Swagbucks for Printing Coupons? My Head May Explode!!!

If you haven't already joined Swagbucks, do it! Free money!

One of their latest things has made me crazed with excitement!

1. Print coupons on items you typically purchase.
2. Use the coupons.
3. Every coupons awards you with 10 swag bucks!!
4. 450 Swag bucks = $5 free at Amazon.

Upromise also has coupons, if you are using that site to boost college savings. You don't have to print them,  you choose the ones you want, then activate them. Once you purchase the items at participating stores (most are participating--Weis, Giant, etc), you get the coupon money in your acct. For example, this week I bought three 8 oz Cabot cheese bricks from Weis for $5. The online coupon was for $1.25, so I really spent $3.75 for the cheese and saved $1.25 for college.

Most coupon sites refresh monthly.

Tax Assessment

We just received our assessment notice on our house. Previously,  our home value was over assessed and I fought it and was able to get our tax assessment reduced by $17,000. This year, our assessment went way down and for that, I'm thankful. Our taxes will go down, which means more of our budget that we have allocated towards our home payments will go towards principle vs. taxes.  If you own a home, your assessment should be arriving shortly. If you feel your home is overvalued on the tax assessment, it is worth your time to fight it. If your home has increased in value since your last assessement:

1. Go to Zillow and see what your home is valued at (ballpark estimate here). This will also give you an idea of recently sold home or homes NOT selling in your neighborhood. Take notes.
2. If the assessment seems way too much, fight it. I did a written appeal, but you will see other options on your assessment notice. Tips on Fighting Your Tax Assessment
3. If your assessment has increased, accurately, by quite a bit, you may qualify for the Homestead Tax Credit

Good luck!

Water Savings...Saving You Big Money

Even if you have your own well and water is cheap, most likely, it is not cheap to heat.  Here are some ways to help you save:

• Buy 1 liter of something. Drink it. Fill with rocks or simply water. Put it in your toilet tank. Save money every time you flush. Cost: Free to less than $1. Payback: nearly instant.
• Buy a low flow shower head. They have improved drastically over the years. When we swapped our 2.5 gallon per minute (gpm) shower head to a 1.5 gpm shower head, we noticed no difference in shower time or pressure... but WOW did we notice a difference in our water, sewer and bge bills. Look for reviewed ones. A common one that seems well reviewed is the Waterpik Eco Flow. Cost: $5-45 Payback less than 6 mos. I've been tempted to try the .5 pgm aqua helix, but not sure how the family would react! Imagine the savings!!
• Buy aerators for every sink in your home. Your sinks already have them, but most likely, they are rated at 2.2 gpm. This is overkill for handwashing. We have found the .5 gpm have a squeal to them, so have changed our bathroom sinks to 1 gpm and our kitchen sink to 1.5 gpm  Huge savings, cheap thing to do. Unscrew them, label where they go with masking tape and go into Lowe's or any hardware store and ask for help finding low flow aerators (male/female screws, you just need to make sure you get the correct ones). 1 gpm and 1.5 gpm have been easy to find in my experience. If you have a blending sink (not 2 knobs, but one), you are waking up your hot water heater every time you turn on your water! And very often, if you shut the water off while you wash your hands, it won't even get hot but you have just cost yourself money. This is why on our blended sinks, I turn off our hot knob during the summer. Note that my husband thinks this mad, but he isn't complaining about our bills!!! Cost: Less than $10; Less than 6 mos payback.
• Consider upgrading your washer. Don't fall for a matched washer/drier set. Driers have not had improved efficiency since the 1970s. And with the dry winter air, spend $20 on an extendable drying rack from Target and humidify for free! Our HE washer, which was the most efficient at the time (there are now more efficient models), paid for itself in 1.5 years (using 1 load/day as our #). Do the calculations for your family by finding your current washer model online and looking at water and KWH usage. The old washers truly guzzle in every way. Cost: Over $500. Payback 1-3 years. Always look at efficiency and calculate long term usage before decided which is truly the "cheapest" model: Water, Sewer, KWH used, Water heating (this is ballpark).
• Consider upgrading your dishwasher. Handwashing is difficult to do efficiently. Our dishwasher holds almost every dish we own and uses 1.8 gallons of water. Without rinsing! It only uses 1 kwh per load. Cost: Over $500. Payback: variable, based on usage. Always look at efficiency and calculate long term usage before decided which is truly the "cheapest" model: Water, Sewer, KWH used, Water heating (this is ballpark). 

When looking on the energy star labels, note that this is calculated with 11 cents per kWh. This does not account for utility taxes, etc. It is simply the national average. In Maryland, depending on whom you have have chosen for power (I hope you've done this!), you are paying 17-19 cents/kWh! Calculate accordingly. The good thing with living in an expensive state for energy is excellent incentive for efficiency and the payback times are much shorter! :) 

I just figured out how to save $104 on my Utility Bill!!!

