A penny saved is a penny earned?

[EasyMoney_in_NC]

Announcing the Save $1,000 in 30 Days Challenge « I Will Teach You To Be Rich

There was a story in my local paper today about this guy and his "system". It made me chuckle because since the beginning of the year, my wife and I have been on a massive "monetary preservation" kick (read cost cutting routine) not because we have to, but we felt it was the right time and who knows what will come of the economy so why not re-assess our expenses and save where we can without suffering. I hadn't heard of this guy or his ideas before, to me they are common sense things that when really looked at closely, really represent a lot of $$.

Curious if any one else has done anything similar and what your results are? For starters, here's what we've accomplished.

- My wife registered on a shopping website that coordinates local and national grocery store adds for you to maximize potential savings. We now buy what we normally would have, but take advantage of all the mfg coupons and local store deals. We buy in bulk for less than buying just one. Average savings is roughly $300/month
- Cable - we have been with Time Warner for 16+ years....time for a deal. After 3 phone calls one day (to 3 different reps) and a conference call with them and my father who had just done this, we (I) got TWC to give me their current deal ($29.95/mnth) for digital cable (normally for new cust'. only) for one year. We got rid of HBO/Show (nothing but old movies and crap anyway). I also reduced the speed of my Roadrunner all for a savings of $80 month.
- Insurances - one would think with many properties and cars, insurance companies would give deals.........not mine!
I am in the process of switching to a new agent/different company (been with current for 16+ years!), but so far I have saved $500 year on my Homeowners premium (not to mention avoided a 30% increase worth another $700/year). Only 2 of my rentals have come due recently but each saved me $400 a year by switching. Cars another $600/year. The other rentals taper down in saving with the bulk being these first two and a couple more to follow then the savings is minimal. Figure another couple hundred a year combined.
- We turn our HVAC to 78-80 during the hot days when no one is home and close all the blinds (house usally stay about 77 on its own without HVAC). I put timers on the water heaters and try to use energy a little wiser these days. Saving so far is in the $30-50 a month range on the power bill, I'm sure I haven't seen all the saving here yet.

Not enough time has gone by to do a real assesment on what the saving has been/will be in the end. But There's easily $6-700/month so far and I'm not done!

Love to know if anyone else has done anything similar? When times are rolling along and everyone is making $$ no one thinks of this stuff. I could have been saving 10 grand a year all this time and just been pissing it away stupidly. Ten grand will pay for a couple nice vacations, more track time, stuff for the family.......
Wished I woke up sooner......
I get side tracked easy

 

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[Davidla]

It is a great thing that you can talk about saving & becoming more efficient with your wife, and more impressivingly execute it!

It may sound funny, but for a lot of couples this isn't simple and involves emotional charges and arguing.

Also, It seems like you have good balance with how far you go with saving.
Some people actually make it a life style and end up wasting too much time on the subject (I mean become fanatic about it) - insted of investing that time on expanding their revenues and finding opportunities.

At the end of the day, you can't save more money than you earn.
But there is no limit to how many times you can double the money you earn.

 

[EasyMoney_in_NC]

Well its actually been quite simple. My wife has never been a "spender". But on the other hand over the last few years, we both lost sight of expenditures because the economy was doing well and there was no worry about money, but now.....
Our rental properties are still doing well, but that could change. She is in a tenured job, but you never know...
So we just thought it was an appropriate time to act, before it became necessary. And our cuts are more about price shopping than cutting/suffering without, and becoming more aware. She spends maybe an hour on Sundays going through whatever the website she is a member of sends her and then goes and saves 50% on her grocery cart. I took a little time over a few days and made calls for the insurance needs. Took an hour to install heater timers....
Even the cable reduction still affords me 95% of what I previously had, so we aren't suffering in any way, we're just living smarter.

Allows me to enjoy driving around in my gas guzzling (13mpg) F150 and not worry about fuel prices to much

Thanks for the comments.

 

[MJ DeMarco]

I installed compact fluorescent lights throughout my home -- they use 79% less energy. I put them in places where I have a tendency to leave lights on. I actually noticed a decrease in my electric bill.

Also the best benefit of all -- they LAST! It seems like every month I was replacing light bulbs in my bathroom, closet, etc. -- these I've had in for 6 months and I haven't had to replace any of them. It was always a pain in the a$$ to drag the ladder out and replace the bulbs.

While they are more expensive, I feel they have been worth every penny and hey, I'm being GREEN TOO!!!

 

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[TaxGuy]

Ahh another 30 day challenge :coolgleamA:

Did the same thing with the light bulbs, unfortunately, didn't check to see how much was saved, I guess doing activities like these are much like modding a car- the fun is knowing the difference, i.e. what it was like before and after, not just after.

Next month we'll be starting the $1/day for food program as most of the items on the menu look like food we eat anyways, which will hopefully lead to one night a week being a date night instead of always fussing over whether or not to eat out(I know, I know, live within your means is so slowlane and middle-class, increase my income/profits and violia- problem solved )

 

[fanocks2003]

These days you can have electricity free of charge (only pay for the installment of your own energy producing system. One time fee only), you can have free water if you live near the sea or near a lake. Just hook a little home made water system to the lake and install a well run cleaning system. You can find plans for how to have such things built. Just search the internet. These days I can't understand why anyone living in a house have to pay for getting water and electricity delivered to them.

