I used to be a McDonald's junkie, and if Icreated a budget onlinewith CalendarBudget, the expense of eating out would have been very clear. According to the video "Super Size Me", McDonald's would have considered me a heavy-consumer, frequenting a McDonald's restaurant more than 3 times a month. Fortunately for my budget (and health!), I've reduced my eating out habit to almost nil.

Learn why you eat out and create a budget online to stop spending

One of the most common budget-breakers is eating out too often. This occurs for a number of reasons.

• We make ourselves so busy, we can't (or won't) find the time to prepare a quality meal.
• We don't grocery shop and meal plan very well so we end up with lots of the same thing night after night. Eventually, we get same-meal fatigue and want to eat-out for variety.
• We are either too tired or lazy to prepare a meal. Even if we have the time, we'd rather watch TV, or do a myriad of other things.

The above graph shows dollars spent on eating out (in Canada) over a number of years. Clearly, the trend has been increasing. Judge for yourself where you stand.

Because I've been using CalendarBudget to track my finances since 2002, I can calculate exactly how much I would have saved by not eating at McDonald's… a whopping $965.82! If I had invested this money, it would be worth almost $2000 today.

How much money would you save if you didn't eat out so often?  Why not use the best money management software, CalendarBudget, to find out?  Contact usand create a budget online to serve as a single point of consult to determine whether or not you can afford to eat out.