We have natural gas for our water heater (about to go) and for our stove and have been saving to replace both with electric alternatives (induction/convection for stove and tankless electric water heater, power provided by our solar panels). I called our utility today to find out once we replace both, could we have the gas turned off for 8 mos of the year where we don't use heat? ($13/mos just to be hooked up to natural gas, regardless of usage). YES! We just need to call and cancel and then call to restart service! $104 to spend less than 10 min on the phone per year. What a great hourly rate of pay!!! ;)

If you are in a similar situation and use natural gas for heating and have only 1 or 2 appliances run by natural gas, you may want to consider something similar (especially if you only use it for heating!). $104 is only a start to pay for a water heater, however, since ours is already 9 years old and inconsistently heating (with very hard water), we know its days are numbered. Figure out roughly what a new water heater will cost you (tankless saves family using less than 40 gallons of heating water/ day roughly 35-45% of heating water costs, 40-80 gallons a day save 15-25%) and look at your payback.

You can easily nudge your gallon number lower by washing clothes only in cold water, using a shower head with .5-1.5 gpm flow rate vs. the standard 2.5 gpm, and running your dishwasher only when it is full.

Turn $40 to $50

I meant to post this sooner. Turn $40 into $50! Get your change (or go to your bank and get some) and your money will grow by $10. This can be changed into gift cards only with no fee. But an extra $10 is welcome for stores like Lowe's, where it always seems like I am replacing something for the house. The Amazon portion of this deal expires today, but the rest of the deal goes on until Dec 31. Check out the link, as not all machines do all gift cards.

Free $10 for FUN activities!!

Eversave is just like Groupon, but you get free credit just for joining. Join through the above link and your account will open with a $5 credit. Buy something today and use the code "FIRSTBUY" and you will get $5 more off. Today only! I used my $10 to buy 2 passes to glow golf in Westminster, which was $8...but really free, plus I still have a $2 credit in my account. Check it out! Many locations, not just Baltimore :)

Free Cross Country Skiing and Snowshoeing Lessons

Locations nationwide, this sounds like a lot of fun. Being offered at more than 70 state parks and ski resorts around the country. One day event.

$5 Free MP3s from Rhapsody

Follow the above link and get $5 of free music via facebook.

Free Gift Cards for Searching the Internet

I know I have mentioned Swagbucks before, but I need to truly rave about it at this point. I love it because most "deals" have you spending less money, not truly saving money. You can truly save money by earning free gift cards on this site. All you have to do is search the internet. In less than 3 weeks, I have acquired enough points to buy three $5 Amazon gift cards. This was largely just doing regular searches. Now you know all my savings declarations need a true goal, so my new goal is to buy everything from Amazon with free money from Swagbucks (minus Subscribe and Save subscriptions).  There are other gift cards, too. They will also give you "swag" money for old books,  cell phones, etc. Check it out! I can't recommend it highly enough!!!
Swagbucks

And once you join via the above link, let's do this to the maximum efficiency...maximize your "swag" earnings by reading this and taking the advice:
Maximize Your Swag Earnings!

Have fun! :)

Stretching Your Donation Dollars

Here are some great Groupon deals for giving!

I am loving these donation Groupons...
$10 buys $25 of classroom materials; $40 brings that up to $100!
Check out this Groupon:
Donor's Choose Groupon

Then check out this site and choose whichever classroom teacher you'd like to help:
Donors Choose

The Kiva Groupon is back as well!
$15 buys $25 towards a Kiva microloan for the entrepreneur of your choosing.
Kiva Groupon

Either of these meaningful gifts would be appreciated by someone you are buying for.

Free $10 Restaurant.Com Gift Cards

Up to 40 per day. Click the link above to learn more. Expires 12/31/10

Have 50 Cents? Make it $25.50 Right Now!

Open a savings account for a child and get $25 with first deposit:
ING Savings Deal
This deal ends Sunday.

Free $3 mp3 credit on Amazon

Yay another free $3 to spend on music!
http://www.amazon.com/gp/feature.html?ie=UTF8&gcIsProcess=1&gcpcCode=Get3mp3s&docId=1000634471#gc

Click enter your code and type:
Get3mp3s

(happy Birthday, Jackie!)

Kiva Groupon!

Fantastic Groupon for the next 2 days. The link above will take you to Ebates. From there, earning 3% cash back, you can search "groupon" and head to their website for this great deal on giving. For $15 ($14.65 if you use Ebates), you can gift $25 to an entrepreneur of your choice. Once this is paid back, you can give this $25 gift again and again! I love Kiva! I love Groupon! Check this out :)

Simple Ways to Save Cash Online!

If you are not a member of Ebates yet, now is the time! There are no crazy strings. You go to their site, find the website you intend to visit, click on it and see the coupons/deals available, and at the end of the quarter, you get a check in the mail. Usually it is 2-10% cash back, on top of coupons (and often free shipping). However, as the holidays are approaching, the deals have increased and the cash back offers have been excellent.
Ebates

Another great way to get money back without doing anything special is to switch your browser. Instead of using google or other browsers, check out Swagbucks. Set is as your home screen so you don't forget! You get paid for searching the web in either items or gift cards. Good ones, too (Target, Amazon, etc).
Swagbucks

We do a fair amount of shopping on Amazon. Recently we decided to switch from our 2 credit card system (Amex Cash Blue, gives 5% back on gas and groceries and Chase Freedom, which has 3 different 5% cash back categories every quarter; both have no annual fee) to a 3 credit card system, adding an Amazon charge, to use exclusively for Amazon purchases. I realized without doing this, I was wasting money every time I bought anything on Amazon. You get $40 instantly off of your first bill, no annual fee and 3% back on all Amazon purchases. As long as you don't carry a balance, cash back cards can be a real savings on and offline. The interest rates tend to be higher than most, so applier beware if you carry a balance.
Amazon

The other cash back item we are considering is the Target charge, as you get 5% back and with the ability to stack Target and manufacturer's coupons already, the 5% back (vs. 1.25% cash back w/the one charge for non-grocery shopping) with make the savings that much greater.

