Hubby and I are beginning a pretty aggressive money saving plan to meet some goals we have for the next few years. Obviously we have already put a lot of thought into what we need and what we can cut, but there are always ideas that we may not have considered!

What are your best money saving tips?

Have a look at recurring costs for services you don’t use much. Netflix, gym, etc.

Have all of your insurance policies re-quoted. I do this every two years. Independent agents who represent several companies are a good bet and a lot if companies have teaser rates for new customers.

Check in to refinancing your house at a lower rate.

Caulk and weatherstrip every window, door and vent.

Learn to like beans, rice, potatoes, soup, ramen and pasta. Learn to dislike restaurant food except for special occasions.

Talk to your tax guy and make sure your tax strategy fits with your current plan.

If you owe any money, find one of those credit cards that offer 12 months at zero interest for balance transfers. Shop your everyday card around for better perks.

I think this stuff is kind of fun…

No purchased coffee drinks. Don’t eat out. No credit card debt. Entertainment that is free. (Digital antenna for your tv, get rid of cable) i do watch Amazon prime and Netflix, if I had to get rid of one, it would be netflix(because I order stuf from Amazon all the time, buying local for a lot of things I need is not an option where we live)

I’d have to give up my wine habit. Even modest $10 bottles add up fast.

I do like patronizing the local cafe’. Maybe once or twice a week. It helps your mental health to be around other people.

I’ve mostly given up alcohol because it became a migraine trigger - makes me sad, but I actually feel a whole lot better. Such a lightweight anymore that alcohol just makes me sleepy anyway. A light beer maybe once or twice a month, or a couple sips of the occasional drink that Steve pours himself.

Cut out or cut back on convenience food items like bottled water and individually packaged foods.

Easier said than done in today's market....but if you can, buy a good used car (instead of new), maintain it, and keep it for a long time. And be sure it doesn't burn premium fuel.

And I might add (and this comes from a huge skinflint)....it's great to save money, but don't feel guilty if every once in a while you decide to splurge on something outside your usual limits. Like eating out. When you don't do it often, it may feel more special. Or you may discover that you didn't miss it at all and you don't need to do it again any time soon.....

Regularly review your expenses. They are constantly going up if you are not taking constant steps to bring the down. Knowledge is power.

What about micropayments?

I believe this is not relevant for CC debt, but I'm not certain since I try to always pay in full at the end of each billing cycle.

But for a mortgage (and probably for a car loan and def. for a personal loan), interest is compounded daily, so if you can make a principal-only payment each month, you will benefit more from that payment if you pay it the beginning of the month than if you pay at the end of the month... Or say you get paid twice a month, and you're going to make a principal-only payment of $500/month over and above the regular mortgage payment. If you make that principal-only payment with each paycheck ($250 each) instead of waiting to do it at the end of the month ($500 all at once), you're lowering the principal twice a month instead of once a month, which means less interest accrues over time.

I had a personal loan which I paid down this way. The other thing is if you're making micropayments, you get into the habit of taking "left over money" (I know, there's no such thing) and putting it toward the payment. So I always made micropayments over and above the monthly payment and sometimes if I was doing online banking or just looking at my acocunt for something, I would just randomly pay $50 on that loan. (Always make sure to click where it says "principal only payment" though!) As a result, I paid off the loan super fast.

You could apply this to putting money into a savings account as well. Plan to pay a certain amount each time you get paid, and also any time you are online looking at your account, put some money into the savings account over and above that set amount.

Actually, we should start doing this, now that our summer house projects mostly finished, we need to start re-padding our savings account.

Time to "micropay" ourselves!

quote:

Originally posted by ShiroKuro:
What about micropayments?

for a mortgage (and probably for a car loan and def. for a personal loan), interest is compounded daily, so if you can make a principal-only payment each month, you will benefit more from that payment if you pay it the beginning of the month than if you pay at the end of the month

That is substantially equivalent to making an extra payment, once, at the beginning of the period, then the normal payment at the end of the period, then continuing to make each payment thereafter at the end of the period.

quote:

That is substantially equivalent to making an extra payment, once, at the beginning of the period

Of course. But say you get paid twice a month and you plan to make an extra payment, it’s always better to make an additional payment as early as you can. I didn’t know this originally and was making my regular payment early, and then the extra payment later. Reading about micropayments led me to switch that.

