It’s not always necessary to make big changes to save at home, sometimes the wee changes can add up to large savings after a while.

Some of these may seem obvious but if you aren’t already doing them, they could save you lots of money over time.

Turning your heating down by 1 degree can reduce the amount of electricity, gas or oil your heating is using. Consider installing programmable thermostats and/or investing in separate heating controls for upstairs and downstairs so that you can set timers on your heating and avoid heating rooms that you aren’t in at the time.

Turn off lights and chargers when they are not being used. Get the kids in the habit of turning off lights when they leave the room and switching off socket plugs when they unplug their devices.

“We tried turning the heat down by 5 degrees to start with but actually we found it was totally comfortable still and are definitely seeing a reduction in our energy use.” – Tara

Meal Planning is one of the best things you can do to save money before you go shopping. This free Meal Planning sheet can help and download our Free Lunch Box Planner. Plan out the week’s meals and pick your recipes in advance.

The next time you are cooking, double or triple the quantities and freeze the extra in batches. That way, the next time you need a quick meal you’ll be able to reheat quickly plus bulk buying meat and veg is cheaper so get in the habit of making up bigger batches when you cook.

Caitriona Redmond from Wholesome Ireland has lots of recipes and suggestions for keeping the weekly food and household budget low.

“Meal planning has been working great for me. Every Sunday our fridge is almost empty, exact meal planning & shopping means zero waste for us.” – Babina

“I use a couple of butchers that do the family packs of meat and I use my meat every other day with something like tuna bake in between.” – Sally

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Use vinegar and baking soda. Independently and combined, they are great cleaning agents. Our grandmothers and mothers cleaned with vinegar, baking soda and lemon. For example, pour 1/2 cup vinegar and 1/2 cup baking soda down the drain and rinse with water to keep drains clear.

Here’s a video on making your own laundry detergent:

“I use Norwex microfiber Enviro Cloths with tap water and have replaced my all-purpose cleaners. (They are also guaranteed for 2 years.)” – Sandra

“Instead of using bleach to take stains from your clothes use Milton sterilizing fluid. It’s a fraction of the price and brings white items up like new.” – Alana

More tips on how to clean your whole house with vinegar, baking soda and lemon on Earth911.com.

While there might be some brands you wouldn’t compromise on, you might be surprised at the quality of the supermarket own brand and save some money at the same time. If you compare the price of own brand to branded products there is usually a significant saving to be made by switching.

“Look after the pennies, the pounds will look after themselves”, as my grandmother used to say.

Slow cookers are a good way to transform inexpensive ingredients into delicious meals. You can use cheaper cuts of meat which helps with the meat bill.

Or make a big batch of bean, lentil or quinoa stew and the long slow cooking time will add plenty of flavour. They are ideal for dried beans which tend to be cheaper than tinned varieties.

Slow cookers are also great for batch cooking especially the larger ones so you can make extra and freeze.

They also use way less energy than the cooker or oven, and are easy to use.

When my daughter was younger she would use screeds of toilet paper often blocking the bend. We hit upon a simple number of sheets that she had to count up to.

Saving on toilet paper does add up and helps the environment too.

You can also keep empty paper rolls and fill them with compost to plant seeds in which saves money on plant pots.