An update on the forced fake car payment--it was no fun and not motivating, so I changed the title of the savings account to "Vacation Fund" and am now taking what I have "saved" when I shop and I manually put it in there when I get home. Much more fun and motivating! It is not really savings if it doesn't get saved!!!

LL Bean 20% off plus free shipping

Right now they have free shipping with no minimums through Dec 20, but if you spend $50, you can get 20% off with code November20

This offer expires Nov 19.

Amazing Gift for a Little One! Today Only!

Target’s Daily Deal is the children’s Paul Frank Rain boots. They are Buy One, Get One 50% off — making them $16.90 for two pairs shipped.  Use  4IKCC8AJ to take 10% off for a total of $16.90 shipped. Even if you don't have kids of your own, I bet some child you know would love these for their bday present or holiday present!

Support Local Business and Get $25 from Amex

More details here, looks great!

$1 off Alexia Frozen Products

Click above to go to Alexia's page on facebook. You can print the coupon twice, just hit the browser back button after it prints once to have a second round. They are on sale this week at Weis for $2.50/bag.

Ceiling Fans...Friend or Foe in the Winter?

Ceiling fans can be such a blessing in the summer when it is boiling outside and you just want to lie immobile under them. They cost just less than $13/month to run constantly, per unit. It usually never makes sense to have fans running, unless you are in the room with them. If you keep them running and you leave the room, you are wasting $13/month per unit. (Calculate you exact usage with the title link). Fans are for people not for rooms...even in Winter...

Why am I writing about fans now, as I shiver in my layers in my 60 degree house?  I am again pondering if it makes sense to run the fan in the winter.  I have decided it will only make sense once the heat is on more often. With the research I've done online, keeping it on low, not any higher, may make sense for spreading heat. Any higher, you are using way too much extra energy (and my insanely efficient fan uses only 3 watts on low, and I worry!), and you will be providing yourself with an extra chill.   To put your fan on in the correct Winter direction, make sure you fan is going clockwise and put it on low once you are using your heat more often.

Those little energy drainers...they add up

Do you have nightlights in your home? Some people leave these on all the time. We have 3, 2 of which are supposed to cycle off with sunlight, but they are really constantly on. 2 are 1.5 watt (the ones that are constantly on) and the other is a 4 watt, which is only sometimes on. LED bulbs are coming down in price, there is currently a half watt pack of 2 night light bulbs in Target.

1/2 watt nightlight, $.79/year to run 24/7
1.5 watt nightlight $2.37/year to run 24/7
4 watt nightlight $6.31/year to run 24/7

Okay, doesn't seem huge, does it? However, all these little things around our house are the things to add up to giant electric bills! If you have the nightlight w/a replaceable bulb, it would make a lot of sense to purchase the 2 pack LED from Target. It is $5.99 without coupon or $3.99 if this coupon works. GE coupon   I will be waiting until just before this coupon expires, holding out for a stackable Target coupon, however this may make sense as a purchase for your family now. The payback time is fairly short. At $3/bulb,  it will pay itself off in just over 6 mos, at $2/bulb, even less. Great payback time! And after it is paid off, that is $5.52 every single year you can do whatever you want with!

In Other Coupon News...

If you would like to stack your 7th generation printables I sent you earlier, buy at Target, where you can print 2 $1 off any 7th generation item and stack them with your other coupons, getting $2 off per item. That is paying as little as $.49-.99/item.
Target Coupons

If you like Newman's Own Organic Pretzels, Licorice or Cat Food printables are found here:
Newman's Organics Coupons

If you like Barbara's Bakery Cereals, here is a great buy one, get one free coupon, 2 prints allowed. These are $2.99 until 12/2/10 at Giant, so you can get cereal for $1.50/box--not organic, but all natural:
Barbara's BOGO Coupons

Home Depot $3-$15 off LED Lighting

Nov 4-14, so act fast if you want strings of lights!

Wegman's Freebies

If you live anywhere near a Wegman's or just sometimes pass one, it would be worth your time to get their store loyalty card. Once a quarter, they have been sending us coupons for free meals! This month it is free pasta, sauce, bread and salad. In August, it was free organic jam, organic peanut butter, bread and something else.

They also send out free coupons that are generic, like $1 off $5 of produce, $1 off $5 in nature's marketplace (organic food, largely). The coupons usually give you about 2 mos before they expire, so plenty of time to pass by a Wegman's. If you sign up for their email, they often send additional generic coupons to print, where you can choose your items. For those of you buying for those with food allergies, take note, as a way to save money while choosing safe brands for your family.

