What is your best money saving tip?

[Khan]

Am about ready to drop cable.

[Notmuchlonger]

Quote:

Originally Posted by Khan Am about ready to drop cable.

Yeah Im getting to that point myself. So many things on the internet.

[summer2007]

I had thought about cable and if you are paying $60 a month it works out to be well over $7000 in 10 years (without any increases in price....and you KNOW it will increase!).

So when you think of it like that it seems like a lot to spend for watching tv.

I have to Thank T-AL and Martha for the cut the paper towel roll in half trick.....that is a good one to save money with.

How about more efficient washing machines and toilets?

Also what about growing an organic garden?

If you love being outdoors especially in summer (how did I come up with my screen name??!!!) like I do and are not afraid of getting dirty and doing a little work. You can have a good amount of free and really healthy food.

If you figure it out even if you grow a few hundred dollars worth of produce it adds up over a decade and you can't beat the taste of fresh from the garden.

Jim

[bbbamI]

These are things I do/have done:

Changed to another insurance co with better coverage and saved $1k this year.

Clip coupons and buy when the items are on sale. Saved approximately $500 last year.

Mow my yard. Saves $800 a year.

Paint and do most maintenance on my house. Saved $500 when I stained the new fence.

Turn my fountain pumps off at night. Saves electricity and doubles the life of the pumps.

Divide plants. When something interesting grows in the yard and looks nice, I leave it. Try to use only drought resistant plants, thereby using less water.

Do my own taxes.

[Notmuchlonger]

Quote:

Originally Posted by bbbamI These are things I do/have done: Changed to another insurance co with better coverage and saved $1k this year. Clip coupons and buy when the items are on sale. Saved approximately $500 last year. Mow my yard. Saves $800 a year. Paint and do most maintenance on my house. Saved $500 when I stained the new fence. Turn my fountain pumps off at night. Saves electricity and doubles the life of the pumps. Divide plants. When something interesting grows in the yard and looks nice, I leave it. Try to use only drought resistant plants, thereby using less water. Do my own taxes.

Mowin the grass is also good exercise. I guess providing you are using a push mower..

[Westernskies]

Quote:

Originally Posted by JOHNNIE36 ...raised my score to over 900.

900 out of 850 possible ?...

[mbooth]

[quote=bbbamI;799421]These are things I do/have done:

Turn my fountain pumps off at night. Saves electricity and doubles the life of the pumps.

I've recently become 'interested' in our electricity consumption and bought a cheap plug-in meter to guage each appliance's use......man did I get some surprises!

Microwave, just sitting there doing nuffin in p'ticlar, chewing through 70 watts, we don't even look at the digital time it displays!

Washing-machine, plugged in but not operating, happily wastes 28 watts.

All the wall-warts and 'convenience' indicator lights in the house were 'conveniencing' us to the tune of around $150+ per year. Together with the two above examples I think that by turning all those appliances off at the plug when not actually required will save us $500+/year.

I thought we were reasonably frugal with our use of electricity, but that little $30 investment in the meter has shown us otherwise and definitely paid off.

Of course it all depends on your local electricity costs, but it sure could pay to find out exactly what you are using at the individual appliance level.

Cheers - Mick

[shotgunner]

Quote:

Originally Posted by Want2retire An unrelated money-saving tip: In the summer, I keep the thermostat as warm as is comfortable, and wear nearly nothing

Ya Baby!!

[growing_older]

My best money savings tip: payroll deductions.

Money I see in my account is easy to spend. Money I don't see in my account doesn't seem to have that effect. I've adjusted (takes a few months) to higher and lower income levels. By deducting pay before it gets deposited, my natural tendency to spend most of the money I see will bring my spending in line with my plan. If I want to spend less, I just increase the deduction. Sounds kind of silly, but it works for me.

[Bimmerbill]

I do my own car maintenance. Oil changes, tire rotation, brake jobs, wiper changes, battery and light replacement, etc. Pretty sure I saved a lot of $, at the expense of my time (and knuckles sometimes).

[Sparky]

I dropped all but basic cable - bill went from about $70 per month to $14.95. I went from 3 at a time Netflix to 1 at a time - $9 per month, I'm getting about 8 movies a month.

Shop at Aldi's.

[OAG]

Dropped Cable Phone Service and went to F&F Cell Phone Only @ $10 a month: Savings about $35 a month.
Dropped "Extended" Basic Cable TV Service and went to pure Basic for $16 a month: Savings about $20 a month.
Have always serviced my own car (Oil & Filter Changes, Wheel Rotation (all 5 which saves about 20% over the 4 wheel rotation, brakes, etc.,). Also went to a single vehicle about 15 years ago.
Set Back Thermostat 80 in summer and 55/65 in winter.
All purchases possible are put on "cash back" PENFED Visa Card.

