A beacon for uncertain times
Fight inflation and live well on less: cut the big monthly bills, buy durable, and question spending habits.
Each row is one idea from a Future West article, with its yearly saving in USD and as a share of a typical US household budget: USD 105,709 for a young family of four and USD 61,432 for a retired couple (BLS 2024, family; BLS 2024, age 65+). Ideas that overlap are counted once. New articles add new rows.
Pinch to zoom in on the table.
| Spending area | Your choice | Instead of | From the post | Family of 4 | Retired couple |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Main car | 5-year-old car bought for cash | New status car on a 72-month loan | Buying an old car | USD 7,922 (7.5%) | USD 7,922 (12.9%) |
| Transport | Family: maxi-scooter instead of a second car. Retired couple: one car only | A second car | Skip the second car | USD 5,685 (5.4%) | USD 4,257 (6.9%) |
| Groceries | Store brands for about a quarter of the grocery basket | Name brands | Stop keeping up with the Joneses | USD 693 (0.7%) | USD 438 (0.7%) |
| Food | One home vegetable garden | Buying all your vegetables | Grow food on a budget | USD 530 (0.5%) | USD 530 (0.9%) |
| Total yearly savings | USD 14,830 (14.0%) | USD 13,147 (21.4%) | |||
Energy bonus: about USD 3,080 a year more (2.9% for a family, 5.0% for a retired couple) if your car is electric and charged by home solar instead of a gas car on grid power. Not added to the totals, because the main-car row above assumes a regular used car. Solar costs about USD 22,600 to 29,100 up front and pays back in 12 to 14 years; see solar and EV payback.
Pinch to zoom in on the table.
| Spending area | Your choice | Instead of | From the post | Family of 4 | Retired couple |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Living costs | Move to Da Nang / Hoi An, Vietnam, the cheapest of our 16 expat cities: 68% less for a family, 65% less for a retired couple | Living costs in a typical US household | Cost of living abroad | USD 54,889 (51.9%) | USD 30,547 (49.7%) |
| US income tax | Foreign earned income exclusion for a family earning USD 100,000 abroad through remote work or a portable business; pensions do not qualify | Full US income tax on the same pay | Cost of living abroad | USD 3,240 (3.1%) | – |
| Total yearly savings | USD 58,129 (55.0%) | USD 30,547 (49.7%) | |||
Not included: health insurance abroad, which can be a retiree's largest cost, and visa costs. Garden and scooter savings are not added, as cheap local food and transport are already in local prices. Moving within the US instead, from New York or Los Angeles to the countryside, lowers overall prices by about 21% to 22%; see the cheapest states to buy land.
Disclaimer: these are rough estimates built from the sources in each article, updated October 2026. Your savings depend on where you live, what you spend now and the choices you make. This is general information, not financial, tax or legal advice.
Visit Site Buying an old car is one of the few big purchases where someone else has already paid most of the price for you. When I went shopping for a car in Thailand, one ad said its Mercedes E-Class had sold new for more than 5 million baht (about USD 149,000). Sixteen years later, … Read more
What a home garden really saves, a year-one budget for one raised bed, the crops that pay, and a season-by-season plan.
Why a maxi-scooter like the Honda ADV350 can replace a second car: storage, step-through comfort, running costs and safety.
In the article on buying an old car, I stuck to combustion engines. This is the other half of the story: panels on the roof, an electric car in the driveway and a Tesla-style home battery on the garage wall. The question is simple. If the sun fuels both your house and your car, does … Read more
Keeping up with the Joneses is the most expensive habit most households never budget for. It doesn’t show up as a line item. It hides inside the car payment, the kitchen remodel, the kids’ sneakers and the vacation that had to look good online. And no spreadsheet can fix it, because the problem isn’t math. … Read more