Why Eating In Is the Productive Choice...

You can move toward achieving many of your goals by Eating In rather than Eating Out! Last post we listed why Eating Out Is Counter Productive. This week let's look at why Eating In is the productive choice. This all starts with your goals and defining being productive as progressing in the direction of those goals. The most frequently seen personal goals related to this article are:

1. Lose Weight
2. Get Out of Debt
3. Save for something
4. Get in Shape
5. Reduce Stress
6. Eat Well

When eating in you have a much better chance of losing weight because you can make choices on what you ingest rather than eating what others put in the food that is put in front of you at a restaurant. Eating in and grabbing convenience foods or take out (for those of you defining eating in as eating anything at home) are bad choices. Having an abundance of healthy food is a good choice and easy at home. For those who don't have time to go shopping – you don't have to. Many grocery stores across the nation will deliver groceries including fresh produce right to your door.

In this era of shopping online it's a natural process. So, order your veggies, lean meats or fresh seafood, pasta, bread and fruit and eat well by Eating In.

Note: Beyond the convenience factor of having your groceries delivered to your home you avoid one of the biggest fat traps in the grocery store – the impulse buy. You eliminate the opportunity to buy that bag of fried food that is a great price and on the end cap attracting your appetite and wallet because you don't see it when you shop online.

Getting out of debt and save for something is also supported by Eating In. Eating In is far less expensive than eating out and the money you don't spend on eating out could go right into paying down your debt. Let's look at a bowl of soup for an example. Ordering a bowl of homemade-style split pea soup at a restaurant is going to cost you typically $4.50 plus a 15% tip results in a $5.17 bowl of soup. When you make a big batch of real homemade split pea soup at home, 6 servings will cost you somewhere near $8 ($1.25 per serving) to make. Savings: $3.93. Multiply that times just one meal per week and you're keeping $204.10 per year in your pocket.

You will create time to get in better shape by staying out of restaurants. Typical meals served by a waitress take an hour at least and up toward two hours for a leisurely meal. Eating in could take less than 30 minutes from prep to clean up. In our soup example that would be a meal where you made the soup on another day and heated it up today, sliced some wonderful crust bread that was delivered by your grocery store this morning, and throw the dirty dishes in the dishwasher when you're done. That time not spent in the restaurant could now be spent in the gym, on a walk, or other activity that keeps you moving.

Stress reduction from eating in could be the result of you not having to block such a big amount of time away from doing your other priorities. That is to say you will have more time to spend with your kids doing homework, taking care of yourself, getting a pet project completed, and doing something you enjoy like getting a massage to literally reduce your stress. As your humble author, I engage in stress reduction activities from biking to cooking rather than eating out often.

Why Eating Out is Counterproductive...

When time is short eating out seems to be the answer. But, eating out is counterproductive. That is to say that eating out is inhibiting you from attaining your goals rather than supporting you in reaching them. So, we should start with understanding what goals are being thwarted by eating out. Here are popular goals related to this article:

1. Losing weight (we're just 35 days from the infamous #1 New Year Resolution)
2. Building savings for anything from a vacation to buying a new vehicle to retirement
3. Eliminate debt
4. Get in shape
5. Eat Right
6. Reduce Stress

For lists of more goals see: USA.gov and RIS Media.

Linking each goal to the counterproductive impact eating out has looks like this:

1. Losing weight is foiled by eating out because restaurant food tends to emphasize the taste and not the nutrition. Hidden calories and irresistible temptations abound in restaurants. Additionally, people tend to drink weight-adding calories

1. while sitting in a restaurant for service.
2. Eating out at modest restaurants tends to cost twice to five times as much as eating a home. Although we love our coffee at the Productivity Cafe, this is vividly illustrated in a simple calculation on the cost of a cup of coffee at home vs out. Say a pound of good coffee (Starbucks Casi Cielo used in this example) costs $13 and you can make 35 cups from that pound. The cost per cup is: $0.34. Paying $1.50 for a cup out is $1.16 over making it at home or $312.50 per year. That is $4,119 every ten years. Go to the hugh's coffee calculator for your own savings. Now multiply one cup of coffee times multiple cups, full meals, soda, and other foods in your life.
3. In addition to point 2 above, these little expenses add up to money owed versus money saved or applied to reducing debt.
4. Getting in shape does not happen when eating out. Typically people spend just under an hour at restaurants during lunch hour and 1½ or more for dinners. That compares poorly to whipping up something in your kitchen for a fraction of the time (including shopping since you can shop for a week's worth of meals in one trip). So sitting around in a restaurant consumes loads of time diminishing your fitness and keeping you from activity which would enhance your fitness whether it's walking around the neighborhood or working out with your trainer.
5. Eating right or healthfully is tremendously difficult when eating out. First of all you don't know what is in the food so it could be good stuff or bad stuff. Secondly portions in America are geared to satisfy a 200+ lb. person so if you don't want to be 200+ pounds, you're getting served tpo much when you eat out and you're probably eating it. And eating at home you know clearly what ingredients are going into your recipes and can make healthful choices easily.
6. Eating out can increase your stress if you're busy because that becomes one more thing that you have to do. It's more time that evaporates rather than having a return on your investment of time.

For ways to make eating time less unproductive time, come back next Monday.

How can I reduce my auto insurance bill?

How can I reduce my auto insurance bill?

Answer:

Insurers usually base their auto insurance rates on criteria such as your age, driving record, and the type of car you drive. Rates vary from company to company, however, so a good way to save money is to shop around--you may find that another insurer offers the same coverage at a lower rate.

Some of your coverages may be subject to deductibles (money you must pay before your insurance kicks in). Raising your deductibles can also help you save money. For the most part, the higher your deductibles, the lower your premiums. Before you raise a deductible, though, you'll want to be sure you can cover the out-of-pocket expense should an accident occur. Are you more concerned with lower premiums or full insurance coverage?

Many insurance companies offer credits or discounts. For example, an insurer might provide discounts to those who have safe driving records or to those who insure more than one car with them. Check to see what types of credits and discounts your insurer offers.

To save money, you may also want to rethink your optional coverages. For example, if you have an older car in poor condition, it may make sense to drop your collision and comprehensive coverage if possible. A claim paid by your insurance company on such a car may be minimal and might not even exceed what you'd pay in premiums and deductibles.