Farm to fridge to garbage can

I worry about wasting scraps of food, let alone large quantities. The title link will take you to an article on food waste. If food is rotting, you are throwing food out, etc, start to think of the money you are throwing away instead of the food. Would you throw dollar bills in the trash? At least if you are composting, you will get a lovely garden additive for free.

I like to make my own stock, here is my recipe:
In a freezer ziplock, stored in the freezer, collect trimmings over a period of time:
Root tips of carrots
Non-root ends and peels of onion
Leafy tips of celery
Other trimmings from non-cruciferous vegetables

Once the gallon ziploc fills up, dump it in your largest stockpot.
Add
2 cloves garlic
2 bay leaves
Salt
Pepper
Herbs, whatever you have--I like parsley or basil

I use a 12 quart pot and fill water to 10 qt level. Bring to a boil. Simmer for 1 hour. Let cool in pot.

Put colander over large bowl(s) and dump pot. Compost cooked trimmings. You will have about 8 quarts of fragrant delicious stock. This would sell for $20 or more in the store! I usually use this for rice, soup, etc. I use some and freeze some.

Maximizing Your Donation Dollars

Halloween is over and this is the season of giving. This is one of my favorite times of year. We aren't religious, however I do like to get in the spirit of giving. While we can do a lot by donating food we've bought with good sense, there are other ways of maximizing your donations.

One of my favorite sites is http://www.charitynavigator.org/ as you can see the efficiency of various organizations in areas you are interested in donating to. I prefer to donate to organizations that use 90% or more of my donation towards funding what I'm trying to help fund, this is an ideal, of course I have favorites who fall short. You can look at what CEO's at the non-profits are earning (in some cases, this is shocking), exactly how money is spent, and decide if your donation will be used wisely.  If you want to donate money for children, look in that category and find the highest efficiency to stretch your dollars further. Not all non-profits are managed well!

Another way to stretch your donations is to wait for donation matching drives. I know that Appalachian Service Project will do this multiple times a year. So I only donate during matched times. So even if my donation is small, it does double the good!

Another favorite website is http://www.kiva.org You donate $25 to an entrepreneur of your choice around the world. On top of this money that goes directly to an entrepreneur, you pay a donation to Kiva from $0-whatever you'd like. So you decide how efficient they are! Your $25 is paid back and you can reloan. This is a great option if you only have a little to donate. This is also a great project to get children interested in helping up our world community. This is also a great present for others in this season of giving. Who wouldn't want to help others?!

Save your receipts for tax time!

Buy 2, get 1 free 7th Generation Products

Buy a liquid laundry detergent and a Hand dish soap from 7th Generation and get a free spray cleaner.

I don't generally like the per load price on the detergent, but with the coupons I posted previously combined with a free spray, this looks like a pretty good deal.

6 Ways to Lower Food Cost at the Grocery Store

1. Make a well thought out list and do not deviate once you get to the store. The faster you move through the store, the less you will spend. It is wise to check sales and look for coupons online to print or buy from ebay before going to the store, or you will grossly overspend. Almost everything goes on sale in a patterned way and most items have coupons, even produce. I rarely buy a labeled product, food or non-food, unless it is on sale with a coupon.

2. Use coupons only for things that you need, don't just use coupons to use coupons or you are wasting money. Your phone most likely has a calculator--use it! Make sure you are getting the bottom price per unit on whatever you are buying. Sometimes the brand or store brand without the coupon is cheaper. (Note cheapest price in your price book!). Remember to to thoughtful about wants and needs are you fill your grocery cart. And keep in mind your goal...I hope you have one by now, to motivate all this fabulous thriftiness!

3. Be flexible on brand. Yes, I prefer organic food. Yes, I prefer specific organic food. But dry goods like toilet paper, I'm much more flexible. I will buy non-organic food if it is close to free. I'd be crazy not to, especially now, when my goal is large and the end date is February!  Check your price and figure out how much more you are truly willing to pay for the premium of specific brand, organic, etc.

4. Buy produce in season. I cannot emphasize this enough. And know what stores consistently have the best prices on certain produce. I will not pay more than 69 cents/lb for organic bananas. I know I can get them at this price at Wegman's and Common Market. Ripe organic fair trade bananas are 39 cents/lb at Common Market. When they are there, I buy every single one available and bag and freeze them--smoothies or muffins later. I buy organic apples locally in bulk at 38 cents/lb. If you pick your own, you can get organic strawberries at $1.50/lb most places and fill your freezer. If you buy strawberries in December, you will pay $5/lb! Of course I prefer to buy at the farmer's market for weekly produce, but for stock up produce and winter produce, I think BULK. For non-organic apples, you will pay $1.29 or more per pound in the grocery store! Eat 1/day in your family and you've just spent $235.43/year.  Do a little work and for that same amount of fruit, you've spent $63.88, a savings of $171.55...mmm a domestic plane ticket to somewhere fun! Imagine the savings when you do this with multiple foods!! (You can go to Wisconsin or South Caroline on Southwest for less than this currently and surely other places, too.)

