fund, you're investing 15%. Any money beyond that, you can start throwing into a sinking fund for the boat. I don't know how much a fishing boat costs these days. I'm sure it can range anything from, like, free to $50,000 or more. So I would just start putting away as much as I feel comfortable once I've got that investment going to 15%. Let's say you can throw in 300 bucks a month. That's 3,600 a year. After two years, you got 7,200. After four years, you're at, what, 14 grand plus. That might do it. That might do the trick. For a nice little fishing boat, you can always upgrade later. It is a depreciating asset. So in that sense, it is sinking. All right, last but not least, we've got Lib 2000. What to do when grocery or other basic shopping. And there's an insanely good deal. For example, 50 to 90% off. And I could freeze it and save money, but I'd go over budget. I usually cave. Can't resist a useful bargain. But then feel guilty later and have to tweak the budget. Will I ever get the hang of budgeting? Should I do a random and unexpected category emoji? I think we gotta put this one up, guys. As a visual that was. I'm stressed for you. I feel the anxiety, like, raging from your body as you type this. This feels like a ransom note. Like, there's so much, so many parentheticals here. This parenthetical has some spaces, but the next one doesn't. You use the money sign. Over here, there's an ampersand, but in other places you don't use it. I just don't know. So let me try to go through this one by one. So your grocery shopping there's a really good deal. And you're like, well, I could go over the grocery budget and get a bunch of food and freeze it to save for later, which could save me later, but it's messing up my budget now. That's okay if you go 250 instead of 200, but then next month you can lower it by 50. It's a net wash. So just adjust your budget next month because you spent a little more. That's all I would do there. Now, if this is an ongoing pattern, I think there's something else happening here where you're like, falling for the deal. So you might need to train yourself to just go, Nope, I'm fine. I don't need to go to the clearance section to the manager special all the time. I'm just gonna get what I said I needed to buy and I'm gonna do it with the budget I have. That's okay too. I feel guilty later. I have to tweak the budget. That's okay. Don't feel guilty. The budget is made to be flexible. The key is, are you living on less than you make? Will I ever get the hang of budgeting? Yes. It takes about 90 days to get the hang of your budget. And so I don't know how long you've been doing it, but over time it gets easier. And if it gets overwhelming, you might need to just simplify the budget. You may not need 28 line items. Maybe it's just, you know, food. Instead of Aldi, Costco, Target, Kroger. Like, just simplify your budget and it might simplify your life and give you less anxiety. Should I do a random and unexpected category? Yeah, I would have a miscellaneous category that has a little bit. It wouldn't be like $500 of miscellaneous, but maybe it's $50 for you or $100 for those little catch all random things. I went over a little bit here, went under a little bit here. I think that will help you in this season of your life. Thank you for that. But great question about food there, and I think a lot of people struggle with this one. So if you want my best tips for putting food on the table without breaking the bank, I made this video breaking down my favorite hacks for saving money on grocery. So click here to watch it next or use the link in the description. That's it for today's video. Be sure to hit like, hit subscribe if you haven't already. Thanks for watching. We'll see you next time.