Frugal living isn't being cheap

Mpls Star Tribune Mobile ^ | February 7, 2010 | KARA McGUIRE

[Reddy]

See post 26.

[Reddy]

I don’t think that’s being frugal.

[whd23]

Download music and burn cds. Download what movies you can and rent the rest. Figure out how to rip dvds onto your hard drive and return the disks.

Steal, don't buy your next car. Wear an overcoat to the grocery store and stuff it full of steaks. Climb the utility pole outside your house and splice into your neighbor's cable feed. Watch for packages being dropped off around your neighborhood and grab them before the owner's get home; sell whatever is inside on eBay or craigslist.

[PatriotGirl827]

bookmark to keep reading

[darth]

Thanks. I did not read far enough before I posted.

[robomatik]

"I don’t think that’s being frugal."

true, maybe "thrifty" is a better word. :)

[nw_arizona_granny]

Thanks for pinging me.

[nw_arizona_granny]

I posted your thread link on the survival thread:

http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/chat/2299939/posts?page=5804

[hennie pennie]

Almost every single food item that enters our door was purchased on sale from local grocery stores, and I have read in the past that one should be very careful about the PRICE per pound or PRICE per serving of the big bags of items available at the big box clubs like Sam's.

Frequently those huge containers are not a real deal; however, I've read comments online that many parents of large families appreciate being able to buy ONE large container of a specific item, rather than a dozen small ones at the local grocery store.

I would NOT buy all that meat at one time in one store; were I planning to go on a high protein meat based diet, I would scour the local grocery ads every weekend, and learn which store had the best deals on meat -- and THEN I would buy at least three times what I needed of the best sale meat available that week.

We purchase all our baking needs for the rest of the year, between November and April --- stores have some great deals starting in early November - for Thanksgiving and extending through Easter/Passover in March/April. Typically, there are lots of coupons in the Sunday paper inserts for such items, at the same time period.

I was going to buy a ten pound package of sugar last week -- but after I examined the price per pound, I realized it was cheaper to purchase granulated sugar in a small 4 pound sack.

So you must keep an eye on TRUE prices; make no assumptions....

[goodwithagun]

We upgrade at Walmart instead of AT&T. At AT&T store, our new phones would have been buy one at 99.99 and get one for free. Except, we would have had to have paid the full 200 up front and send in all of the rebate info. At Walmart’s cell phone desk, we paid 8.88 for each phone- the exact same phone as the AT&T store! The best part is, we paid less than 20 up front and did not have to send in any rebate info!

[hennie pennie]

Sorry to bother you, but I'm curious if there are any CPAs around FR. I came across an interesting tidbit in a news article about coupons and couponing.

The woman featured in the story uses coupons to buy food items to stuff in weekend backpacks for needy children -- and the woman who taught her various methods of doing this, claims that at the end of the year, one can count as CHARITABLE CONTRIBUTIONS the retail price of the food purchased -- as opposed to the actual amount of money she paid for the food she donated to charity.

Does this sound inaccurate to anyone else?

How much would she have to contribute this year to make it worth her white to itemize charitable contributions?

Anybody have any comments?

THANKS.

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COUPON CUTTING FOR CHARITY

http://www.localwireless.com/wap/news/text.jsp?carrier=google&sid=120&nid=6473047&cid=155&scid=-1&title=Local%20News&ith=2

EXCERPT

"....Anthony says after taking a class about the ins and outs of coupon cutting, she's now saving enough money to be able to donate some of her "extra" food to charity.

She has since been able to adopt two children through the KidsAid Weekend Backpack Program, which provides backpacks full of food for needy children to take home on weekends, when they otherwise wouldn't get free and reduced meals from school.

And Anthony's couponing teacher, Holly Settle, says you can also write-off your charitable couponing donations at the face value of what the store charges for the item, not what you paid with a coupon, and says by the end of the year, 'I'm able to save thousands of dollars just by donating to organizations.'"

[hennie pennie]

Here's an article from Savannah which mentions something called cell-fire coupons which I think may be of interest to you:

http://m.savannahnow.com/topic/3497-News/articles/196017743

[SnakeDoctor]

I’m not a CPA, but I am a tax attorney. I typically handle tax settlements, and don’t prepare returns very often, so the following is an educated guess, not an expert opinion.

There is an argument to be made that donated goods are deductible based on their value, and not the price paid at retail. However, my guess is that the deductions wouldn’t survive an audit if the IRS decided to go to the mat on it. I doubt they would go to the mat on it ... but they could, and if they ask her to fully justify the deduction, she may not be able to to their satisfaction.

I think she’d need to be able to deduct above the standard deduction (she’d need to look up her standard deduction) to make itemizing worthwhile.

SnakeDoc

[hennie pennie]

Hi there, Snakedoc!

Thanks for sharing your educated opinion about this.

Really, the only thing I've ever seen about the IRS and couponing was at some point a long time ago they attempted to tax monies received from mailing in rebates.

