Splendid September's No-Spend Days Challenge!

cathybird

Welcome to Splendid September'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. 

September emojis

Off to a start:

5 days:

10 days:

15 days:

20 days:

25 days:

Target reached:

Target beaten:

Everyone welcome to join! 😊😊

Soontobeoap

Thank you @cathybird. As I completely lost it last month I would like to try for 15 in September. Please.

cathybird

September 2026 NSD targets
beanielou 12
cathybird 15
crazybeautiful 20
DarknessIntoPower 10
Deb 4 15
Dizzycap 10
Doris17 10
Honeysucklelou2 10
InDebtEnby 13
Jazee 15
KajiKita 20
laurenh1 18
LittleMissDetermined 20
loopylupin 14
Mamma2004 16
Mrsnuffleupugus 10
OptimisticSaver 15
Paperback Writer 15
peony40 15
Rupacomp 13
Soontobeoap 15
Tenar15 10
ThriftyPrincess40 18
VickyA 2 15
Wanna Bee Free 10

🌞 🌞  Everyone welcome to join! 🌞 🌞

peony40

Hello,

I would like to join you in September, please can you put me down for 15, many thanks.

cathybird

@peony40 welcome back to our lovely thread, I've added you to the list, hope you enjoy the challenge

cathybird

September totals updated here

Deb4

Starting the month with a NSD 1/15

peony40

NSD 1/15. This is an eye opener as twice already I was popping onto Am*zon to buy a 2027 diary and something I can’t even remember what it was now! The diary has gone onto my Christmas list as DH always asks for ideas and I cannot think of anything.

cathybird

September totals updated here   

Doris17

NSD for me please 1/10.

beanielou

Starting the month with no 1 of the month.