Ways to Save Money in College

Let's face it: For many students, college is expensive. Tuition, student fees, housing, transportation and textbook costs all add up quickly, no matter how carefully students budget.

If you're a student looking for ways to simply stretch your budget, however, there are some moves you can make to tamp down on certain expenditures such as food, transportation and entertainment. Reducing these can help stretch that paycheck from a part-time job or get the most out of a student loan disbursement.

Remember that if you're struggling to make ends meet as a college student, you're not alone. In fact, nearly half of students responding to a survey reported they had experienced food insecurity in the previous 30 days, according to an April 2019 report from the Hope Center for College, Community, and Justice. So if financial uncertainty has you worried about housing or food, consider reaching out to to your financial aid office, residential services office or another department at your school for additional help.

[Read: How to Survive as a Homeless or Hungry College Student]

If your budget concerns are more moderate and you're looking for intuitive ways to get the most out of your paycheck or student loans, here's how to save money as a college student.

-- Make a budget.

-- Give yourself a paycheck.

-- Don't overlook on-campus amenities.

-- Bank carefully.

-- Evaluate regular monthly expenses.

Read on for more information on each strategy to save money as a college student.

Make a Budget

Building a budget is crucial for college students, just as it is for people in the working world.

"It's really important to sit down and say, 'Here's how much money is coming in and here are the sources, and here's how I intend to use it," says Jonathan Clarke, associate professor of finance at Georgia Tech's Scheller College of Business.

Tally up your monthly expenses and large one-time costs, such as lab fees and registration fees, and compare those to incoming funds from student loan disbursements, scholarship payouts, part-time work or parental support.

Do you have enough money to cover your costs? If not, consider the tweaks you can make to reduce your monthly expenditures, such as adding a roommate to your apartment, ditching your car or taking full advantage of a student meal plan. Additionally, look for strategies to increase the money coming in, such as by taking on (a reasonable number of) additional work hours or talking to the financial aid office about grants or loans.

[See: 8 Big Budgeting Blunders -- and How to Fix Them.]

Give Yourself a Paycheck

Students sometimes have the complex money-management task of understanding how to mete out a large, one-time scholarship payment or student loan disbursement over several months. If you start out the school year with a substantial deposit of cash in your bank account that you're expected to make last until the end of the year, create a plan for doling it out.

One strategy is to deposit that payout into your savings account, then set up automated transfers on a weekly or biweekly basis from that savings account to your checking account, says Kathleen Kenealy, managing director and senior wealth advisor at Boston Private. Like a paycheck, this will help you moderate the amount of money you draw down each week instead of blowing a large payout all at once.

Don't Overlook On-Campus Amenities

Your campus may offer resources to students who are cash-strapped or unsure of how to pay for their next meal.

For example, your university may run an on-campus food pantry, which aims to provide sustenance to hungry college students, to help stretch your food budget further. Other resources may include on-campus clothing centers such as Georgia Tech's Campus Closet that let you borrow professional outfits for job and internship interviews, so you don't have to buy your own. Check in with residential or student services about what's available to you as a student.

For entertainment and lifestyle costs, check your university for on-campus amenities. Your campus may host movie nights, gym classes or sponsored outings, negating the need to pay for those entertainment costs yourself.

Bank Carefully

When your budget is already stretched thin, the last thing you want to pay is fees for banking and credit cards.

Students are prime targets for pesky fees such as insufficient funds fees, overdraft charges and interest charges. So make sure to set up alerts with your banks to monitor your balances and ensure that you're not overdrawing. "Major banks at least allow you set up alerts if your account balance drops below a certain amount; set up a text or email," Kenealy says.

Some banks may offer student accounts that waive certain fees or require no balance minimums. "If there is a student-specific account or student-specific waivers, ask for that," says April Schneider, head of Consumer and Small Business Products at Bank of America.

Students using a credit card should treat it carefully. The credit behaviors you exhibit today will follow you for years to come. If the goal is to build up credit history, use the card for one or two regular monthly expenditures, such as gas, then pay it in full every month. The worst thing you can do is to carry a balance, which will cost you more than you'd expect in interest down the road.

[Read: 7 Pesky Bank Fees and How to Avoid Them]

Evaluate Regular Monthly Expenses

It's always wise to tamp down on impulse purchases and irregular spending, but you'll get the most value from reducing regular expenses. Consider whether your rent, transportation costs, video-streaming subscriptions and other monthly expenditures can be canceled or reduced.

Evaluate what you're paying for renters insurance, gas, oil changes and other fees, and consider shopping around or negotiating your rates. Says Kenealy: "A lot of the challenge is being mindful of where you're spending your money on an ongoing basis."