No-Buy Rules Card

How to use it

The No-Buy Rules Card turns your no-buy or no-spend plan into a one-page set of rules you can print, sign and put where you will see it. It helps anyone who wants their rules written down before day one. That is the whole point of the no-buy year playbook: you make the rules in advance and change them only at a monthly review.

Not sure where to start? Try the example fills in a sample card. To build your own, start with The term: A no-buy year, A low-buy year, A no-spend month or Custom dates. Pick a Start date. The End date sets itself for a year or a month, and you choose it only with Custom dates. Then tick your Bans and add up to three of your own. Fill in Allowances with a name, a Cap in dollars and a Per period. Tick the Replacements only boxes, list Exceptions I already know about with a Price cap in dollars, keep or untick the House rules, and choose a Review day. The card updates as you go. When it looks right, use Print the card and sign it by hand.

Your card

The form needs JavaScript to change the card. Without it, the card below stays on the example, and your browser's print command prints it on its own.

How the numbers work

The card follows a few fixed rules:

• The end date. A year or a month ends on the day before the same date a year or a month later, so a no-buy year from November 1, 2026 ends October 31, 2027. When the later month has no such date, the term ends on that month's last day. A no-spend month from January 31, 2026 runs to February 28, 2026.
• The length in days. It counts both the first and the last day. November 1, 2026 to October 31, 2027 shows as 365 days, and a no-spend month in November shows as 30 days.
• Allowances. Each prints as a name, a cap and a period, such as "Meals out: up to $40 a week". A row with only a name or only a cap stays off the card, with a note that an allowance needs a number and a period, or it is not an allowance.
• Exceptions I already know about. Each prints with its cap, such as "A winter coat: up to $200". An exception without a price cap stays off too. The example's caps are made-up round figures, there only to show the shape of a card.
• Bans. They print in the form's order, then your own, cut to 40 characters. On a no-spend month, Bans always opens with "Everything that is not on my allowances list".
• House rules. They are numbered and printed in the playbook's words. The first sends anything not on the exception list to the 30-Day List to wait for the monthly review.

What this does and does not tell you

The card tells you, on one page, exactly what you agreed to before the first urge hits: what is off limits, what you can spend and how often, what you replace, and which purchases you already planned. A ban sets a whole category's budget at zero, a firm use of the mental accounting habit of keeping separate budgets for different kinds of spending. The figure to watch is the cap on each allowance. Check each month's spending against it at every review. An allowance that keeps hitting its cap is worth a look, and you get one rule change a month.

The card does not keep the rules for you. A card on the fridge is only as strong as the habit of reading it, and the monthly review and the log are where the rules really live. It does not track spending or urges, so keep the playbook's log of date, item, price and what prompted it on paper or in a notes app. It does not check your caps against your income or say whether an allowance is generous or tight. Every figure is yours. It sends no email and no notification on review day. And it cannot tell a ban from a need. Needs sit outside the card, and deciding which is which is your call.

If you choose a low-buy year, the playbook adds one in, one out, which the card does not track. Our one in, one out playbook explains how to run it alongside your card.