Posted on 12/31/2017 12:51:08 PM PST by PJ-Comix
Okay, it is the last day of the year. So what did you do in 2017 that saved you money? I am all ears and will be taking notes. In addition, I will lead off with my own moves to save money.
My biggest single money savings move of 2017 was getting Amazon Fire Stick for our 2 TVs. At the same time I cut out our cable TV. Net savings for the year over $600. This comes from saving $80 per month by cutting Comcast Cable TV. Actually I am really saving $55 per month because along with my Amazon Prime, I opted for $25 per month for Sling TV so net yearly savings of $600. One interesting thing is that I thought Comcast would go for a long sales pitch to keep me with their cable TV when they switched me to their account executive but I was pleasantly surprised when he gave me online TV streaming for no additional cost so I ONLY pay for Internet.
Okay, what else? Well, a lot of you know I am a heavy duty couponer so I figure I saved at least $2000 this past year via coupons. I come to that figure because I save at least $40 per week. Oh, and for those of you who don't think the time and effort are worth it, GOOD NEWS! You only need to use a couple of coupon sites to find all the deals you need. For me it is PublixSavings101.com because I shop a lot at Publix and the Mother Ship of all coupon web sites... KRAZY COUPON LADY. As to clipping coupons, things have changed. Most of the coupons I use now you can print right off the web or get electronically.
Another trick that I use when buying stuff online is to go thru the entire checkout process except for the payment. I just leave the item sitting in my shopping cart. Guess what? Almost always the company sends you an email within days offering a discount from what you would have paid.
In 2018 I will be looking for saving money on travel deals. I have heard the best time for booking cruises is within a couple of weeks when the cruise actually begins so they can fill unbooked cabins.
Cutting cable down to only basic channels.
We paid off the 8.5% APR mortgage. If we had just gone along with the 30 year mortgage schedule, we would have paid about $130,000 more in interest.
What kind of phone to they offer you?
Learned to use Qualified Charitable Distributions from our IRA’s to save on federal taxes - we always gave a nice chunk of cash to the church and took it as an itemized charitable deduction on taxes - but as old people we are now getting an augmented standard deduction which saves us a few hundred over itemized deductions, so the money to the church was no longer a tax write off - however, with QCD’s you request that the manager of the IRA send a distribution from your account directly to the charity, in this case the church, and when it comes time to report the IRA distribution to the IRS you deduct what went out to charity from the basis on which you pay taxes - no need to report anything under itemized deductions - my hope now is that this neat bit wasn’t eliminated in the new tax bill.....
Speaking of Ebay, I always always make below asking price offers, even with open auctions. Nine times out of ten the seller will accept my offer because I promise to pay “immediately” by Paypal—and I do!! Most sellers are willng to negotiate.
I usually save 25 to 40 percent off the asking Ebay prices. I just bought a brand new gorgeous piece of House of Waterford crystal. Retail price is $1200, I got it for $700 and free standard shipping. I collect Waterford crystal, it’s one of my few vices. :0)
I poke around for NOS jeep, CB 750, and K5 parts when look. There are few things I will get eventually.
One is the full sized 70s Space 1999 Eagle. I had one as a kid. Those show up often enough. I’d like to rebuild my 80s GI Joe collection. That got essentially destroyed without my knowledge.
Mom went into babysitting while I was in service. I regret not padlocking my closet at the old house. A ton of 70s and early 80s baseball and football cards vanished too.
I have a small lighted sign for Willys Sales & Service and an AMC Dealer flag. The flag along with some original patches will get framed.
“Be sure and monitor your Roll Call.”
Yes; that’s what I was referring to — our specific cruise’s Roll Call. A wealth of information and, by the time you board, you’ve already “met” many passengers already. And usually Cruise Critic sponsors a nice get-together in one of the bars on the first or second day.
We primarily cruise Princess, but broke away early this year to try Celebrity. (Hated it!) And for that cruise, we went through AAA. (Hated it!) Usually we go through the Princess travel people, but have had excellent service and prices via our agents back in California.
We will check out Costco for any cruises in the future.
For a long road trip with my sister, I rented a car through Costco and was pleasantly surprised with the price itself and the fact that you can add an additional driver free. Most (all?) rental agencies tack on a fee, sometimes $10/day; Costco doesn’t.
It’s 18° at this very moment in E. TN, and is supposed to get down to 8° tomorrow. We could use a glimpse of sunshine in an exotic location from a ship’s balcony.
Yes, One of the reasons we moved to east Florida...it was too difficult to go cruising from Seattle except Alaska cruises and we did enough of those.
Cheaper to ditch the cable and get the Amazon Fire Stick with Amazon Prime.
Not only you are saving on energy bills, but you are also prolonging life of your water heater and plumbing by turning the thermostat down. I have been doing just that for decades, and never had to replace the water heater.
Dumped Comcast Cable for Direct TV. Yeah it ain’t as fancy, but neither am I. $100 a month BOOM !
I evicted my 40 year old dead beat daughter from one of my “rental” houses. She would not pay me $300 a month rent. Too bad.
Wow, sounds like you are doing what you ought to be doing. Mowing your own yard and cleaning your own home! Who would have thought of that?
I get full synthetic motor oil for $9.99 for 5 quarts at Rural King. Jeans and work clothes are a value there.
2. Moving to Texas will save us 4.95% income tax and reduce our sales tax roughly 1% more.
3. Shopped around to eight car insurance carriers and got one HALF price from what we had, with Accident Forgiveness and the exact same limits and deductible, as we had. This saves us $1150 a year. The new carrier was rated nearly as good, overall, too.
Nice list.
However not a single financial advisor or author was worth much to the millions of hard working people who drained their retirement money just to survive downturns.
Truth is all money advisors were wrong. They were all failures because they did not understand human nature.
That is stunning how bean counters know nothing about people.
This failure is comparable to teachers whose students end up homeless or in prison. Teachers and advisors cherry pick their supposed talents, and are sadly unaccountable.
Using the budget app has been yuge, felt like getting a raise. Reigning in the whilly-nilly swiping with the credits cards, even if they were PIF monthly, was the other big thing.
#80 So what is on that 1 page!.... : )
Scott Adams, author of Dilbert: “I once tried to write a book about personal investing. After extensive research I realized I could describe everything that a young first-time investor needs to know on one page.”
I bought a stock at a low price. Still have not sold it as it keeps going up. BTW it is NVIDIA
Maybe that is the secret. But low and sell high.
>>>Took the World Poker Tour Cruise<<<
I was thinking about doing that next year. How was it?
Didn’t blow all of our “disposable” income and ended up with higher numbers than the year started with.
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