This will sound disgusting, but if people where really extreme with the "free" water part they could actually build their own mini cleaning system for pee. You pee into your toilet, it goes through an advanced, home made cleaning advice in the bathroom and then the clean water (from pee to clean drinkable water) is ready to be drunken again. Don't frown, this is how the whole system works already (on a big scale though).

I read somewhere that with coal and different filters of natural materials etc you will have harmless drinkable water from pee in the other end. Pee on the top and tap the drinkable water at the bottom. I have tried it myself. A survival class thing.

I remember from chemistry basics class that cleaning stations (stations that clean water from pee and other waste disposals) have 3 different cleaning procedures. Don't remember the correct line of procedure right now, but they included a filter one (not a fine filter), filter 2 (a much finer filter to exclude all but liquid forms more or less) and filter 3 which basicly was a chemical procedure for killing of harmfull bacterias. When it comes out the other end it is pure water (released to nature again). Free from pee, poop and other harmfull chemicals used in washing machines etc (even spilled oil etc is removed).

Why wouldn't that work at home? Talk about saving cash folks.

If you want to live more or less free of charge, it is possible. The question is:

1. How far are you willing to go?
2. How much are you willing or able to put up right now in cash investments to make it happen?

Nothing is impossible, just very hard (in certain cases). The less you know the more impossible everything is and will be until the right knowledge has been programmed in.

NOTE: The only people saying "impossible" are those people who have no clue what you are talking about in the first place.

What more do we have?

-We can grow our own food.
-We can have our own servers from telephone and internet and share slots with the neighboors who want to to lower their broadband and telephone costs as well. Share the costs of operating it over a whole area of neighboors and you will have to pay only a fraction in the end. Hook the damn thing up with the existing net telephone and broadband net. You will, certainly, have to pay a fee to the company owning the lines, but I would find it worth it. The more you are who share, the lower the costs of using it. See it as a router event.

There are so many things we can do to lower expenses to almost nothing at all. But it will cost something upfront (usually big money). That's where people are not interested anymore. That's why they pay more than they really have too.

 

[Russ H]

. . .I know, live within your means is so slowlane and middle-class . . .

Actually, it's not.

It's upper class. And fastlane.

How many billionaires have you heard about that live ABOVE their means?

By the same token, MILLIONS of middle class Americans are in mega-debt b/c they live beyond their means.

So it's the opposite.

Spending 5 hours cutting coupons and driving 50 miles to 6 different stores to save $5-- THAT is slowlane.

Or driving 30 miles across town to save 2¢ per gallon on gas, THAT is also slowlane.

Make sense?

-Russ H.

 

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[MJ DeMarco]

I know, I know, live within your means is so slowlane and middle-class

Clint, I'm shocked. You should know better. If you earn $40,000 every month and spend $60,000 every month -- that isn't exactly "fastlane" and you like many others -- middle-class or otherwise -- will be one turbulent challenge away from broke.

Shame shame! :nono:

 

[TaxGuy]

oops :smx4:

what I meant was not necessarily to live beyond your means(we saw how even with millions that MC Hammer, Ed McMahon and Latrell Sprewell did that ), but as Russ stated to not go out of your way to save a few cents and instead figure out how to earn that extra money :coolgleamA:

Simply put- it's not necessarily about living within your means, it's about not going beyond them and if so, finding a way to increase them.

 

[hatterasguy]

I'm a cheap yankee by birth, so I have no issue reducing expenses.

I'm happy that my cell phone bill will be going down $5 a month in two months thanks to a new plan.

WE created the phrase a penny saved is a penny earned!:coffee:

 

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[G_Alexander]

Good thread EasyMoney.

It is common sense for me to be naturally frugal because I am saving up for my first pooled property investment (or solo if the opportunity presents itself); but it is nice to see some of the ideas in this thread.

Too many times I find myself caught up in my work, at work, or not paying attention to those little expenditures.

I have been REALLY good since I joined this site and posted my original introduction thread.
http://www.thefastlanetomillions.com/introductions-networking/13928-new-18-year-old-entrepreneur-here.html. I totally changed my lifestyle and spending habits as I said I would, just glad I realized it when I was 18 years old instead of 28 years old.

My first year in College I managed to spend less than $75 dollars a month (which includes a gym membership which was $30/mo to stay healthy) at a BigTEN school.

So far this summer I would say I have not spent more than $200 while I grossed a net earnings of nearly $1500 thus far. I've only been working for less than a week now as well.

Thank you for reminding me to tell my father to cancel all of Comcast's premium channels. While I love them...REDBOX has a new place in my heart with their $1.00 DVD rentals.

By the way, may I ask what site it is your wife uses to get these coupons? I'm sure my mother would love to know.

G_Alexander

 

[EasyMoney_in_NC]

No worries, nice to see someone as young as you getting interested in their future instead of pissing your time and money away on video games, fancy phones, etc....
The site is Thegrocerygame.com
I believe the way it works is that you buy a membership to each store you want to frequent, and by doing so, they send you the info for those stores only. I have witnessed her savings at the checkout and I'm not kidding, its a minimum of 40% off the original price or better. I've seen her pay under $150 for a $300 cart.....just amazes me. And we still get all of what we normally get, just in a more bulk way and for less....its crazy! The end result is that you end up only needing a couple items here and there as time goes on, and not have to do bug shoppings again. She's down to $50-75 a week now (for a family of 4) to sustain. Its pretty cool!

And we love Redbox too......so much I bought the stock! (since sold it). They have kiosks in the store my wife deal shops at, so its a no brainer. If they're out, there's a half dozen other sites in a short distance from our house, so....

Congrats and good luck