Save $15 by getting a calendar for free. Where? Try banks, insurance agencies, card stores, and your mail—you may find calendars from charities you support as well as from businesses you’ve used.
Keep your candles cold. Store your candles in the freezer for a longer burn life.
Don’t waste by waiting. If you plan to wait for someone in your idling car for more than one minute, turn the car off to save gas. You’ll use less fuel starting up the car than leaving it on for even this short a time.
Warm your heart, not your car. Today’s cars do not need to be warmed up for more than 30 seconds. You car will warm up as you drive. If you warm it up in the driveway, you’re just wasting gas.
Fill up and wash up. Some gas stations offer free or cut-rate car washes when you stop to get gas.
Go to pieces. Next time you need to replace your carpet, think about using carpet tiles for busy areas such as hallways and entryways. If a piece of the carpet gets stained or worn, you can simply replace the tile, rather than the whole carpet.
Pay more to pay less. Invest in a good-quality pad for under your carpet. It will protect the carpet from wear and tear, and let you buy a less expensive carpet.
Salt it away. Don’t use an expensive carpet cleaner next time you experience a nasty red wine spill on your carpet. Save that $5 to $10 and simply pour a pile of good old table salt on the spill. Leave the salt on until it dries, and then vacuum it up. The stain is gone!
Share it and save. Rent a carpet-cleaning machine for you and a neighbor, and split the cost. You can save big on a one-day rental.
Sprinkle on seltzer. As soon as food hits your rug, wipe up the excess and then sprinkle it liberally with seltzer or club soda. Scrub with a brush, sprinkling on more seltzer or soda as needed. Blot dry with a towel.
Stash the cash. Cutting impulse spending can save big bucks, so if this is your personal bugaboo, try keeping only $20 to $40 in your wallet. The less you have in cash, the less you’re likely to spend on impulse purchases. That $4 latte at the coffee shop will look a lot less appealing if it leaves you with only $16 for the rest of the day!
Watch it like a hawk. Cash registers, as well as humans, make errors, so watch the register carefully to make sure it rings up the right price for the right item. You might get overcharged if the register mistakes your cream cheese for Brie or if it hasn’t been programmed with the current sale prices. Many grocery stores will give the item for free or at a sharp discount if the register (whether operated by a cashier or you on a self-checkout line) charges you the wrong amount.
It’s the cat’s meow. Save on vet bills by adding 1/8 to 1/4 teaspoon of olive oil to your cat’s food. It will help prevent hairballs and keep your cat’s digestive system purring along.
Talk isn’t cheap. The average cell phone user faces a $60 bill each month, including taxes and miscellaneous fees. If you talk less than 200 minutes a month, you may be better off using a pay-as-you-go plan (as long as it charges 25 cents a minute or less). You can easily save $45 a month with a prepaid plan.
Extend your battery life. Try to run your battery out before recharging, at least every other time, for the longest battery life. Avoid buying a new cell phone battery and give your electric bill a break in the process by shutting your cell phone off before you go to sleep. Just remember to turn it back on in the morning!
Check it off your list. Is your bank charging a lot for printing your checks? If so, check out independent printers: most of them charge about half what your bank does for the same service. Try Checks Unlimited (800-210-0468 or checksunlimited.com) or Checks in the Mail (800-733-4443 or checksinthemail.com), or do an Internet search for “personal check printers,” which will turn you up an additional range of printers such as checkswithstyle.com or checkworks.com. If you’ve ever wanted checks with John Deere tractors on them, an independent printer is the way to go!
Buy it whole. Never buy chicken parts when you can buy the whole thing and make more meals from it, for pennies on the pound. Forget about fancy butchering: using strong kitchen shears, cut the chicken up the breast bone, up the back bone, and then cut those halves in half again. Cut off wings and legs, and you now have the kind of pieces that you’d pay hefty bucks for. Never again!
Treat yourself—to a gift card. Buying a premium coffee regularly is the bugaboo of personal finance advisers, who see it as the ultimate waste of money, but it is okay to get one now and then. (Let’s face it, they can be pretty tasty!) If you’re inclined to overdo, buy a gift card for yourself for a budgeted amount each month, and enjoy every frothy, flavored cupful until the card runs out.
