Awesome August's No-Spend Days Challenge!

cathybird

Welcome to Awesome August's No-Spend Days Challenge! This challenge is all about helping people to save money by setting aside days every month where you deliberately don't spend unnecessary cash. Over the short term, it can help you have a more frugal month. Over the long term, if you stick with it, it can help change your mindset because you get out of the habit of frittering money away and start automatically holding off from spending instead. It also helps you delay purchases, which in turn means you lose interest in a lot of things you might otherwise impulse buy. 

Another good thing with this challenge is we're all in it together, and people will help you on bad days and cheer you on on good days, and the support and accountability can really help make it easier to keep going with it. And if all else fails, there's always next month 

To join, just post the number of no-spend days (NSDs) you're aiming for this month and you are on your way!

Tips for the challenge:

1. It's totally up to you but if you've never done the challenge before, it's probably simpler to start with a goal of 10 or (at most) 15.
2. It is fine to exclude necessary expenses eg petrol, groceries, pet food, essential health spending such as dental checkups or medications, etc, when it comes to deciding what is and isn't an NSD. It is also completely fine to exclude automated or recurring payments such as bills, mortgage or direct debits.
3. It does help to post every time you notch up an NSD, or at least every two or three days ... it's easy to lose track! If you want to keep track of your NSDs in your MSE signature, that can be really motivating too :)
4. It also helps to bookmark the thread, it's much easier to find.
5. NSDs are trickier than they seem and easily derailed. It can work better if you notch up as many days as you can in the first half of the month, or think of the month in thirds so if you're aiming for 10 NSDs, try to do 4 days in the first 10, 3 in the second and 3 in the third. And if you feel that you're falling behind, there's no shame in changing your target! Sometimes life just gets in the way, and the challenge should be fun, not a grind. 

August emojis

Off to a start:

5 days:

10 days:

15 days:

20 days:

25 days:

Target reached:

Target beaten:

Everyone welcome to join! 😊😊

cathybird

August 2026 NSD targets
beanielou 19
cathybird 15
crazybeautiful 15
DarknessIntoPower 10
Deb 4 15
Dizzycap 10
Doris17 10
Honeysucklelou2 10
InDebtEnby 13
Jazee TF
KajiKita 20
laurenh1 18
LittleMissDetermined 20
loopylupin 14
Mamma2004 16
OptimisticSaver 15
Paperback Writer 15
Pinkpieuni 10
QueenJess 15
Rupacomp 13
Sallyp2 18
Soontobeoap 10
Tenar15 10
ThriftyPrincess40 22
VickyA 2 15
Wanna Bee Free 10

🌞 🌞  Everyone welcome to join! 🌞 🌞

KajiKita

Ooh, if I get myself sorted I will get a swing this month! I do love a swing 😊🤩

KK

beanielou

Thanks for our shiny new thread @cathybird.

Paperback_Writer

I’m going for 15 for August. I did the challenge many years ago when my finances were tighter than two coats of paint. It became quite addictive once I saw how much I frittered away, and it was very effective.

cathybird

hi @Paperback_Writer and welcome back to our lovely thread. I've added you to the list, hope you enjoy the challenge

Paperback_Writer

Thank you! It’s a well overdue return I can assure you. 😂

cathybird

August totals updated here

Honeysucklelou2

Thank you for the new thread…hoping for a closer to target result than the last couple of months!

KajiKita

Not today 🤷‍♀️😉 Am finally taking friend out for her birthday lunch 😊❤️

KK

beanielou

Starting with no 1of the month.