How to Save Money: Exercise Edition

Are you tired of paying for expensive gym memberships that you don’t use as often as you should? Well I’m here to help you save money on your exercise and fitness journey! Welcome to How to Save Money: Exercise Edition!

Disclosure: Some of the links below are affiliate links. This means that, at zero cost to you, I will earn an affiliate commission if you click through the link and finalize a purchase.

As I write this, we are currently in the Covid-19 pandemic. Even if your gym is open near you, it might not be the safest place to go at the moment. In addition to that, gym memberships can be very expensive. The average gym membership costs $58 per month. This is $696 per year. That’s a pretty significant amount of money.

Now I’m not saying that you should ignore your health. Quite frankly, if having a gym membership keeps you accountable in your health goals, then it’s probably worth the money for you and you should continue going. Read my article here on WHY I believe you should save more of your money.

Finding Something You Enjoy

I’m a big supporter in preventative health measures and I think fitness and exercise is very important. That’s probably why I’m writing a piece on this as one of my earlier blog posts. Fitness and exercise have been critical in my life. Growing up, I played as many sports as I could. In high school, I ran cross country and participated in track and field. I spent a few years pole vaulting in high school and I still miss it to this day.

Once I got to college, I realized I needed to find a new way to start working out since I wasn’t participating in a sport. I continued running a bit, but it really wasn’t what my body needed. I had a friend who introduced me to weightlifting and I haven’t turned back since. To this day, it’s my favorite form of exercise. I’ve also come across many numerous ways to get some activity into my day that I’d like to share with you that is pretty much free across the board. I’m not a doctor, so please seek the advice of a doctor before starting any new workouts.

YouTube Videos

The world of YouTube is endless. And FREE! AKA: save you money! Whatever form of exercise you enjoy, you can likely find a video or “how-to” video of it on YouTube. Some of my favorite exercise videos on YouTube are yoga, bodyweight exercises, ab workouts, HIIT workouts, and weightlifting.

Yoga

If you’ve never heard of Yoga with Adriene, you are missing out. Go check out her YouTube channel! Her yoga videos are really fun and enjoyable. If your sense of humor is anything like mine, you might also get a good chuckle at her jokes. She has a few “30 days of yoga” series that can really get you into a good yoga flow! I highly recommend.

Save Money on Yoga Equipment

Honestly, I think you can get away with a yoga mat if you have something like carpet or a rug that can cushion your knees. In a pinch, I will throw down a towel to use if I’m traveling and in a hotel, but if you find that gross, there are many yoga mats that you can get at an affordable price. If you take care of it and keep it clean, you can keep it for many years to come.

Other Video Ideas

Often after I’ve had a long day of work, I’ll simply do a search on YouTube for a workout depending on how much time I have. A simple “20 minute body weight workout” will produce many results (or anything similar). This also helps keep things from getting stagnant from doing the same workout every day. There are so many workouts that you could never practically have to do the same workout twice. Even if you have only 5 minutes, there’s likely one for that. Or just an ab workout. Or a lower body workout. Whatever your heart desires at the time. Just give a quick search into YouTube to find a free workout video to workout along side of.

Bodyweight Training

Bodyweight training is amazing. You might think you need a set of heavy weights to get stronger, but that in fact is not the case. From pushups to situps and squats to pullups, you can get an amazing workout in with just your own body weight.

Can you do 20 pushups without stopping? How many sit ups? Or squats? Maybe give yourself a goal of being able to do 20 pushups without stopping (or whatever sounds reasonable). There’s really no need to go out and spends loads of money on expensive pieces of workout equipment if you are lacking in the basics! So you could try out giving yourself a goal of a set number of pushups, sit-ups, and squats to do every day! Maybe break up your goal of 50 squats in a day throughout the day and try completing it bit by bit.

Busy at work but maybe you are working from home? Do 10 pushups on your break every hour. The goal is to find what works for you! It can be as simple as that. If you want to start adding weight to maybe your squat, take a look around your house. Is there something you can use to hold while doing your squat to make it a bit harder? Try filling up a milk jug with water. Get creative.

