Fitness

How to Get Fit Without Giving your Wallet a Workout

There are plenty of reasons to want to sign up for a gym and start a fitness routine — it can boost your overall health, reduce stress from hectic work weeks and help you train for an ambitious goal. Sadly, one of the reasons why you’ve probably waited so long to sign up is that it can burn a hole in your wallet. If you want to get fit but you don’t want to overspend, here is how you can exercise and save money at the same time.

Be Smart About Your Gym Membership!

The average American spends $54 a month on gym membership costs — this means that people spend approximately $650 a year on the membership itself, without counting extra costs on classes, trainers and clothes. The sad news is that it will likely be more expensive in the upcoming year because membership fees have been rising. In 2011, the average citizen only spent a total of $43 a month to attend their gym.

If you want to sign up for a membership, do your research ahead of time and cut out locations with luxury amenities. Features like swimming pools, saunas, massage therapy and spa treatments will always drive up the prices. Another one of the good ways to save on your gym membership is to sign up at just the right time — the very beginning of the year will be more expensive to account for the surplus of patrons trying to start their New Year’s resolutions. Be patient and wait for the end of the month when the location will want to reach its quota.

If you’re having trouble coming up with the cash, you should check out this guide on how to save money better — it offers matter-of-fact advice on how you can break spending habits and trim down payments on a daily, weekly and monthly basis. The changes can be as simple as skipping out on expensive lattes at the local café to giving yourself financial limits every week.

The guide comes courtesy of the company MoneyKey, which can help people through rough patches like overdue energy bills or emergency car repairs. If someone needs to pay off a bill or get something fixed in a hurry, they can turn to them for assistance. They can receive a cash advance loan to help them settle those payments right away so that they get back on their feet until the next paycheck comes. Hopefully, the rough patch never happens and smart budgeting decisions are enough to get all of the monthly payments dealt with, including the gym membership.

Work Out At Home!

The best way that you can stop membership fees whittling down the contents of your bank account is to avoid going to the gym altogether. People who want to exercise on a budget don’t have to travel far to start their workouts — they can easily move some equipment into their living room and break a sweat without leaving their front door.

It’s true that a gym will be stocked to the brim with weight racks, treadmills and stationary machines to get their attendees heart rates racing. You may not have the floor space or the budget to build a personal gym at home so look for small, versatile and affordable equipment pieces.

You can do a yoga routine every single morning with a simple mat that costs less than twenty dollars. Dumbbells and kettlebells are excellent for weight-training and they have the added benefit of being easy to store. Resistance bands are great for strengthening muscle groups and will take up as much room as a pair of rolled up socks.

Skip The Equipment Altogether!

You don’t have to use any weights or mats at all if you really want to save money. At home, you can build muscle by doing simple movements capitalizing off of your body weight, like:

  • Planks
  • Lunges
  • Squats
  • Push-ups
  • Crunches

Committing to a good fitness routine will actually help you with your money in the future. Taking care of your physical health means that you will get sick less and have fewer visits to the doctor. Consider your trips to the gym and your workouts at home to be a great investment in the long-term.

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