How Much Does It Cost to Eat at Home?by Mary Ann Romans | More from this Blogger 15 Aug 2007 05:24 AM Of course we know that eating at home is much more frugal than eating out. But, have you ever taken the time to actually calculate how much you save. You might be really surprised to know what a huge gap there is between eating out and eating at home. I'll use my family as an example. There are five of us here, including one baby in diapers and on mostly mushy food. I'm going to count him as a full member for this example, because I still include his diapers in our grocery bill, which are expensive in themselves. So while my calculation may not be completely accurate, it is probably close. Currently, we pay about $100 a week for groceries. I am still working on getting that number down, but it has been tough with the increase in food prices. (Still, I know I could do better.) Anyway that adds up to $400 a month. I'll take that number and divide it by the amount of meals we would consume in a month. Three meals a day times 30 days equals 90 meals. The calculation looks like this: $400 divided by 90 = $4.44444. I'll round this to $4.44 per meal. The next step is to divide that figure by the number of people in your household. I have five, as I mentioned above, so this is what my new calculation looks like: $4.44 divided by 5 = $.88 This means that is costs me 88 cents per person per meal. Now, I know this price must be even less, since I didn't include snacks in any of these calculations. On a typical eating out night, we can spend between $30 and $50, and that is with pulling every eating out trick in the book. I'll take the middle figure of $40. The cost per meal for eating out is almost ten times the cost of eating at home! Mary Ann Romans also writes for the Computing Blog here at Families.com where she shares everything from the latest news on technology to cool downloads and fun websites. Related Articles: Frugal Uses For Leftovers: The Sandwich Spread A Frugal Secret: Bakery Thrift Stores Does Bagged Produce Save You Money? Learn more about Mary Ann Romans  Mary Ann Romans is a freelance writer, wife and mother of three children. She lives in Pennsylvania with her husband, the kids and a 16-pound cat. Relevantfrugal tags User Comments  Mary Ann Romans (26876) 15 Aug 2007 06:28 AMIt is amazing what comes out when you look at things in a different way. Thanks so much for the comment!  Valorie Delp (49340) 15 Aug 2007 08:41 AMYou can use the calculation in reverse as well to try to set a reasonable budget. Even spending $1 per person, per meal is cheaper than eating out and would set you with a food budget that was quite reasonable for a month! Mary Ann Romans (26876) 15 Aug 2007 09:27 AMGreat idea Val! That is a very practical approach to see how much you really need for your family. Then, if you go under that budget, you can save the extra for a special treat. Valorie Delp (49340) 15 Aug 2007 11:08 AMMmmmmm. . .special treat! No honestly, I had never thought of it before until I read your article. You're the inspiration Mary Ann! ;-)  serenitysmom (166) 29 Sep 2008 10:14 PMI finally got my bf to try and eat better for our daughter, which means he's not really eating out anymore (except subway). He had no idea how much he really was spending on eating out (1-2 meals daily @ $8+). Mary Ann Romans (26876) 30 Sep 2008 10:38 AMMy husband has been working from home about two days a week, and not only does that save on gas, but he is less likely to pick up something from the cafeteria or snack machine (even though I makes lots of snacks here at home). Community Tags Food, frugal, groceries, meals, save money Discuss this article
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