Restaurants and coffee shop visits drain your wallet faster than you might realize. Those $5 lattes and $15 lunches accumulate into thousands annually. For anyone ready to cook more at home and cut dining expenses, there are kitchen appliances and tools that offer impressive returns on investment.
Through comprehensive analysis of popular home cooking equipment -- from water filters to pizza ovens, seltzer makers and coffee machines -- the numbers reveal big potential savings. Some appliances can offset their purchase price within months. The most dramatic example: Switching from daily coffee shop visits to home brewing can save upward of $1,000 yearly.
The strategy works because these tools eliminate recurring premium costs. Instead of paying restaurant markups, you invest once in equipment that serves you for years. Below, you'll discover which kitchen investments deliver the strongest financial returns, complete with upfront costs and projected annual savings calculations.
Pizza oven
A home pizza oven can be had for a few hundred bucks and will spare you the rising takeout costs. Ooni
Making pizza at home isn't just fun, it can save you major bucks if you swap an at-home pizza night for expensive store-bought, even just a few times a year.
The ingredients to make several pies at home -- dough, red sauce and grated cheese -- cost around $8. Compare that with the $18 average cost of a single pizza in the US, and the potential for saving becomes clear. Since most households require two pizzas per order, you could be saving roughly $28 every time that craving hits.
Best of all, pizza ovens are easy to operate, with most fueled by gas or wood pellets, and make restaurant-quality pies in under 3 minutes. Some of our favorite models cost just a few hundred bucks, meaning it won't take long for your pizza oven to pay for itself.
Upfront cost: $100 to $500
$100 to $500 How much you could save: $672 per year (based on two pizzas, twice a month)
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