Convict Conditioning

You could also look into “convict conditioning.” It’s a method using only your body weight to gain a lot of strength. It was based off what people in prison did to workout to become stronger. There are sets of progressions in order to work through all of the ranges of motion without an exercise equipment. A quick google search can give you more information.

Save Money with Low Cost Home Gym Options

There are also many low cost options for you to start building your own small home gym that can still allow you to save money. Some of these things take up little space but can provide a lot of value. Sometimes, it’s just a matter of being smart with your money and if there’s something that provides great value to you, then it might be worth it to spend a little bit of money on it. A set of resistance bands or glute bands can provide some great options for strength training and you can take these with you when you travel. I also have 2 pairs of dumbbells. A lighter pair of dumbbells and a slightly higher weight pair of dumbbells. I use these 3x a week, every time I lift.

Save Money by Going on a Walk

I can’t tell you enough the power behind a simple walk. This costs you nothing and will save you money on the fees you’d be spending on gym memberships. If you can’t find the energy to lift weights or do high intensity interval training, then look no further to a simple walk.

35-40 minutes, 3 times per week of moderate physical aerobic activity is an effective exercise schedule [1]. Therefore, this translates to walks! I like to throw on my headphones and listen to a good financial independence podcast on my walks. On the whole, this makes me feel twice as productive. I’m getting a workout in and I’m learning more about other ways I can seek financial independence. I like to walk on my lunch break during work, or after a long day at work. It’s a great way to clear my mind and destress.

Walking in place: However, you might feel like you live in an area that might not be the safest place to go out for longer walks. If that’s the case, how about walking in place! Sure, it doesn’t get you out of the house, but you could do it while you watch your tv shows in the evening.

Do you have a standard meeting during your work week that you doesn’t require much participation from you? If you are working from home during the pandemic, this can make for a great time to walk in place at your computer while listening in to your meeting (maybe with your video off…). This is a great way to a more movement into your day!

Save Money by Hiking

Search around your area for a nice hike to go on because this is a great way to get out in to nature and clear the mind. Think you don’t have any hikes near you? There are two apps I’d recommend you take a look at. The Hiking Project and AllTrails. These both list numerous trails near you. They will tell you the distance of the hike as well as the skill level required so you can pick the one that best suites you! These apps are both free and I highly recommend!

Building Movement into Your Day

Does your job involve sitting at a desk all day? Adding in additional movement into your day can add steps to your step count which unquestionably gets you more active! There are certainly many things you can add in to your life to add in some activity into your day! Try getting up every hour for a walk to the kitchen or to get a drink of water. Stand up every half an hour for a 5 minute stretch. While at home, things such as gardening, vacuuming, cleaning, doing the laundry and dishes, and mowing the lawn can all add some movement in to your day.

Save Money by Creating Your Own Simple Workout Schedule

Build yourself a simple workout plan that you can follow. You can develop it based on your current skill level. If you are starting from not working out at all, you could potentially start out with 3 days a week. Maybe start with a 10 minute walk and then work your way up slowly to a 30 min walk. I’ve come up with two simple examples of a workout plan that you could generate. There is one for beginner level and one for intermediate level.

Beginner Example

Intermediate Example

These are just to get you thinking about how you can build your own exercise plan! Try to build it around your current life. This makes it easier to follow and to stick to. For example, Saturday’s are the day that my significant other and I enjoy going out maybe for a nice hike. Maybe you have kids and you could take everybody on a nice walk or bike ride in the evening after dinner.

The weekends for me is a time to get some yard work done or house projects! Learn how to do your own house projects. This is also a great way to get in some exercise and will also save you some money. Instead of paying someone else to do it, learn how to do it yourself.

I hope you found something useful here! Just get creative and use your mind to come up with some new ways to incorporate movement into your day and ways to build some muscle. I’m not a doctor, but keeping your body healthy and active can help keep medical bills lower.

I’m not a doctor and you should seek the advice of your medical professional before trying any new exercise program.

Do you think you know where all of your money is going? Read this next article that walks you through the easy process of finding where all your money is being spent!

Footnotes

[1] Dr. Stephen Ilardi- Department of Psychology, Therapeutic Lifestyle Change, The University of Kansas, accessed 3/31/2022, <http://tlc.ku.edu/elements>

Photo by Kelly Sikkema on Unsplash