I Spend $200 a Month on Groceries

Five ways I save money at the grocery store

Whenever I share my monthly or annual budget, it inevitably triggers half of the internet and intrigues the other half. If you’re the former, this article is for you.

Before I went down a personal finance rabbit hole, I was spending $500 a month on groceries just for me. When I realized that my overall spending wasn’t aligned with my long term goals, I did a few things to bring my cost of groceries down.

I specifically targeted groceries as a priority expense to bring down because it was one of my top three monthly expenses (after housing and taxes). As someone who has chosen a lower paying career by choice in California, keeping essential expenses at a minimum allows me to maximize the amount I spend on luxuries and financial independence.

For context, I currently live with my fiance in a MCOL town in California, and we each spend about $200/month on groceries. He loves to cook and finds it to be therapeutic, whereas I find it to be an inconvenient chore. He does 99% of the cooking, but I will note that before he moved in, I still was still able to keep my grocery bill under $200/month.

We eat very well, and our hauls don’t at all feel restrictive. We use Instacart for more than 50% of our groceries by choice, and still manage a…