5. Watch as you are checked out at the grocery store--very often things ring up incorrectly. After checking out, scan your receipt, make sure everything rung up correctly and they deducted coupons correctly. More than 50% of the time, there is an error in my receipt costing me $5-10 or more! That is an average of $260/year, if you shop once a week. That is huge.


6. Plan meals for the week and start with food you already have from the pantry. This will ensure you lose nothing to spoiling and you spend as little as you need to. When I do this, it frees up money to buy things in bulk--last month I went slightly over my $400/month food budget (this includes grocery and all food purchases), but I got 100 lb of organic whole wheat flour for $68 (Thanks, Noelle!) and 80 lbs of apples for $28. Worth it. And we will just be more careful this month. I can't emphasize planning the menu enough--write it out! This saves me so much money. And I'm organized so we rarely choose to eat out.

Free $3 towards amazon mp3!

Simply free, no strings. Follow the link and the code is "student3". Enjoy :)

Save 30% or more on your electric bill...with 1 phone call

Get out your old utility bills. You have electricity choice now. If you have not chosen an electricity suppplier, you are overpaying for electricity by at least 30%! All you need is your acct number.

For those in Maryland, switching to Washington Gas and Electric will save you a lot of money. Currently, their lowest kWh rate is 9 cents/ kWh, before the standard fees. BGE is currently 10.1 cents, before fees. The average US household uses 740 kWh/ month. Full disclosure...that bill would make me pass out! But the average household would save $8.14/month. That is $97.68/ year found! This savings will be even more in the summer, when Bge's rates spike. This past summer, it was 12.7 cents/kWh.

If you are locked into a plan that is much higher, you may consider switching to a different plan. Usually the cancellation rate is $7/ month counting back from the contact cancellation date.

I pay extra for wind credit power, which right now will cost you 11.3 cents/ kWh. Overall, this is still cheaper than BGE for my family as we use most of our electric in the summer. Luckily we have solar now, otherwise I would look at my 11.7 locked in rate and decide if it made sense to switch.

Maximizing the use of heat

The chill is forecasted to reach soon and I am not ready to embrace my winter heating bill. Start throwing open your south facing window shades. Clean the windows to maximize heat gain and shut shades at night. Even W and E windows can give some heat.

Now is the time to fire up the oven, but do so wisely. I aim to cook enough for at least 2 meals. Typically I will bake and roast vegetables (throw a few potatoes in) or make a casserole and immediately follow that with a tray of muffins (my oven has 1 useable rack, everything on the bottom burns). When I do bake small scale, I have a convection toaster oven that uses half the energy of an electric stove.

Electricity in our area is about 18 cents once you figure out all the add ons to the base kWh price, depending on your electrical supplier. Gas is 69 cents/ therm in the plan we are in. Based on these figures, here is what your heat producing appliances are costing you:

Electric oven 36 cents/hour at 350F
Gas oven, 8 cents/hour, plus if electric ignition, 7 cents every time you start it.
Crockpot, 12 cents/hour
Microwave, 15 min on high is 6 cents

The variation changes based on kWh and gas prices for us, but looking at these details made me stop boiling water on the stove for tea (7 cents plus gas used) and instead use the microwave, which can boil my water for less than a penny. I have 3 cups a tea a day on average. In other words, I just saved $76.65 over the course of a year. Little changes add up to big savings and keep you on course. $76.65 is just shy of what I budget for a night at a hotel on vacation.

More free stuff!

http://www.heyitsfree.net/

7th Generation Printable Coupons

These coupons have just reset. Sometimes these items go on sale, but not often. Not on sale, I've found the best price is usually at Target. Of course, best price is to make your own cleaners :) These are convenient:
http://www.seventhgeneration.com/products

Free Tom's of Maine Toothpaste

http://www.startsampling.com/sm/toms101470/main.iphtml?item=101470&source=&ss_id=&key=b41e1cb4df0c8f9f9b2ab605766c6894&friend_id=

A Coupon/Sale/Gas Deal Worth Your Time

If you shop at Giant, here is a great cheese/gas deal:
Print out this coupon two times:
http://brands.kraftfoods.com/kraftcheese/index.html

This gives you $10 off cheese.

Buy 12 units of Kraft cheese--Cracker Barrel, Shredded, whatever you like, all are on sale for $2.50. The great thing with this is that not only are they on sale, there are bonus gas points with them this week. So if you buy 12, you will get 300 gas points  (every 4 units= 10 cents off per gallon of gas) and only spend $20 on cheese...and then you'll get 30 cents off per gallon at the pump. Now for me, that is only $2.70 on fumes (450 miles=9 gallons in the Prius), however, if you drive a thirstier car, this deal is even sweeter for you.

You will need a Giant store card to take part in this promotion and gas must be bought at Shell.

If you have multiple computers--at work, at home, or friends who don't eat cheese, utilize your resources, I do not think there is a limit to this promotion as far as quantity, but each computer will only print 2 coupons. I have been wondering if libraries allow coupon prints...anyone know?

