06.29.08
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Email ThisOver the past few weeks I’ve sat down and thought-up a list of all the ways I either have or have wanted to spend less money. The following is a list of ideas for spending less money in the categories of home, technology, driving, health, entertainment, shopping, finance and business.
- Install a programmable thermostat
Invest a little money and time into one of these and you’ll find the AC and heat can be used more efficiently. Setting a little higher temperature in the summer and a little lower temperature in the winter (especially when you are away from home at work) can save you a lot in the long run. - Turn off lights
If you aren’t in the habit, you’re wasting a lot of energy and money by leaving lights on when you leave a room. - Replace your light bulbs with CFLs
For the time when you legitimately need the lights on you should be using light bulbs that don’t waste the majority of their energy on heat instead of light. Compact Fluorescent Lights, or CFLs, use an electrical charge and gas to produce light instead of a heating element like incandescent lights. - Use less laundry detergent
Chances are the detergent you’re using is very concentrated and you don’t need the full recommended amount listed on the back of the bottle or box (especially if it isn’t a full load). - Enable power saving features on your computer
If you leave your computer on all the time, make sure to enable power saving features to turn off your monitor, hard drives, and other parts of the system when it’s not in use. - Replace your monitor with an LCD
If you find yourself in need of a new monitor, make sure you buy an LCD monitor. These use a lot less power than traditional CRTs. Chances are you might not even find CRTs in the store these days, though. - Use Linux
Chances are you don’t need to spend money on a Microsoft or Macintosh operating system if you find yourself doing simple things like web browsing, word processing, and listening to music. Check-out Ubuntu linux. It’s helped bring linux closer to the average computer user in it’s ease of use, clean looking user interface, and ease of installation and configuration. - Share an Internet connection
Without permission, this is technically illegal in many places, but there’s no reason not to go in 50/50 with someone living nearby. Why pay the phone or cable company twice as much when neither you nor your neighbor are using all your bandwidth. - Use a free virus scanning software
Try-out a program like AVG instead of paid-subscription based virus scanners. - Use rechargeable batteries
These are great for things like digital cameras, XBOX controllers, and mp3 players especially. - Open windows during city driving instead of A/C
When you’re driving at slower speeds it makes sense to open your windows instead of using your A/C which puts extra work on your engine and thus uses more gas. However, at a certain speed, it’s actually more fuel and energy efficient to use your A/C for aerodynamic reasons. On the highway, for example, you’ll probably be better off closing the windows and turning on the air in many cars. - Check your tires for correct inflation
Again, you’ll use more gas and put yourself in less control if your tires are improperly inflated. The extra friction and heat caused by low tires require greater work from your engine and will require you to buy more tires more frequently. - Keep your oil changed
Better fuel economy and a car that lasts a longer time will result from this. - Replace your air filter
Also produces better fuel economy. You might even want to try something like a K&N air filter that can be rinsed-out and reused. I really need to clean mine, too, now that I think about it… - Buy less food
Do you really need all the food you buy and ingest? Chances are you don’t, and that excess of calories means more stress on your body, less money in your wallet after the grocery store / restaurant, and not to mention more money on products and memberships to loss your weight and maintain your physical health! - Walk instead of driving
Free exercise; better for the environment; relaxing; different. - Visit the doctor
Some health insurance plans encourage preventive treatment since it can save them from more costly repairs to your health in the future. - Stop smoking
As I’m writing this outside at a cafe I’m sitting next to a couple young gentlemen who probably spend half their hourly wage on the pack of cigarettes in their pocket. They’ll need the other half to pay for their future medical treatment. - Exercise regularly
You know this is important. Stop putting it off and get working-out NOW. - Have a game night at home
A night out on the town really adds up. Try inviting some people over to your place. Mix in some games, food, booze, and you’ve got a good time for less of a price. - Drop premium movie channels
How many of the movies on your premium movie channels do you actually watch? On Demand technologies might make more sense. - Drop subscription TV altogether
Replace it with an HDTV antenna or watch online at ABC, Fox, ESPN360, and other sites that offer the same and even extra content online. - Go out for matinee movies