Cut the cost of home-brewed gourmet coffee. Even coffee made at home can be expensive, if you have expensive coffee tastes in fancy beans and roast. But you can mix the pleasure with savings if you combine one part of your favorite gourmet coffee with one part of a much less expensive store brand, and enjoy your high-end coffee tastes at a fraction of the cost.
Pretend it’s a day at the office. Even if you’re drinking your coffee at home, think about buying it at an office-supply superstore, such as Staples or Office Depot. You may find substantial savings on hot chocolate, tea, coffee, creamer, and sugar at the same place you get a good deal on your pencils and printer ink.
Turn off the pot.
Nothing’s better than a leisurely morning and a bottomless cup of coffee, but warming the coffee pot all morning isn’t good for your electric bill—or your coffee, which will take on a flat, bitter flavor as all the essential oils evaporate. Brew directly into a thermal pot or pour your fresh-brewed coffee into a thermos, then turn off the coffeemaker, and treasure your savings.
Hoard loose change. Dump your loose change into a jar at the end of every day, and once every six months or so (or while you can still lift the jar!), bring your change to a local bank that has a coin-counting machine. It’s important to take them to a bank, which likely won’t charge you a fee for the counting, rather than to one of the commercial coin-counting machines you see in grocery stores, which will deduct 10 percent of your hard-earned change. Ka-ching!
Think small to save big. Buy a laptop computer: it uses less energy than an Energy Star–rated desktop computer and monitor. A typical laptop draws from 15 to 25 watts when being used, while a conventional PC and monitor draw 150 watts. You’ll be pleased with the evidence on your utility bill.
Go to sleep. Your computer continues to use energy even when you’re not using it. In fact, you can cut its power demand by up to 90 percent if you make it automatically “sleep” after 20 or 30 minutes of non-use. (See your manual for programming instructions—it’s usually a simple adjustment.) And when you finish a session of Internet surfing or e-mailing, turn it off altogether.
Celebrate the savings. There’s nothing more festive than a handful of confetti at a party, but don’t spend money buying little bits of paper. Save leftover wrapping paper—even small pieces will work—and use a hole punch or little scissors to create lots of circles or squares for colorful confetti. Use your homegrown confetti to celebrate family birthdays, News Year’s Eve, or any happy occasion. (You can even vacuum it up into a clean hand vac to use again!)
Pick your target carefully. One obvious way to cut back on clothing costs is to check out consignments shops. But don’t choose just any consignment shop: find one close to a wealthy neighborhood, where you may be surprised to find stacks of hardly or never-worn clothes, many from top designers and some items with the tags still on. You’ll get amazing bargains on extraordinary clothes you won’t find elsewhere.
See your way through the mail. Save up to 50 percent on contact lenses and more on the necessary accessories (fluid and cleaning apparatus) by ordering through the mail. You can order the exact type of lenses you currently wear—not a lesser brand—at a substantial discount by phone at 1-800-Contacts or online at 1800contacts.com.
Skimp on the soil. Save money on potting soil by using only as much as your plant needs—not what the deep container dictates. Put broken-up polystyrene chunks or packing “peanuts” at the bottom of the pot (making sure to keep the drainage hole clear), then add enough potting soil for your plant. You’ll benefit from a lighter pot as well as a heavier wallet, and you’ll find your pot drains better when it’s not heavily packed with soil down to the bottom.
You don’t need to be restricted by traditional containers when choosing pots for your container gardening. Think about apple boxes, tin or colorful plastic buckets, bushel baskets, funky Italian tomato cans, an old trunk—any container that can have drainage holes drilled in the bottom.
Turn it on its head. Store your container of cottage cheese upside down in the refrigerator. It will last twice as long than when stored right side up.
Edit your credit. Lose the temptation to spend by locking away your credit cards. Don’t cancel them (it can hurt your credit score); instead, put them in a safe place, keeping only one in your wallet.