Time to read : 7 Minutes
How easy is it to save over $8,000 on household bills a year? The answer is surprisingly straightforward, and in this piece I’m going to show you how. Last year I managed to cut my expenses by $6,500. This year, it’s even more.
None of this involves clever hacks pushed by influencers on social media. It’s not particularly hard or time-consuming either, although it does require a little bit of discipline and staying on top of your contracts and renewal dates.
And most of all, this is tried and tested. A caveat: it’s only applicable to my finances. Yours may be different. But view this as inspiration for what you can save, and if you’re able to save a few thousand dollars as well, that can make a big difference to your bank balance.
Two tips before we start:
1. Start with your biggest expenses. These will have the most impact.
2. If you struggle to keep track of all your big expenses, use Compare Club’s Vault feature in our member area, Club+. You can save all your major bills and policies in one place, and it’s seriously helpful for keeping on top of your finances.
Health insurance savings: $2,211
This was one of our biggest savings.
Eighteen months ago, my wife and I had split our health cover as she needed a specific procedure, while my needs were more basic.
It made financial sense for my wife to take out a single Gold hospital policy with Bupa at $320 a month, while I took out a Bronze Plus single family for $201.51 a month. We opted to skip extras.
Once my wife had the procedure and had made her claim, we looked to lower her level of coverage and see if we could switch to a cheaper policy.
One of our health insurance brokers, Eli, moved us to a combined nib Bronze hospital and Core Extras family policy for $395 a month, saving us $1,498 a year.
This policy also came with six weeks free when we switched, which saved us an extra $547. That’s a massive saving for a 30 minute chat, plus we now have extras.
My wife and I also maxed out our dental and optical for the year, giving us $1,700 back, plus we claimed another $300 for assorted extras, meaning we’d actually claimed more back than we’d paid.
So strictly speaking, that’s another $166 saved, bringing us to a grand saving of $2,211 on health insurance.
Paying too much?
Australia: We saved our average customer $300* on their average annual premium! Select your age below and see how much you could save!
Just me
Me and my partner
My family
Me and my kid(s)Car loan savings: $2,594
Amazingly, health insurance wasn’t our biggest saving of the year. 2024 was the year we finally corrected a stupid mistake I made several years ago.
Having moved house with a baby in tow, we were suddenly in far greater need of a car. After one particularly trying week involving hospital trips and challenging daycare commutes, I snapped, walked into a dealership, and purchased a secondhand Toyota.
I then did what a lot of other Aussies do: took the financing on offer from the dealership, having done no research beforehand.
I have very little excuse for signing up to a massive 23% interest, but once I started working at Compare Club, I realised I was on a very bad deal. Breaking the contract and refinancing was also expensive so we opted to save and pay off the loan early.
Doing this saved us $2,594 in interest repayments over the rest of the lifetime of the loan. Buying vehicles and property on credit is largely unavoidable but the quicker you can pay down the principal loan and avoid unnecessary interest, the better.
Top tip: never do what I did. Compare loans and get pre-approval before you go anywhere near a dealership. You’ll almost certainly get a better interest rate.
Energy savings: $1,600
18 months ago, I’d switched from Red Energy to Sumo, who had one of the strongest offers in the market at the time. A year later, Sumo informed me my plan and pricing was changing – and wow, they weren’t kidding.
Even allowing for cranking up the heating during the winter, my monthly bills leapt by around $150. I didn’t want to have to switch so soon, but that’s a steep price hike.
Energy is one of the most frustrating and confusing products to switch. It’s hard to work out what’s like for like, so I got our Compare Club energy team to look at my usage.
I switched to Origin, who at the time (July) were offering more than 20% off the reference price in NSW.
While our bills obviously depend on how we use our energy, we estimated the annual saving is around $1,600 from the previous plan.
Top tip: if you’re worried about big jumps in your bill during the warmer and colder months, you can ask for a plan with Bill Smoothing. This keeps your price more consistent with each bill.
Phone and broadband savings: $1,152
We’ve been with Optus since forever and tend to upgrade our phones every two years after paying them off. It’s low touch but not hugely cost effective.
When we paid off our phones, we opted not to immediately upgrade and instead focused on how we can get a better value plan. This was a bit frustrating as we had to go back and forth a couple of times to Optus and show them plans we’d got from other telcos.
Eventually, we moved onto a Black Friday deal for our mobile plan and split it from our broadband contract. This saved us nearly $95 a month.
This was the hardest and most time consuming of all the switching and took us nearly two weeks to complete, but the savings were worth it.
Home insurance savings: $218
We rent, so we just need contents insurance. Each year, I do the following dance with my home insurance provider...
Insurer sticks up price by around $150.
I compare and draw up a shortlist. There’s always one insurer that comes in significantly cheaper.
I go back to my insurer. They offer to lower the price but can’t match.
I switch and save.
My current home and car insurer was AAMI. Budget Direct came in significantly cheaper than AAMI’s renewal quote even with a larger sum insured, so it was a no-brainer to switch.
I’ve kept my car insurance with AAMI, partly because the increase was only around $30 more and partly because it came with roadside assistance.
I’d already used this once and the service was excellent, so the customer experience was worth the increase in my mind. It’s not always about the cheapest cover.
Event tickets: $400
One unexpected saving came from Ticketek, who now allow you to pay for tickets with Qantas points.
Although I don’t tend to fly with Qantas, I have a Qantas points earning credit card which helps build up my points. I used the points to buy gig tickets for my in-laws as a present, and for an evening out at the Big Bash.
And a few other tips…
I’ve not yet got round to moving super funds, but can see my fund is charging significantly higher fees than other better performing funds. I won’t see that impact immediately, but every cent that stays in your pocket rather than the super fund is good.
I don’t have a mortgage, but if I did I would have looked at consolidating my car loan into my home loan. Even if your home loan is around 6%, that’ll still be significantly less than you’ll pay in interest on your car loan (or any other form of personal loan).
Still on mortgages, if I had one, I’d try to find one with an offset account. These can save you in your monthly interest payments and can help pay your principal loan off sooner. My colleague Gillian Clive has an excellent explainer on offsets here.
Maxed out your credit card? Balance transfers are your friend here. I saved $600 in 2023 by transferring my debt to a 32 month 0% no fee card. Just make sure you pay off the balance within the specified period otherwise you could get hit with a very large interest rate.
I don’t have life insurance (if my life insurance colleagues are reading this, it is on my 2025 to do list). But I do know from speaking to our expert life team that a lot of life policies often come with discounts that expire after around one to three years and lead to a steep hike in premiums. If this has happened to you, have a chat with our life team as there’s a good chance you can switch and save.
Bottom line
There’s a lot of money to be saved just by keeping on top of your big bills. Everybody’s circumstances are different, but I was genuinely surprised that I saved more in 2024 than the year before with what felt like a lot less effort.
Unless you’re really desperate to cut costs or want to get everything moved in one go, I find it a bit more effective and easy to spend a small amount of time comparing and switching at renewal time or when prices change.
Combine this with using my colleagues at Compare Club and I’m also saving time, as well as money, and have a pretty good idea of exactly what I’m saving.
So, now that you know how I saved $8,175... how much could you save?
Go deeper:
The hacks and apps I use to take my family on holidays for less money
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Disclaimer
This article is opinion only and is only reflective of the author’s experiences. Always check with a financial professional before making any major decisions.
