My little sister Allison is doing an activity for the women in her church group about saving money. I told her I would get some ideas from my blog readers on how they save money.
Here is what Jon and I do to save $$:
- Pay our bills (and credit card) on time so we aren't charged any late fees or interest.
- Turn down our thermostat when we leave the apartment.
- Unplug appliances and electronics when we aren't using them.
- Take the Metro to work instead of driving and parking.
- We try to bring a bag lunch to work.
- (My family's personal favorite) Reuse our sandwich baggies.
- We try to combine vacation with Jon's business trips so his company pays for our hotel.
So, fellow bloggers, what do you do to save money?
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10 comments:
I can't belive you reuse sandwich bags . . . oh wait, yes I can.
While "save money" isn't typically part of my vocabulary, lately I have been leaving my wallet in the car when I go to the mall. (Creepers now stay out of my car!) I just can't say no, so this way I have to want it enough to go back to my car for my wallet. Pathetic, I know.
We use cloth diapers; not only does it save us money, but we get to be cool and "green". People think we are sacrificing so much for the environment, but really, it's all about the money!
Hm, currently I am living with my parents to save money. Does that count?
Also, if I am trying to save money I just avoid the mall/Target/where ever all together - I am rarely tempted to shop if I am not in a place to shop. Also I avoid going on to bananarepublic.com.
Oh, and I'll also set a limit as to how many times I can eat out in a weekend or whatever.
I don't have any hard and fast rules, but I am a saver by nature, so I don't worry about it too much.
*I plan my menus in advance. I grocery shop 2x/month, planning my menus around what is on sale and what is in season. I buy what I need and then for two weeks know that I have everything I need to make those meals. Solves the "what's for dinner?" question (answer: "pick something on the list that sounds good") and saves a ton of $, because there are no extra runs to the store.
*We each get an allowance. It saves $ because anything that doesn't come out of our allowance has to come from a line-item in the budget. I really don't want to figure out how to budget stupid things, so I don't buy them.
*I take out our eating out money in cash every pay day. Once it's gone, it's gone and we're eating in. We've gone from eating out a lot (too humiliated to admit how much) to twice a month.
When we buy stuff online we have to use coupons. i will never pay shipping. We also buy lots of stuff on ebay.
jeffs new computer batter= hp website=80 bucks. ebay=19.99. works like a charm:)
We sell lots of stuff on the school bulliten board and craigslist.
use walgreens and manufacture coupons and rebates:)
Let's see:
I limit the number of times I wash my clothes to once like every 10 days... luckily we have enough clothes to do this.
I always make sure the dishwasher is loaded as full as I can get it.... or run it only once a day.
Always use common sense... despite the fact the $1 store has many great things... often these don't last very long or can be found cheaper at Wal-mart or other places. So be weary of where you shop... just because it is a dollar doesn't always mean it is a great deal.
I have an ING Account that has a great interest rate. For every pay check that I get, a certain amount is automatically deposited into my ING account and I don't miss what I never see in the first place.
Also (and this is kind of gross), if I need to run by the store, I try to do it after I go running. That way I'm all sweaty and not tempted by clothes because I know I can't try them on. Plus I want to get out of the store as quickly as possible because I'm all nasty. lol
The best thing that Noah and I do (that hasn't been mentioned yet) is we put cash in envelopes. At the start of each month we sit down and do our budget for the month. Then we go to the bank, get out the cash and put it in labeled envelopes. That way when we've gone through our "restaurant" budget for the month and the envelope is empty, we can start playing rock-paper-scissors over who will cook instead of spending money we'd planned to spend on something else.
we carpool! great suggestions :) that and do redbox instead of seeing movies in the theatre. as long as you get the movies back in good time, you save money...
I'm with Sierra on the labeled envelopes. We do that too. I don't know. We're just cheap, cheap, cheap for everything. We only buy clothes that are on sale, we only shop discount foods, we keep track of every penny on mint.com, turn off lights, keep the heater low, etc, etc.
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