Then the idea of micropayments in general started to click for me, I thought of it as just sort throwing money at the loan with those principal-only payments as often as possible to push the principal down.

It really changed how I thought about interest.

There are some great tips in here! Thanks!

We have moved to a meat-once-in-a-while diet and that makes a huge different in our grocery bill. We just went through all of our subscriptions and cancelled, lowered, and paused most of them. We have just made some changes to our cell phone plans as well as our car insurance which will help as well. We are doing a bit of a challenge to try to see how much we can save between now and Christmas. Wish us luck!

quote:

Originally posted by dolmansaxlil:
There are some great tips in here! Thanks!

We have moved to a meat-once-in-a-while diet and that makes a huge different in our grocery bill. We just went through all of our subscriptions and cancelled, lowered, and paused most of them. We have just made some changes to our cell phone plans as well as our car insurance which will help as well. We are doing a bit of a challenge to try to see how much we can save between now and Christmas. Wish us luck!

I loathe and despise Dave Ramsay but he does have some good ideas. Maybe give a listen if you can stomach his presentation style.

Don't know if it's relevant in every state, let alone Canada, but in PA we can shop for our electric supplier. The electricity still gets billed and distributed by our local utility but we can choose the actual supplier. Each supplier has different rates and if I shop around, I can almost always find someone that beats our local utility by a couple cents per kwh. Our house is primarily electric (we don't have natural gas or propane) so we use a lot of kwh...that couple cents adds up!

There are some great tips here. I totally agree with keeping a running tab on exactly what you're spending your money on. There may be some surprises there.

The other thing, which may not be possible given your circumstances, is to look at transit options. We were paying a lot in parking fees, which we could get rid of by taking transit whenever possible.

Some of this has already been offered, but I'll put in my two cents:

First, understand where you are spending money now. See if you can create a spreadsheet with as much detail as possible for the last three months (because you want to start changing your habits now, not three months from now). Some things are hard to get to the detail: your utility bills show how much water or electricity you used, not how much you used taking showers, watering the garden, or washing dishes.

If you don't know where the money is going now, it's hard to understand where the low-hanging fruit is.

Use the Deming method: Plan - Do - Check - Act (repeat).

Money is the source of most marriage/family friction. Plan together on what you are going to do.

Do what you planned to do.

Check and see if that is having the desired effect.

Act on what you found... start the PDCA cycle again with your new insight.


Buy what you eat and eat what you buy. Don't buy arugula just because it's on sale if you don't like arugula. (I have made a few impulse buys at Costco recently, like the umami sardines. They were tasty, but came out to about 75 cents a fish.) I see stats that anywhere between 25 and 50% of all food is wasted.

The price of LED bulbs has come down so far, especially from IKEA. It is probably worth it to just swap out all of your incandescent and CFL bulbs for LEDs even if they haven't burned out (I see admonitions to keep incandescent bulbs in emergency lights, but I think LEDs are reliable enough now that this is obsolete guidance).

Unplug all those little chargers for your phone, iPad, etc. unless you are actually charging. They use a tiny trickle, but it's more than zero. Many of your other electronics, like TVs, computers, monitors, and things also consume a little power while plugged in, but newer items use a tiny trickle.

Turn down your water heater to 125F/52C if it's not already. If it's in an unheated area, look into buying an additional insulation blanket for it.

Fix any water leaks in your house... do you have a toilet that fills periodically even if you don't flush? Replace the flapper.

Ask your insurance company if you are getting all of the discounts you are eligible for. I carry a little extra liability insurance on the car, but it costs like $5 a month.

Subscriptions? Magazines, web sites, etc? What's on auto-renew that you don't even think about?


I buy a lot of stuff off craiglist -- camera gear, tools, art supplies, camping equipment. I rarely pay more than half of retail, sometimes more like 10%.


As has been said.. you can live frugally without living like a monk. There are a million ways to entertain yourself and enjoy life that don't cost a bundle. See every museum in your home town before you think about traveling. Go to every park in your home town before you head off to enjoy the scenery elsewhere.


I'm sure I will think of more.


Living frugally and saving deliberately allowed me to retire pretty comfortably at 58.