Millennials are known for a number of things – not all of them good. While it is not fun that the word millennial does not automatically ring to everyone in a positive way, it does mean that it is perhaps easier for millennials to stand out from their peers in good ways with excellent lifestyle choices.

Here are three smart lifestyle choices for millennials:

The First Super Financially Smart Lifestyle Choice:

Don’t drink.

Drinking can be an easy habit to get into due to the peer pressure in school or stress, but it is a habit that is worth avoiding!

For one, alcohol costs a lot, and the already large price tags associated with drinking at bars are only growing larger over time.

So avoiding drinking at bars or restaurants, and in general is great for a person’s budget. But not only that, not indulging in alcohol is great for a person physically.

The effects of heavy drinking over a long period of time have been well documented.

So save yourself the money and physical troubles and do not add alcohol to your weekly routine.

Another Financially Smart Lifestyle Choice That Will Save You Thousands

Eat at Home

When you look at the spending habits of millennials, you find that one of their priciest typical splurges is dining out. Not only is it a financial mistake to dine out for too many meals, there are a number of other negatives that come along with it that millennials might not consider.

For one, dining out is not healthy. It is common for restaurants, even those that present themselves as health conscious to sell food that is not for the health conscious. They reconcile this fact with their image as a healthy restaurant by saying that people do not eat all of their meals at their restaurant, so it is okay for their diners to splurge. But for the diners, they typically do not consider it a splurge with unhealthy food – they think they are eating at a healthy restaurant, so what they are eating must be healthy.

For two, not dining out (aka preparing food at home) teaches a person to be more responsible. By planning what they will eat, and then preparing the food, millennials learn to take care of themselves. These good habits of planning and executing can carry over into the areas of personal finance and time management.

The Most Painful of the Financially Smart Lifestyle Choice (But a Good One):

Cut the cable – watch Netflix, Hulu, or a free alternative.

Back in the day, television viewers had to work on the schedules of networks – not anymore! And not only do viewers not have to work off of the schedules of networks, but they do not have to record shows from networks using devices such as Tivo that have finite amounts of memory, either. Now with online services like Netflix, Hulu, and Amazon Prime, viewers can enjoy their shows and movies on their terms – when they want to see them, and in the amount of episodes or movies that they would like to watch.

In addition to freeing up a person’s schedule, using online services for visual entertainment saves millennials large amounts of money. For instance, the average cable bill in the U.S. is around $70 to $100 per month, whereas Netflix costs a mere $7.99 per month.

In addition to saving a millennial loads of money, online services offer popular contemporary shows along with classics that are rare or impossible to find on cable.

So the next time the topic of millennials comes up, be sure to mention that millennials can differentiate themselves from the pack by not drinking, eating at home, and enjoying shows and movies from online services.