What is your best money saving tip?

[daylatedollarshort]

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Originally Posted by big-papa I was out of work for about 10 months and did a number of things that were all sensible and will continue on. - our power company keeps a couple of years of bills online. I was able to use that plus average temperature to get a baseline of our electric bills. Then we did several things. Replaced bulbs with LED, changed our pool pump cycle (it can use as much power as the A/C), reprogrammed the a/c thermostat, borrowed an infrared sensor from a friend and found hotspots around the ceiling and fixed the obviously bad spots with more insulation - My car is quite a bit older than my wife's. Dropped down to only liability for it. - Sat down with insurance agent and went through homeowners and found several things there that made sense for us. - Dropped Cable. Roku, Hulu, antenna, PlayOn give us more than what we need. - Restricted restaurants - budgeted food for a change. - A real budget (which makes you pay attention to gas, utilities, food, home maint., and "misc". - Refinanced the house

Good list. We did many of the same action items once DH left the day job. I wish we'd done more of that years ago. We've saved a lot of money on stuff no one has missed.

[big-papa]

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Originally Posted by daylatedollarshort Good list. We did many of the same action items once DH left the day job. I wish we'd done more of that years ago. We've saved a lot of money of stuff no one has missed.

Same here - wish we had looked at it years earlier. By the way, I still track the electricity usage vs. average daily temperature. We seem to have dropped 500 kW-hr consistently off the top. I bet most of that is the pool pump.

[John467]

The Flow-bee haircut Machine works well! I've been using it every 3 weeks for 5 years, saving $30 a cut compared to a salon cut. However, my wife trims around the ears and the lower edge of the hair on the back back of my head. She also shaves the back of my Chewbaca like neck. My wife still uses our stylist who laments I'm the only client she ever lost to the Flow-bee!!


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[FUEGO]

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Originally Posted by John467 The Flow-bee haircut Machine works well!

I heard it sucks.

[NW-Bound]

I have not grown garlic, but probably consume much more than 50 bulbs a year. Fresh herbs and green onions are my favorite home grown plants, and they bring exceptional returns.

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Originally Posted by queeneev Since y'all are talking about garlic, and the theme is money saving tips, my tip is to grow your own garlic. Its so easy and it keeps on giving! Plant in the fall and then pretty much do nothing (except water as needed) until the following August. I have 60 bulbs coming up. Keep 50 to eat (seems like a good amount for a 1 year supply) and plant the other 10 each year and you will never run out. If you cure it and store it properly, homegrown garlic can stay fresh for 6-9 months. Also - the growing garlic provides additional treats via the scapes (the shoots that grow above-ground), which you harvest in early summer.

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Originally Posted by daylatedollarshort ... Last month our per person grocery bill dropped to almost food stamp challenge level but we actually have plenty of healthy food in the house with lots of fresh produce and most of the meat, eggs and produce on the dirty dozen list are organic (those are usually from Costco and Grocery Outlet)...

Speaking of Grocery Outlet, we have none where we live. In our current RV trek, we first saw one store in WA, which we checked out by curiosity. Then, we saw more in OR, and in northern CA.

Grocery Outlet stores do have excellent prices on many items that are national brands. It appears that the items may be odd-n-ends, or overstock items, though we do not see any that are outdated (not that expiration dates are that critical anyway). For example, we got some Laughing Cow cheese for $6 for 5! Usual price is $4 to $5 each. We got a Hillshire sausage for $1.50 (regular price is $4). What's going on?

Their price on wine is nothing to get excited about; it is the same or higher than at normal stores.

[daylatedollarshort]

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Originally Posted by NW-Bound For example, we got some Laughing Cow cheese for $6 for 5! Usual price is $4 to $5 each. We got a Hillshire sausage for $1.50 (regular price is $4). What's going on?

Those prices are what I'm talking about! The merchandise changes each week but that is part of the fun. I bought an orchid for $6.99 recently that was $24 for the same size at the local retail grocery store.

[NW-Bound]

The problem with seeing this kind of prices is we tend to buy more than we can eat!

Well, we have no Grocery Outlet in our town yet, so are still safe from becoming hoarders.

[daylatedollarshort]

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Originally Posted by NW-Bound Well, we have no Grocery Outlet in our town yet, so are still safe from becoming hoarders.

I prefer to think of it as "stockpiling". But either way our monthly grocery bill has dropped since we started shopping more at G.O.