I couldn’t believe it when I took my parents to the movies a month ago and found the price to be $10. Go to the movies at lower priced times or watch them at home. - Dine at home on your next date
Hit the store, bond while making pasta, get a bottle of wine, and put on some great music. - Get the cheap toothpaste
I’m not convinced that my brand or type of toothpaste makes any difference, are you? I buy the cheapest tube of Crest I can find and my teeth are doing great. - Buy store brands without accepting lower quality
Alright, so the store brands are made with the same stuff, but aren’t always the same. Sometimes, I like the name brand cereal, canned fruit, and grape jelly better. It doesn’t always make a difference, though, and you can save money with the store brand on those products that are exactly the same. - Buy clothes at the end of the season
Pants are cheaper at the end of winter, shorts are cheaper at the end of summer. Offset when you buy what. - Buy quality goods that require replacing less frequently
A quality pair of shoes may cost twice as much, but could last five times as long as the cheap pair. Think about this with everything you buy. Just because you bought the more expensive option doesn’t mean you should necessarily feel guilty– it might make sense in the big picture. - Drink office coffee
If you load it up with cream and sugar anyway, it might not make any difference at all what kind of coffe you’re drinking. Drinking it black? Well… might not want that office coffee. - Filter water instead of buying bottled water
Depending on the filter you buy, it might save you money. - Pay bills online instead of using a stamp for snail mail
The price of a stamp keeps going up. Pay online and make sure you don’t get hit with late fees either. - Pay student loans over a longer period of time
Unless you make in the top 5 percentile of people in the world, chances are you can write your student loan interest off on your taxes. Instead of paying them off quickly, take your extra money to build up an emergency fund and long term savings. - Revise your insurance policies
Things like keeping a fire extinguisher in your home, a blinking light on your car dash, and a safe driving record can save you money on your insurance policies, but only if you let your insurer know! - Avoid careless fees
Overdraft fees at banks, ATM fees for out-of-network withdrawals, late bill payments, no trading fees, etc. all add up and take a large bite out of your bottom line over time. - Trade your skill or service for someone else’s
The tax man can’t hit you up for sales or income tax if money isn’t changing hands. - Partner for ventures without financing
If you don’t have an angel investor to help your company, it might make sense to spread your risk across someone else’s bottom line. - Find friends to hook you up
It’s great to get discounts and free stuff when you use services of companies your friends work at.
Home
Technology
Driving
Health
Entertainment
Shopping
Finance
Business
It’s important to remember that it does not always pay to be a cheap b*stard, but there are many times it most definitely pays to spend less!
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21 Responses to “37 Ideas for Spending Less Money”
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Alex, good ones. Here are a few more:
*In addition to turning off the lights, unplug all of your appliances when they’re not in use and especially when you go on vacation.
*Google for coupon codes every time you buy something online.
*Host a book swap or a clothing swap. Alternatively, you could sell your gently used stuff on eBay or half.com.
*Use your library card to get books and DVDs instead of buying or renting.
*Check freecycle.org before you buy new furniture, appliances, and other costly purchases.
I love this. There are so many things we can do and you hit so many of them.
A couple of months ago, I started air drying my laundry. Dryers really use excessive amounts of energy (and money). And I actually prefer my laundry this way now.
Also, playing off what Susan said above, if you are a book lover but want to cut back on costs, try bookmooch.com, which allows you to trade books with people all over the world (or just the country, if you want to limit postage fees).
Great post. I’ve learned to employ most of these in the past 3 or 4 years, trying to make them a habit instead of a chore.
I’m again at that point though where I feel like I’m spending too much. Its like losing weight; the first 37 lbs. are easy but the last 5 take a lot of effort. Any suggestions over and above the ones you’ve noted so far to optimize your savings?
Alli, I love BookMooch! Another writer clued me in that you can even Mooch magazines from them, which is really helpful for me as I’m researching writing markets.
Thanks for the feedback everyone. I like your additions to the list. I really wanted to keep on going and growing the list, but I realized I’d never publish the article if I didn’t just go with what I had.
Great tips, Alex.
In LA - $10 IS the cheap price for the movies. Occasionally you can find a $3 theater somewhere, but even those have probably raised their prices.
A couple of commentors mentioned BookMooch. There’s also a neat site called BookCrossing that I used to use years ago.
I’m also a fan of searching for stuff on CraigsList before I hit the stores.