Free food!

http://www.facebook.com/FoodShouldTasteGood?v=app_163836236969327#!/FoodShouldTasteGood?v=app_163836236969327

Freecycle...get rid of your stuff and find new treasures

If you haven't joined freecycle, yet, what are you waiting for?

We have shoes, bookshelves, a bench and clothes all from freecycle. We didn't pay a cent. We have given away useful, working things. What I like is that you leave it on your stoop and often the item is gone in an hour. We have given away carpet and padding, broken electronics (disclosing this fact, handy man picked them up), clothing, etc. What I like about freecycle vs. Simply donating to goodwill or Nesap is that the item instantly finds a home. Very efficient. Check it out!

http://www.freecycle.org/

Favorite Healthy Meals

I would love for us to share some of our favorite frugal meals. Tonight we had Cauliflower Curry. So healthy and high- end, price-wise for us. I would love fresh frugal dinner ideas. Here is our go-to winter meal with cauliflower, roughly $4-7, depending on if from your garden, bought on sale, etc.
1 head cauliflower, diced
1 quart diced tomatoes (large can, if buying from store)
2-4 cups cooked white or sweet potatoes or pasta of any kind
2 tsp curry powder
1 cup peas
1/2 c raisins
Salt, to taste

Put cauliflower and raisins into pan with a bit of water. Steam for 5 min over high heat. Add tomatoes, curry powder and salt and cover, cook over medium heat. Add remaining ingredients and cook until heated through. Plain yogurt spooned on top is a nice addition.

My Fake Car...Preparing for the Inevitable

We were so happy last year when I won a contest and was able to pay off my car early. If we hadn't won that, I would still be paying off my car until December of this year. Now we have been 18 mos or more without a car payment. Kevin's car is 10 years old and while mine only has 70,000 miles on it, I know the time will come when the dreaded thing will happen...another car payment. Today, I have done what I've been meaning to do for quite awhile.

Today I've created a fake car payment. It isn't nearly as much as a regular car payment, but it will prepare us with a downpayment when one of the cars needs to go or when it needs a giant repair. I decided to set this up as a separate account, as I need the disipline.  We bank with etrade, entirely online, so this was easy to set up--it took less than 2 minutes. I plan to funnel $20 per week into this account. While this isn't much compared to a regular car payment, in one year (if no giant repairs come up), this will add up to $1,040, plus whatever measly interest is by that point, so maybe $1,050. But that is the beginning of a safety net with regards to transportation cost. Even $1/day and you'd have $365 by the end of the year. Every bit counts. The key is automating this. I will have $20 withdrawn from the checking account every week and put into the savings account I've titled "CAR PAYMENT."

I'm hoping you consider setting up an account like this, too. When you go to buy your next car, this will feel like free money! :)

Compare Yourself, it Motivates

I just went to this interesting site that left me in shock and awe. Seriously.
https://www.ingcompareme.com/app/?returnURL=Public&appState=default&referrer=

Compare your financial situation with others in a similar situation.  Completely anonymous.

We have been working on our finances for a few years now and the value of a good website---very eye opening. This is the first year we have hit our target (this week, actually) of saving 33% of Kevin's salary for retirement.  And yet, this still has him working until he is 63. But with a few years of diligence, this was brought down from NEVER able to retire to 63. It can be done. Yes, beans and rice may be involved. But they are mighty tasty!

I highly recommend this calculator http://www3.troweprice.com/ric/ric/public/ric.do  See where you are at, so you know what you need to do to meet your goals. Every dollar counts, as in retirement that dollar is ten to thirty times more than it is now. A dollar purchase today is $30 less in the future. Is a $5 coffee today worth $150 in retirement? Would you burn $150?! So much of this is changing your mindset.

Keep HALF for you: Homeowner's Insurance

Before I used the following tips, I paid more than double for homeowner's insurance. By reducing our insurance costs, our monthly mortgage payment fell rather dramatically, as in MD, insurance is rolled into a mortgage. Despite paying $50/year extra to have the co-op preschool at our house, our homeowner's insurance is only about $300/year.  Here is how I did it (and in my mind, I had enough extra for half an international plane ticket!):

1. Shop around. We ultimately went with USAA, however I looked around online and called various local insurance companies.
2. Increase your deductible. This was the biggest savings for us. We decided to raise it to $6000. Look at the money you have in your emergency fund. I knew I wouldn't be comfortable with a five figure deductible, but I was okay with at 4 figure one, as we would still have several months left for our emergency fund (which took years to build), if we did have to use our deductible. If you don't have an emergency fund, use the cash you save here to build yourself an emergency fund. Online raise this deductible to the level with which YOU are comfortable.  Some insurance companies set it at $250 or $500 if you don't ask for a higher deductible. Just increasing your deductible a bit will save you money. You can always raise it more later, as your emergency fund grows.
3. When looking at how much homeowner's insurance to take out, make sure your home value is up-to-date on your policy.  In some regions of the country, home values have fallen dramatically. I feel more comfortable taking out 10% above what www.zillow.com says.
4. Combine policies--both of our cars and the house are with the same company. When I called to shop around for rates, I was shopping for home and cars (and raised car deductibles as well)--you will save 5-15% doing this, experts say. We saved 30% by combining Kevin's car policy with mine, before raising deductibles.
5. Find out what discounts are offered for smoke alarms, security alarms, etc. Find out discounts available, so you can decide if you want to add those features to your home.
6. Your FICO score will give you the best rates on insurance. If you haven't figured out how to improve your score, yet, look at the previous post.
7. Be loyal. Once you find your best rate, companies reward loyalty. Stick with them and after 3 years, you are often rewarded with 5% off. After 6 years, it increases to 10 or 15%.

