A couple of years ago, some unexpected bills caught my family off-guard and drained our savings.
Going from bad to worse, directly after our savings was gone, a few of my most reliable clients became erratic in their payments for my services. We suddenly were living paycheck to reduced paycheck.
Unfortunately, my family’s story is not that unusual. According to a CareerBuilder survey, 78 percent of American workers are living paycheck-to-paycheck. To pull us out of this cycle, my wife and I sat down to trim the excess off our budget—which included my gym membership.
Note: If you are looking for other things in your budget that can be cut, I suggest trying the Trim app. Trim will locate subscriptions you no longer need and cancel them for you. They will also negotiate certain bills like your cable or insurance.
Axing My Gym Membership In A Budget Overhaul
We had become lax in our budgeting habits once my wife was able to start working part-time again. Because I had a roster of clients I regularly worked for, it left us with a comfortable income.
But during that time of financial laziness, our family had added several subscriptions. A book club membership that sent my wife a new book every month. Plus, my gym membership, which I had the highest level subscriptions so that I could take all the classes I wanted.
I also realized how much I had spent on running and cycling races over the last year, along with all the other extras fitness folk seem to acquire.
I had rationalized a lot of these expenses because my work relates heavily to fitness, fitness products, and other peripherals connected to the exercise industry. But in reality, I didn’t need all that stuff to do what I loved. I just needed to enjoy working out.
So, I cut my pricey gym membership as my wife and I pared off everything but the essentials.
Rediscovering My Love Of Outdoor Fitness
In an effort to live within our means, I rediscovered my love of the great outdoors. While I did run and cycle outside, I often stuck to my regular set of city paths and counted on my gym routine to shake things up.
By cutting my gym membership, I cut the strings tying me to my stale routine, and I started to explore the plethora of free outdoor fitness options that surrounded me.
Some of the things I tried that others might want to are:
- Go to fitness parks – Many towns and cities have developed outdoor fitness parks as health initiatives. These fitness parks are open to the public free of charge and have all the basic workout equipment you would expect from any gym.
- Locate local parks – If there is no fitness park where you live, a local park can meet your needs. There are plenty of bodyweight playground workout routines you can do. I like taking my kids with me, so they can play while I work up a sweat.
- Google hiking trails nearby – I was a little embarrassed to find I only knew a handful of the trails around my house. Once I turned to Google, I found hundreds of branching trail systems nearby, and I still haven’t explored all of them! Even if you live in a flatter area, there will often be nature paths developed so that everyone can become immersed in nature.
- Take the family out geocaching – Another family-friendly outdoor workout I discovered was geocaching. A real-life treasure hunt. People hide containers of all types and post the coordinates. When you find a cache, often there is a place for you to write the date you found it. The only rules are you have to put it back in the exact same spot, and if you take an item from the container, you have to add something back in its place.
Building Up My Affordable Home Gym
When I had to make the initial cutbacks on my family’s spending, I was lucky it happened during the early summer. That way, I could easily take advantage of all my outdoor workout options. But I knew I needed a solution for when late fall and winter hit.
As I live in the Northern Utah region, winter can be a dangerous time to exercise outside due to the uncertain ground underfoot or bike and reckless drivers. One narrow miss with a car sliding on ice years ago was enough to convince me that I needed an indoor gym for the cold months.
So, since I had a few months to prepare, I took several careful steps to build up an affordable home gym. Some of the things I did were:
- Shop for used weights – I kept my eye on several secondhand websites like Craigslist and Letgo to find free weight dumbbells, plate weights, and bars for my home gym. These items are generally safe to purchase used, as it is clear if they are too damaged to be used.
- Buy new machines – When it comes to machines like treadmills and other pieces of fitness equipment, it is safer to purchase new, as I can be sure it works and have a warranty if it does become damaged. I went with fitness giant NordicTrack as they have affordable commercial gym-style equipment to the home gym and often have excellent sales.
While my home gym will never have all the equipment my commercial gym has, I have been far more content with what I do have and actually use everything in my home gym. Even better, by sticking to our careful budgeting and making smarter fitness decisions, I have been able to stay in shape while I got my family finances back in good condition.
