Ways to save money

[Elizabeth.Ruda]

Hi Julie Andrews,
Here are some money saving tips. Some of them are great and easy ways to save money.
Spend less money than you earn.
Adjust your lifestyle to accommodate the first rule.
Don't buy anything just because it is on sale.
Occasionally buy generic, or non-name brand merchandise.
Stay busy - you have less time to spend money.
Look critically at how you spend and save your money.
Practice restraint.
Be patient.
Start saving money today!

Thanks..

<style type="text/css"> <!-- @page { margin: 2cm } P { margin-bottom: 0.21cm } --> </style> Futures Trading System

[brunt]

The only clothing that I buy new are socks, underwear and shoes - and shoes only because I have size 12 1/2 feet so that it is difficult for me to find any. My wife has her choice of new clothing every time we go into a thrift store - racks and racks for 90+% off.

Ditch cable TV. That awful garbage that they pass off as entertainment is an insult. I cannot bear the commercials! Borrow DVD's from the library, or buy seasons of series that you like on sale - we get most for under $20 brand new. Not only does the cable cost a lot, but you lose a lot of otherwise productive time, and everybody in the household is influenced to try to buy more stuff.

[brunt]

A couple more points...

As your income increases, keep your expenses the same!!!!!! Too many increase expenditures in lockstep with raises and spend every penny they make. Resist the temptation to "reward" yourself by spending your raise on something that you want.

Another point is that we appear to be hardwired to perceive our happiness in our lot in life relative to our neighbours. This is often the case - if you move so that you are the poorest person in a rich neighbourhood, you will be miserable. If you move to a poor neighbourhood where you are the richest, you will be happy. Even if you have the same income. So "movin' on up" may not be the best move psychologically speaking.

A third point - I found that I was much more motivated to save money when I started tracking our net worth in a spreadsheet. Of course, a piece of paper would work just as well, but as I work with computers, it was easier for me. There is nothing, I repeat nothing more financially satisfying than seeing a graph of your net worth increasing at a steady rate. It certainly makes it easier to say "no" to frivolous purchases when you are happy with how things are going in the spreadsheet.

[ahatt]

One of the ways I save money is by using reward cards. I sign up for as many rewards card possible.

-HBC Rewards, Petro Points, Sunoco Points, Air Miles, Aeroplan, Shoppers Optimum, Scene Points, Club Sobeys, etc.

If there's a reward card for something, I have it! I believe if a company is giving you something for spending money at their store on something you would normally buy, why not take advantage?

We save quite a bit of money by redeeming Air Miles for gas or grocery giftcards, redeeming Petro Points for CAA Dollars (which reduce the amount of my CAA membership per year), Aeroplan points for free Cineplex passes, etc.

[coupon girl]

One of the ways I save money is by using reward cards. I sign up for as many rewards card possible.

-HBC Rewards, Petro Points, Sunoco Points, Air Miles, Aeroplan, Shoppers Optimum, Scene Points, Club Sobeys, etc.

If there's a reward card for something, I have it! I believe if a company is giving you something for spending money at their store on something you would normally buy, why not take advantage?

We save quite a bit of money by redeeming Air Miles for gas or grocery giftcards, redeeming Petro Points for CAA Dollars (which reduce the amount of my CAA membership per year), Aeroplan points for free Cineplex passes, etc.

for sure i agree i live my life like this using every points cards i can get, just got $160 in freegas from airmiles,i use my petro points for czz membership too-to pay it down, why not get free things eventually-just got $5 off my groceries at sobeys yesterday- way to go girl

[barbs]

good tips!

[richelleM]

this reply is about using benefits, not about saving money. but i think this will still help. if the benefits are available... taxable or not.. why not take advantage of them... extra money is money be it for travel or cash back...if you can travel for free with money that you would normally spend anyway... why not?

[nadiabreckon]

this reply is about using benefits, not about saving money. but i this this will still help. if the benefits are available... taxable or not.. why not take advantage of them... extra money is money be it for travel or cash back...if you can travel for free with money that you would normally spend anyway... why not?

I'm not sure if I'm the only one thinking this...but, WHAT?! I don't understand this post at all...

[FallenPixels]

I'm not sure if I'm the only one thinking this...but, WHAT?! I don't understand this post at all...

check out the signature and the spammy post makes way more sense

[Woofy]

check out the signature and the spammy post makes way more sense

Ack! I just did... I guess the poster achieved his/her purpose!

To get click throughs from this site!

[FallenPixels]

I didn't even click it, just looked at the wording on the link

[montyloree]

I think saving money as a state of mind. If you're constantly wanting stuff than you will constantly be be broke. being content with what you have is probably the best way to save money.

As for groceries, what we do is go to the bank once each month and take out our monthly grocery allocation. We divide the money up into four envelopes, and then give ourselves an envelope per week. Once the money finished the money is finished!
Once we started doing this, we had to be a lot more conscious of what we're spending, and cutting out anything that was unnecessary. Another benefit of this is that we got creative on how to make the money stretch. So this is a really good practical technique

[brunt]

One thing that gets me with discussions on how to save money is that it often revolves around how to pay the minimum for some certain thing. I know that I am guilty of this myself.

What is often missing is how you can spend money to save money. A good example here is a small chest freezer. For $150 or so for a 7.5 cubic foot freezer at Costco, you can save $50 easily per month by stocking up on frozen foods on super sale at the grocery store.

These freezers are very energy efficient, and my wife and I can easily carry it ourselves, although I always make sure to take the end with the compressor in it.

It really pays off when I am on one of my frequent business trips to Pennsylvania where we have a rental. We have an amazing grocery store there called Amelia's (http://www.ameliasgroceryoutlet.com/). Un-freaking-believable deals there. 5 pound bags of chicken fingers for $5. Industrial sized serving (serves 12) of Stouffer's meatloaf and gravy for $2.99. And so on.

A single trip to this grocery store can save $75 in grocery bills easily in the frozen food department. This pays off the freezer pretty quickly.

[chrischutley]

This CIBC widget has some great suggestions on how to take some control of your financial situation.

http://mthirty.com/mtrack/r/cibcswitch

[Gorefest]

This was an excellent topic. I read the entire post.

One thing I did not see mentioned was that most computer programs that are necessary // desired can be obtained free of charge. You do not need to spend $40 or more each year on an anti-virus program. A perfectly good one is the free version of AVG or Avira if you prefer (there are others as well).

A good, safe web site to download these programs is:

http://download.cnet.com/windows/

Another good free program is WinUtilities Free. With this free program you can clean up your computer and improve its performance with one click.

One other program I would recommend is OpenOffice which is a free office suite that can do basically everything Microsoft Office can do at no cost. Why put another $50 or $60 in Microsoft's pocket when the same services can be had for $0?

There are many other programs that can be obtained free which will make your online life easier, and more entertaining. You just have to do a little searching and the web site I mentioned above is a great place to begin.