[youbet]

Quote:

Originally Posted by Westernskies 900 out of 850 possible ?...

Pays in advance.......

[youbet]

Quote:

Originally Posted by Khan Am about ready to drop cable.

I've been threatening to do that for a couple of years. I'd miss a few Bears and Cubs games a year now that ESPN somehow got rights to do a few exclusively. DW watches some movies, cooking and other stuff on cable channels. But when I tally up the hours we spend watching stuff only available on cable, they turn our to be pretty pricey hours. $55/mo for cable and we spend maybe 20 - 25 hours/mo watching cable channels.

I'm about ready to pull the switch. DW is a little hesitant. She has come around a little since I installed a digital converter box on her Mom's TV (MIL uses only OTA, can't afford cable) and she has seen that there are a number of new, extra channels available OTA inlcuding a dedicated weather channel, etc.

Note: We live in suburban Chicago and a simple antenna gets us a lot of OTA signals. I think if you live in the boonies, you have a different problem as you might require a big outdoor antenna to get just a few OTA channels. BTW, that was how cable TV started. It was called CATV (Conmmunity Accesss TV) and was simply a large comminity antenna system fed to subscribers houses so that each house didn't require a tall tower and rotary antenna. Then it expanded to picking up satellite signals directly. And finally cable channels (programming never broadcast over the air) came into plan.

[ziggy29]

Quote:

Originally Posted by youbet I've been threatening to do that for a couple of years. I'd miss a few Bears and Cubs games a year now that ESPN somehow got rights to do a few exclusively. DW watches some movies, cooking and other stuff on cable channels. But when I tally up the hours we spend watching stuff only available on cable, they turn our to be pretty pricey hours. $55/mo for cable and we spend maybe 20 - 25 hours/mo watching cable channels.

Same here. But we only get about 8 different stations with a total of about 12 subchannels (and two are in Spanish). And that's only with two large, high-gain antennas mounted to the side of our garage above the roofline, since we're 60 miles away from the Austin transmitters and have some ridges of hills in the middle.

Nevertheless, I think if we pick up a DVR to use with HD signals over-the-air, we can at least record stuff that's halfway decent on free TV and use stuff like Netflix and Hulu to pick up the slack. In September our two-year commitment to satellite is over and we may decide to cut nearly a grand a year out of the budget.

[freebird5825]

Eat at home always, except for special occasions and for "cravings" on don't-feel-like-cooking nights.
Use artifical flowers (not real) in a vase during cold weather to brighten up the table and living room. Rotate locations every month.
Shop at dollar type stores exclusively for canned and dry goods. Bring a list.
Volunteer at and be a customer of a local food bank.
Limit driving (more than 10 miles) to going only if you have 2 or more errands that day. Or match a just for fun driving outing anywhere
with accomplishing 2 or more errands on the same trip.
Frequent garage sales for books, gardening items, sports equipment, appliances, etc.
Cook in bulk in a crockpot, freeze leftovers.
Shop online for lightweight items, use local stores for heavier items.

[Dog]

I'm ready to drop cable. Comcast has upgraded to a digital network requiring basic users and extended basic users to add converter boxes and adapters or risk losing channels. We complied and now the channels change much slower and the remotes that need to be used with the adapters are "junk". I'm going to investigate using an antenna. We only watch TV at night for a couple of hours anyway. It would save us over $58 plus taxes/monthly.

[tmm99]

Make our own laundry detergent using
How to Make Your Own Laundry Detergent - wikiHow Method 1. We use Fels Naptha Soap. It is very easy to make and it does a better job than Tide and such.

tmm

[youbet]

Quote:

Originally Posted by Khan Am about ready to drop cable.

http://finance.yahoo.com/banking-bud...What's-Out

Quote:

Consumers are cooling to cable. And they're not very satisfied with satellite TV. In fact, according to consumer research firm GfK Roper Consulting, about 40% of those surveyed during mid-2008 and early 2009 said they'd be willing to do without cable or satellite TV. Instead, they'd just as soon watch programming on free sites like Google's YouTube or buy videos à la carte from Netflix. Of those surveyed, only 37% said they were getting good value for the price they pay for cable or satellite subscriptions. The trend is showing up at some of the biggest cable and satellite TV providers. Subscriber totals dropped last year for Comcast, Dish Networks, and Cablevision Systems, while Netflix sales are growing apace, and traffic to video sites including Hulu, owned by General Electric and News Corp., is surging.

[Sparky]

Quote:

Originally Posted by youbet http://finance.yahoo.com/banking-bud...What's-Out

Thanks for that! Having dropped my cable down to basic ($14.95), the one thing I've really missed is Ramsey's Kitchen Nightmares.

I just watched two episodes on Hulu.com.