If you save big, please comment. I'd love to know! 

Getting Your FREE FICO Score and Why this is Important

Do you know your number? If not, you most likely are overpaying for any loan you currently have or will overpay in the future. Optimally, your score should be above 760, with 800 or above your ultimate goal. These numbers will reward you with the best rates on mortgages, car loans, etc. You will have an easier time obtaining a loan or credit of some kind. 

All truly free FICO scores come w/strings attached, however this strings are easy to snip.  Go here for your free credit score. http://www.myfico.com/lp/free-score.aspx?AID=10816124&PID=1798975

After you get your free score and you confirm everything is accurate, see what areas need improvement and then you know where to target your efforts. Then, immediately, go and cancel the account. You have your free FICO score, your free credit report and your free advice on how to improve your score all in less than 10 min from start to finish. 

MMM financial empowerment. Good Stuff.

Save Receipts for a Month and Save Yourself 30% or more!

Reading Amy Dacyczyn's compiled newsletters was a life-changing experience for me.  http://www.amazon.com/Complete-Tightwad-Gazette-Amy-Dacyczyn/dp/0375752250/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1287015048&sr=8-1 (do not buy it, libraries have it!)

Before this book, I hadn't realized how wasteful I was. Yes, some of this book is outdated and extreme. Much of it is laugh-out-loud funny. But the tips within--there are so many. Amy has transformed my life! I do not say this lightly!

One of the topics she talks about is managing your food spending. Food is essential, this is a need area, but we don't need to blow our budgets. We can eat well and spend less. Save your receipts for the month. You will notice patterns. We all tend to buy much of the same food week-to-week. I have a notebook and each page has a different section of the grocery store: Produce, Bulk Goods, Baking, etc. I record what I paid, for example $2. When I find the same item for $1, I record this in my book, cross out the $2, and note where I got the item for $1. I will never pay more than $1 for that item again. Sales always come around again. If I sometimes get coupons for the item, and I get the item for 25 cents instead of the original $2, I make note that on sale and with a coupon, I can get the item for 25 cents. That is my new standard price. And I will only stock up like mad if this is an often used item and I can get it for 25 cents. You can see how multiplied, this strategy could save you an insane amount of money per year. And it does not take long. Roughly 2 min post shopping trip to log. Now I have most regular purchases in my head, so I don't use my book.

Even if you don't have time to log everything, note where your largest spending happens. In our house, it is in Kevin's lunch meat-- $7.20/week simply to fill his sandwiches (starting point, we have brought that down to $3, most weeks). We also spend fairly heavily on dairy--sometimes $10/week. The areas you spend heaviest on are what you should focus on first.

Harness the power of coupons. I don't mean clipping in your weekend paper. You could do that, if you want. I mean searching Ebay. You will find you use the same brands over and over. Check to see if Ebay has coupons for your items. If they aren't currently being sold, do a saved search. Ebay will let you know when the coupons are listed again. This is particularly helpful for allergy friendly foods, flour and other items where coupons aren't usually as plentiful. You can buy packets of 10 to 40 coupons (typical price is 8 cents per $1 off) and really save. My favorite are the Marcal 100% recycled t.p. coupons. $1 off one 1000 sheet roll. Then you get toilet paper for less than 15 cents/roll and it is better for the environment than regular toilet paper. Who wants to waste money on toilet paper? NOT ME! I have trips to plan ;)

You don't have to sit around and wait for auctions either, thanks to http://www.auctionstealer.com/
They have a free version and you can have it bid on up to 3 auctions per week for you.

http://www.forthemommas.com/ Does coupon and sale matching for MD/S. PA stores like Weis, Giant PA, Giant, Safeway, SuperFresh--if you aren't in these areas, find a blog that does it for you.

http://www.mygrocerydeals.com/ For a personal touch, sign up for this free site, you put in your favorite grocery stores and you can search for what is on sale. I often look up these brands: (in parenthesis are the best sale/coupon deal I've found): Stonyfield ($2.49 half gallon milk), Organic Valley (Yo Baby 4 pack, 89 cents; 6 oz, less than 17 cents) and Kashi (now that I got organic cereal for 50 cents/box, I want to try to stick with paying that!!).

Make up your book, take advantage of these free services, hoard your coupons (I just shove mine in a quart ziploc in my purse--lean and mean!) and pounce on a sale. I prefer to save at least 65% per shopping trip. But when buying bulk goods (often the cheapest), sometimes it is only 30%. I'll take it, because buying with my own containers is not only environmentally friendly, it is usually as cheap as you can get. I can't wait to hear how much less you are spending on groceries!!!

