I was paying $20/mo for Copilot and reaching for the Claude API on every side project. Then I added it up. Copilot, a code-review SaaS trial, the occasional ChatGPT Plus month: I was burning real money on tasks a 4GB model running on my own machine handles fine. So I tore the whole thing down and rebuilt it local-first. Here is the exact stack, what each piece replaced, and the parts where I still pay for cloud.

The cost table

Here is what I was spending versus what I run now.

Task

Cloud tool