At the time I read the news article, it was mentioned that SOME people get some pretty big savings accounts going which are solely "fed" by rebate checks, and that's how the whole issue started. Anyway, it was ruled AT THAT TIME, I have NO idea if it has changed, that Rebate Checks are NOT taxable income.

I've read that if you donate used household goods and old clothes to the Salvation Army, that you cannot deduct what you paid for them, but only the fair market value of what they'd be priced at a Garage Sale AKA Yard Sale.

But all those rules & regs change so frequently.

I got irritated when I learned about the IRS going after "Rebater Mom & Pops" because there obviously are BIG FISH like Bernie Madoff and the Wallstreet Crooks who make off with millions upon millions upon millions......

[SnakeDoctor]

With donated clothes/ furniture/ etc., you can deduct the fair market value of the item in its current condition (i.e. used), no matter what you paid for it when it was new. Using the same line of thinking, you can probably logically justify a deduction of the fair market value of food items (which are not used, and thus not reduced in value from the retail purchase price), regardless of what you paid for the item.

However, in an audit, the IRS may come to a different conclusion if they can show that you did not pay fair market value for the items — i.e. if you make $60K a year, and are deducting $25K of donated groceries because you got them for free (virtually), the IRS is going to send up red flags and start asking questions that are hard to answer.

I would think that if you are making reasonbly-sized honest charitable deductions, you should be fine ... if you are using this as a tax shelter, the IRS is likely going to smoke you.

SnakeDoc

[hennie pennie]

Well, evidentally the Coupon Queen who is teaching this precise method in her Coupon Classes claims that she saves several thousand dollars in taxes each year.

[Ellendra]

From http://www.irs.gov

You cannot take a deduction for clothing or household items you donate unless the clothing or household items are in good used condition or better.

Exception. You can take a deduction for a contribution of an item of clothing or a household item that is not in good used condition or better if you deduct more than $500 for it and include a qualified appraisal of it with your return.

Household items. Household items include:
* Furniture and furnishings,
* Electronics,
* Appliances,
* Linens, and
* Other similar items.

Household items do not include:
* Food,
* Paintings, antiques, and other objects of art,
* Jewelry and gems, and
* Collections.

Plus something on donating food:
Food Inventory Special rules apply to certain donations of food inventory to a qualified organization. These rules apply if all the following conditions are met.

1. You made a contribution of apparently wholesome food from your trade or business. Apparently wholesome food is food intended for human consumption that meets all quality and labeling standards imposed by federal, state, and local laws and regulations even though the food may not be readily marketable due to appearance, age, freshness, grade, size, surplus, or other conditions.
2. The food is to be used only for the care of the ill, the needy, or infants.
3. The use of the food is related to the organization's exempt purpose or function.
4. The organization does not transfer the food for money, other property, or services.
5. You receive a written statement from the organization stating it will comply with requirements (2), (3), and (4).
6. The organization is not a private nonoperating foundation.
7. The food satisfies any applicable requirements of the Federal Food, Drug, and Cosmetic Act and regulations on the date of transfer and for the previous 180 days.

If all the conditions above are met, use the following worksheet to figure your deduction.


Looks like she shouldn't be deducting this at all, coupons or no.

[PJ-Comix]

I need to find out more about that cell app. I had a good couponing day yesterday. I bought two packs of steak, half gallon of milk, two bottles of spaghetti sauce, box of cereal, 3 lb bag of onions for a total of under 5 bucks. Then I went to a great fruit market where I picked up two papayas for just a buck each.

[PJ-Comix]

Winn Dixie is a great place for meat discounts. Often they are BOGO. On top of that, you can always ask the meat manager for a Manager's Discount. They have the authority to mark down the meat on their own even if it is already on sale. The reason is if the meat will expire soon but one manager gave me a discount on a 3 lb pack of thick cut Hormel Black Label smoked bacon which normally sells for $9.99 but on sale for $5.99. He knocked another $3.00 off that even though it didn't expire for another 3 weeks so I ended up buying it for just $2.99.

However, some manager's are jerks. I wanted a mark down on some BOGO meat because it was expiring the very next day but the manager told me I should be satisfied with the BOGO deal. Soooo... I did buy some BOGO meat expriring a week away. And who the hell would buy the original BOGO meat when they could buy with later expiration dates for the same price?

[PJ-Comix]

I got a whole bunch of stuff that I will tell my wife to donate today. Like DOZENS of boxes of baking type powder. I also have over a hundred bottles of vitamins that I don’t need so we will send them to Venezuela for my in-laws to use for bartering since the Bolivar has been severely devalued. I gave a bunch of my FREE Bayer aspirins to my contractor as part of the bartering I am doing for his services which normally would cost me at least a couple of thousand bucks. He is a friend so over the next few months I will be giving him several thousand dollars more of free stuff. I hope I can get dogfood free because he just adopted a pet dog.