It’s the topic of the year: how to get by with less. Here is my humble submission to the discussion. I tried to avoid some of the most common money-saving ideas, like taking public transportation, making a list before you go to the grocery store, giving handmade holiday gifts, or stocking up on items when they’re on sale. Still, I’m sure many of these tips will be old news for many of you. My hope is that even the most stingy penny-pincher will come away with one or two fresh ideas.
1. Read about how other people are saving money. There are a lot of great money-saving roundups on the Web. Even if you don’t learn anything new, they may inspire you to do all those things you know you really should be doing to save money. Clever Dude offers 20 ways to save in general, and 50 ways to save by avoiding waste. FiveCentNickel offers ways to save money on prescription drugs and utilities. Blueprint for Financial Prosperity has a ton of good tips, including 100 ways to save money this holiday season. Eightfold Rabbit also has some good ideas.
2. Design a challenge. Try not to spend any money for a week, or not to eat out for a month. Melinda Fullmer at MSN Money fed her family of four for a week for $100, which is $150 less than she usually spends. You could also try the Food Stamp Challenge. Even if you aren’t able to maintain a low level of spending, you’ll have saved some money trying. And you may be surprised at the level of spending you can live with. It helps to get a group of friends to do the challenge with you.
3. Make your own beer. A friend of mine has been doing this, and the beer is great. The kit costs about $80, and ingredients are $20 to $30, for enough to make 48 beers. So when you make the first batch, the beers are roughly $2 each, and after that they cost 50 cents, as long as you reuse the bottles.
4. Deposit any money you save. Every time you put something back at the store or consciously decide to skip something that would have cost money, deposit the savings in your bank account. I got this idea from Paid Twice.
5. Ladies: buy a razor. There is no need to wax anything when there are Gilette Fusion razors with five blades. Seriously. This isn’t 1992, and the Fusion is not a Bic razor. I don’t know why they don’t market this razor to women. It’s fabulous. Ask for one for the holidays. Makes a great stocking stuffer.
6. Get on a family cell phone plan, even if it’s with friends, or family members who don’t live with you.
7. Invest in a Cuisinart Grind-and-Brew Coffeemaker, and a resuable travel mug. This is the coffeemaker for anyone who has ever been to Europe and thought, “Why can’t Americans make coffee like this?” Once you drink this coffee, you will never want to buy coffee every again. Starbucks coffee will taste like sludge. It usually costs over $200 but I got it for $100 by signing up for Gevalia (and canceling within a couple weeks). You can also find great prices on it at Brad’s Deals (I just saw a refurbished one for $20). CAVEAT: The machine is very loud when grinding, and in order to make sure the coffee is hot enough, you have to use hot tap water to make it. Because of these defects, Cook’s Illustrated recommended it “with Reservations.” The top coffeemaker according to Cook’s is the Technivorm Moccamaster, Model KBT741.
8. Host a brunch party instead of a dinner party. Fried potatoes and pancakes — what could be cheaper?
9. Buy spices in bulk. You could pay 47 cents for the same spice that would cost $3.99 in a jar. Find bulk spices at a health food store or the natural foods section of a large grocery store. You may also be able to find some online.
10. Whenever you have time, make a big batch of food, and freeze it. I use Saturday and Sunday to cook meals for the week. So when I go out of town for the weekend, that often means I end up going out to lunch on Monday and Tuesday. This year, however, I started preparing ahead. When I have a weekend at home, I make a bunch of extra food and freeze some of it. Then, when I leave town, I know I’ll have food in the fridge when I get home. Veggie Curry, Pasta Sauce, and Dahl (Indian Lentils) are all really great for this.
11. Save more than you can really afford. I have about 30 percent of my pay sent directly to my savings account. That leaves me with barely enough to get by, so I have to try extra hard to stay within my budget. Sometimes I have to put a couple hundred dollars back into my checking account, but I still end up saving more than I would if I hadn’t put the money in savings in the first place.
12. Use rewards cards. I’m in the Chase Visa Extras program, and over the last eight months or so I’ve accumulated enough points for a $25 gift certificate. We also use the Duane Reade rewards program, so every time we spend $100 at Duane Reade we get a $5 coupon.
13. Have candlelight dinners. They will be romantic and save you at least 37 cents apiece.
14. Shop at Whole Foods. No, really. If you haven’t been there for a while, go back and check the prices again. Their generic products, with the 365 brand, are very reasonably priced–in my experience, the prices are competitive with those at any other grocery store. At least, this is true in NYC, where even the worst grocery stores can be unbelievably expensive.
15. Cancel your newspapers when you’re away. It’s actually really easy to do online. And if you go away as often as we do, you could save as much as $30 a year.
16. Leave your credit card at home–even if you get rewards. A lot of people use their credit cards for everything, pay the bill in full at the end of the month, and then reap the rewards, either cash back or airline miles. But those folks still may be losing the budgeting wars. According to this great Money Magazine article, when you pay with plastic you tend to spend more money. After McDonald’s began accepting credit cards, the average ticket price went up from $4.50 to $7. If you get one percent cash back but your spending increases by more than that–and it probably does–then start paying with cash.
