Suze Orman Says Dining Out Is a 'Waste of Money'

In 2024, dining out is out — at least according to Suze Orman.

In a new interview with The Wall Street Journal, the financial guru and best-selling author, 72, revealed that her favorite way to save money is exclusively enjoying her meals at home.

“I refuse to eat out,” she told the outlet. “I think that eating out on any level is one of the biggest wastes of money out there.”

This philosophy also extends to her daily cup of joe.

“I do Cafe Bustelo coffee every morning. I would drop dead before I bought a coffee,” she told the outlet, adding that she drinks “one cup a day and that’s it.”

Orman’s eat-at-home attitude directly defies the “little treat” mentality, a mindset popularized on social media that prioritizes indulging in small pleasures — like coffee and dining out — for an instant burst of happiness.

But that’s just one thing Orman believes young people are getting wrong about their finances.

“They don’t understand the value of compounding and that the key to their financial independence is their age,” she said. “Let’s say you’re 25 and you put $100 a month into a Standard & Poor’s 500 index fund through a Roth IRA every single month for 12 months, every year, until you are 65. It’s very probable that you will average a 12% annual rate of return over 40 years.”

“At the end of those years, you have a million dollars,” Orman continued. “You wait 10 years until you’re 35? At the age of 65, you’ll have $300,000. [Young people] don’t get that.”

When Orman does splurge, she opts to spend her money on air travel.

“I seriously splurge on private air,” she told the outlet. “Unless we go to Europe or something because that’s ridiculous.”

Orman also advised people to steer clear of making financial changes under the guise of New Year's resolutions. She hates budgets for the same reasons she hates diets.

“If you restrict, you limit, you cut back, you don’t buy this, you don’t buy that, and then all of a sudden you explode and you go out and you buy everything at once,” she told The Wall Street Journal.

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Rather than making big money goals this year, she recommends asking yourself: “Do you feel powerful and secure?”

“If you don’t, just do one thing that might make you feel more secure,” she said, whether that’s “saving $10” or — her personal favorite — “not going out to eat.”