Taming Impulse Purchases...Staying on Course Toward Your Goal

I love Amazon for many reasons. I love their one day manager specials (I still remember my best deals, like organic lollipops for less than 3 cents each, for last Halloween!), I love subscribe &save and the deals they have on organic and allergy-friendly foods. But more than anything, I love them for taming impulse spending.

Saving money with coupons is not saving money, if coupons drive you to buy things you would not normally buy or spend money on. When a coupon lures you in for something you didn't need before, you have been had. I look at coupons as affording my family luxury items that I would love for us to have, but realistically we don't need (yogurt, frozen organic vegetables, whole grain crackers, cold cereal, cheese). If we bought wholly unprocessed food, well, there are very few coupons for those types of foods and our grocery bill would be within our budget without any trying.

I try to do most of my shopping just one day per week. This cuts down on overall purchasing and lessens the gimmes if shopping with children. The gimmes add up. Especially if you participate in them while going shopping hungry. This one day shopping doesn't always work, but this is my goal. Piper knows this as my "coupon shop day" and she knows that excellent behavior from myself and her results in an extra special visit to a bounce play (with a coupon, $3), a playground we don't normally visit or something along those lines. She is an active participant in finding the matching item on the coupon, reading numbers on the coupon and we talk about prices. She knows luxury items (i.e. all processed food) ideally should be on sale with a coupon or at least with a coupon or we delay a purchase. She does enjoy this and often instructs her stuffed animals on how to save money while shopping.  I think doing this more than once a week would ruin the novelty.

Every time you enter a store, you have a chance to waste money, detracting you from your goal. Mine, typically, is travel. Pre-child and husband, I spent more than 50% of my salary on travel and yet was still able to save money and live comfortably, debt-free. In Peace Corps, I banked 2/3 of my living allowance for travel. If I recall correctly, it was roughly $6-7/day. Realistically, we won't spend 50% of Kevin's salary on travel. We can't! But every bit we save brings us closer to a new and exciting destination.

Amazon's wish list feature is one of my favorite tools for curbing impulse spending. Every time I feel I want a book, something for Piper, something for Kevin, something for the house, something as a present for someone...I simply put it in our wishlist (you can add things from any website--while I'm out, I'll make a note of what I want and add it once I come home). When a holiday comes up, I can look at the list and decide what we can afford, what still looks good, what would be a perfect present or what I can delete. And typically I can delete (or get from the libary) half the things on the list. If I've done well that month with spending, and we have saved an appropriate amount, if extra bills haven't crept up (car repair, tree limb trimming, etc), then I will look over my list and might consider a few things, but typically by then, the urge has passed and we have banked more in savings. I urge you to try this wish list feature. Try buying only what you truly need and wish list the rest this month. It is shocking how much you can save. And you are that much closer to your goal.

Save Money Every Month with this FREE Service

If you haven't had your home checked by BGE, yet (for free, as long as you let them improve 3 things), this should be high on you to-do list, as you will effortlessly save money every month:
http://www.bgesmartenergy.com/residential/quick-home-energy-check

We had BGE come out last December and do a basic check for air leaks and other areas of inefficiency in our home. It was less than an hour, we got 12 free cfl lightbulbs out of the deal, and a prioritized list of home improvements. We decided to upgrade our insulation to R60 in the attic and had spray in foam put in along the sill in the basement. It has made a huge difference in the comfort level of our home. They typically offer free low flow faucets, showerheads and CFL lightbulbs. Using 60w or higher lightbulbs is like throwing money out the window! 

When Kevin and I think of home improvements, we try to think of improvements that will save us money first, before doing cosmetic improvements. The way we see it, if we upgrade something now that will save us money in the long term, those long term savings will pay for cosmetic improvements later. If you are out of BGE's area, check your local utility. Most offer simliar, often even better, plans.

Finding Your Purpose

Why do you try to save money? You should? You must? You want to? You need a tangible goal. Something that excites you. What is something you -really- want to do that you feel you simply don't have the money to do? Make it something good. Make it realistic, but a stretch. This will light your tightwad fire.

I'm hoping this blog will inspire you to find the room in your budget to do what your heart desires. It will take discipline, however discipline will be heartily rewarded. Think about your goal and feel free to share. Most often, my goal is travel. It is indulgent, a want and not a need...and one of the things I love most. But it lights my fire and keeps me on track in my spending. Everyone's priorities will be different. I'd rather wear clothes full of holes and be able to travel the world than have a closet full of new clothes. I'd rather buy organic and local food, but I know I need to keep within my $100/week food budget, so I do the best I can within that. Yes, life's needs can get us sidetracked, but with an eye on a goal, we can adjust our timeline and still make it happen.

I hope that we will be able to share here ways to:

• Save Money
• Do Without (and feel awesome about it)
• Fulfill our dreams, while being financially secure and responsible

We live as debt free as possible. Just having a mortgage makes me uncomfortable. But despite that, I do need a more exciting goal than being mortgage free...so I declare my goal to be England in February, as we just got an invitation to a friend's wedding. Double decker buses, hard cider, playgrounds and giant parks, British accents, vegetarian restaurants, mmmm...