When a person decides it is time to make their money behave, it can be difficult to make income minus outgo equal exactly zero.

For most people just getting started on a spending plan, the focus necessarily is placed on reducing variable expenses like gasoline, electricity and groceries. I hear statements such as “We will drive less,” “We will turn off the lights more often,” and “We will eat food out of the pantry for the next month.”

These are all good things, but they usually cannot be sustained over the long term. That is why I ensure that a good look is taken at the fixed costs such as car payments, house payments, insurance premiums and monthly subscriptions (cable, movies, home security systems, phone service, etc.)

Let me share some common ways that I see folks save a lot of money.

Obtain new insurance quotes if one has not done so in the last two years. Have homeowners/renters/auto insurance quoted together. One usually receives a 10 percent to 30 percent discount by bundling insurance together. Obtain quotes from two name-brand companies and an independent insurance agent. I regularly see savings of between $500 and $1,000 a year for the exact same or better insurance just by obtaining new quotes.

Call the cable company and ask for a lower rate. Many times one can save a substantial amount of money just for asking or by cutting out a couple of services.

More than half of the people I have counseled have dumped their home phone and are carrying cell phones instead.

Dave Ramsey has said that a good car is an “I’m getting out of debt car.” I agree! A $1,000 beater certainly will not drive as nicely as a $20,000 truck, but selling a car with a big payment will speed up the journey toward debt freedom and relieve pressure from a very tight budget.

Maybe it is time to get really crazy and sell the house. I have seen folks hold on to houses way too long, and it leads to financial ruin. The scenario usually runs this way. A family is doing fine financially, and then a major pay cut or job layoff happens. The family hopes for the best and begins using the home equity to finance the short term. The short term lasts way longer than they expect, and now they are in a situation where they have no more equity and the income still has not come back. Major pain is in the future.

By the way. there is another way to reduce fixed costs, and that is to aggressively work toward paying off debt. That was the approach that Jenn and I used.

When fixed costs are reduced, a tight budget can be a very fun budget that includes a lot of giving, a lot of saving and a lot of fun. Nice!