What are you giving up for Lent? Even if you’re not Christian, there are benefits to giving up something for 40 days—or for whatever period of time you please. Giving up meat and eating out for 40 days can save you $800. Giving up lattes might save you nearly $200.
SmartMoney reports some background on Lent, along with some budget benefits to going without, say, casual shopping:
If shopping is your vice of choice, the savings from a period of self-denial could be even more substantial. As someone who shopped almost daily and could easily spend $100 any time she went into a store, Carlomagno says she saved more than $1,000 in a month of abstaining from fashion. “I was a good shopper, I’d get a lot of stuff inexpensively, because I was a bargain hunter,” she says. That mentality helped mask how much she was really spending, Carlomagno says.