Most people who track their spending accurately (see CalendarBudget) will notice that their expenditures on entertainment add up to more than they expect. I know for me and all of my friends this is true. Of course, this makes sense. What else are we going to do with our disposable income? Given that, here are a few ideas for less-expensive entertainment alternatives so you can take your extra money and pay down that debt or invest for your future… and you’ll find some of these ideas are great fun!

  1. Rather than going to a restaurant on a date, go to the grocery store, spend less than half the amount and make a night out of preparing the food. You’ll be surprised how much fun this can be.
  2. Create a dream board – collect a bunch of magazines and cut out pictures of things you’d like to have, like to do, places you’d like to go, etc… Put it all together in a collage. This generates great conversation during and after about goals, dreams, etc.
  3. Rather than going to the theater or renting movies, go to your local library and borrow some free DVDs from there. My wife and I don’t have cable TV, but we get sucked into some interesting TV series. We just borrow the whole season and watch an episode every few nights.

Please share your other ideas with everyone else by commenting.