17. For Christmas gifts, make a curry kit. Buy some spices (turmeric, cumin, coriander), wrap them up nicely and include a recipe. It’ll be cheaper if you buy the spices in bulk and get jars from a second-hand store.
18. Buy a pork shoulder. Eight dollars for a week of pork, says my friend Philippe.
19. Forget cable and TiVo; welcome to the era of Hulu. We have discussed getting cable, but the only reason we really wanted it was to watch The Daily Show and The Colbert Report. Both are now available in their entirety online, on Hulu and on their respective websites, as long as you’re willing to wait a day to see them. Hulu has tons of great TV shows that you can watch at any time. Also check out Hulu competitor Sling.
20. Make a list of what’s in your freezer. This tip comes from my friend Miriam, who says: “When it’s time to make dinner and the fridge is empty, I can easily scan what’s available (while saving on electricity costs) and am more apt to defrost something than go out and buy another meal.”
21. Buy frozen peas and corn. You get a lot of food for a relatively small amount of money. Then, you can use them to bulk up a meal when you’re out of fresh vegetables. We sometimes put peas and corn in our homemade marinara sauce to make a hearty vegetarian meal. You could also combine them with other canned, frozen or fresh vegetables to make an easy stir fry.
22. Complete surveys online (and deposit any money you earn). I’ve never done this, but a lot of personal finance bloggers make a few dollars here and there by doing surveys. Read tips from Boston Gal and Paid Twice.
23. Buy a netbook. They cost as little as $300, and they’re good for anyone who just browses the Web and uses word processing. You can buy some of them with Windows XP instead of Vista, which is a huge plus. (Others use Linux.) Plus, they are ultra-portable. Most have nine-inch screens, but some ten-inch versions have recently been released. Laptop Magazine is currently recommending the Samsung NC10 and also likes the MSI Wind. One tip: if you want to buy a netbook online, go to Best Buy and try it out first. You should make sure the keyboard is comfortable and the screen is big enough. In particular, take note of the placement of the shift key–the best netbook keyboards have one right under the Enter key.
24. Only buy new toiletries when you really need them, says my friend Sara. This goes for anything from shampoo to toothpaste to makeup. And, she adds, you can apply the same principal to socks and underwear. On a similar note, Jon recently discovered a good way to use the last little bit of dish soap in the bottle: fill the bottle with a little water. That usually creates enough soapy water for a load or two.
25. Reuse tin foil and Ziploc bags. Ok, so this falls under the category of things that will save you a relatively insignificant amount of money. But that’s okay. I once spent a whole summer reusing two square feet of tin foil. I just flattened each piece out with my thumb after using it and rinsed it off.
26. Find exercise classes online. Last week, a friend and I wanted to go to a Pilates class, but we couldn’t find one at a convenient time. So we did Pilates on our own, at home, with videos like this one, from Spark People. It’s not as good as a real class, but it’ll do in a pinch, and it saved us $15 each.
Do you have any good tips to add to the list?
6 Comments
December 10, 2008 at 8:19 pm
[...] December 10, 2008 · No Comments I have discovered a few more interesting blogs. This one, Monogamoney, examines the life of a “young couple trying to save enough money to get a dog. And hopefully, one day, a child or two.” They have a great post on “26 (relatively painless) ways to save money this holiday season“. [...]
December 10, 2008 at 9:33 pm
I bought several of the foaming soap dispensers, and I use them for everything from hand soap & dish soap to shower gel and shampoo. You can dilute any liquid soap and use in the foaming dispenser, and because it foams it for you, you tend to use less at a time. It’s also a great way to reign in those in the household who tend to go overboard with the soap. Also, using reusable towels instead of paper towels helps me stretch my budget. I keep paper towels in the house for the really icky stuff, but for everyday wipe-ups a lightweight cleaning cloth does just as well and can be tossed in the laundry and used again. Those thin stripey ones that are found in the dishsoap aisle are my favorites. They hold up for many washings even in the washing machine but are thin enough that they can be rinsed quickly and dry super fast.
December 16, 2008 at 12:22 pm
[...] Carnival of personal finance #183 Jump to Comments Thanks to the Frugal Duchess for including my post as one of the editors’ picks in the 183rd Carnival of Personal Finance. I submitted my recent post, “26 ways to save money.” [...]
December 23, 2008 at 3:01 pm
[...] more ways to save money Jump to Comments To write my recent post on 26 Ways To Save Money, I asked friends to send in their tips. These come courtesy of my friend Laura. Leave notes about [...]
March 19, 2009 at 8:41 pm
[...] of the first things mentioned in a column of money-saving tips. I even included it when I posted 26 money-saving tips in December. But I have actually increased my away-from-home coffee consumption by one or two cups [...]
June 1, 2009 at 5:22 am
AIR PRESSURE IN YOUR TIRES WILL SAVE MONEY
ON GAS, LESS TIRE WEAR , ON ALIGNMENTS,SUSPENSION PARTS, AND SO ON
JUST CHECK YOUR TIRE PRESSURES AND IN THE LONG RUN WILL SAVE YOU MONEY ON REPAIRS
THANKS
JAMES FALLO