It’s nice to hear about BookMooch because I didn’t know about that. Another great resource for readers is the public library. I know that my local system is connected to all the libraries in the county. Even if a book is not at a local branch, you can make a request to have it brought to your local branch. Another thing that people do not know about local libraries is that many of them have movies that you can check out for free.
Eating well is also a money saver. It keeps your immune system strong which mean its less likely you will be lying in bed during the next flu season. Great article!
you can get cheap movie tickets just like when you were in college. Some companies have corporate discount programs, coupons are available via the Entertainment Book, or you can sign up for the Borders rewards card (for free) and have access to their perks, which include discounted movie tickets.
In Los Angeles, I’m paying $6.50 for shows before 6pm 7 days/week @ The Grove.
Be sure to ask about loyalty cards at your favorite retailers — staples, bookstores, hallmark — all have some sort of loyalty club. If you’re going to be spending money there anyway, at least get the kick backs for being a regular.
Zak, I agree with you, but I often end up spending more that way! Whenever I get a CVS coupon for $4 off a $20 purchase, I end up buying stuff I don’t need just to get up to $20. I’m sure that’s part of their plan!
@ Susan - oh it’s totally part of the plan. I am always getting coupons for $25 off a purchase of $100 from staples, or $30 off a purchase of $150 or something like that, from Office Max. I rarely spend that much at either place on one trip. But I do have member cards for all the major office supply stores. I was finally able to use one of those $25 off coupons when I purchased an external hard drive.
@zak - interesting to know I can get discounts for movies at the grove. that could come in handy at some point for me. if someone lets me know about discounts at the arclight, that’s definitely something I’d be interested in. I’ll have to check out the Entertainment Book. It was never worth it for me to purchase it before, but that might be different now.
I especially agree with the part about avoiding OD fees. Banks wait for their customers to make a mistake so they can stick it to them.
Here’s a survey about them
http://www.surveymonkey.com/s.aspx?sm=DVrhVS6glKhTBG_2b7fNvYYw_3d_3d
http://www.odnsf.com
If you have a Costco membership, you may be able to buy discount movie tickets there.
Air drying is not just better for your wallet–it’s better for the environment and for your clothes.
And see if your employer offers a discount on public transit. Where I work, the bus pass is 1/3 the cost of parking–and that doesn’t even account for gas or wear and tear.
don’t lose your university ID. Lots of student discounts in lots of places, and they’re not calling to check that you’re enrolled. . . not that I would do something like that. . . well, I would, but I lost the damned thing
This list could be so long! Great idea though, could be even better with links?
A couple additions:
- I sell my old clothes to places like Plato’s Closet
- Carpool: even if you’re paying for the gas, chances are you’re passengers will buy you lunch.
- Watch movies/TV online at sites like Hulu instead of renting or paying for TV
- Unplug all unused appliances and wash in cold water to save on the energy bill.
- Buy less food, yes. But I find it’s very important to cook more and purchase pre-made food less.
I’m sorry to be the naysayer, but really, I’m terribly sick of blogs like this. Their posts all follow a common, and rigid, format, consisting namely of some order of the following items:
n [noun] [verb phrase OR superlative] [quantifier] [noun]
where ‘n’ is an integer. Examples include:
10 Strongest Mammals!
25 Fattest Celebrities
37 Ideas for Spending Less Money
6 Sex Positions You’ve Never Heard Of
These blog posts (for instance, this blog post) are highly subjective, and presuppose the reader is some sort of pathetic, underdeveloped clod. Let’s look at some example blog posts:
“Avoid careless fees”
Ahh, an excellent tip. To spend less money, don’t accumulate fees that you can avoid! This is a difficult concept. Essentially, you are to avoid incurring fees that you don’t necessarily have to incur. Genius.
“Go out for matinee (sic) movies”
Go to the cheaper movies instead of buying the pricier tickets. Simply astonishing.
“Buy less food”
Food costs money. Less food costs less money. Definitely can’t think of that on my own!
Believe it or not, many people can actually derive, totally on their own, the fact that selecting cheaper alternatives or buying less of something saves you money. This could be due to endogenous predicate logic on their part, or perhaps due to the fact that the statements contain “cheaper” or “less.” Indeed, relatively few of these ‘tips’ (tips almost seems too generous a word) are actually useful.
All posts of this class are constructed by persons hugely overestimating their intelligence and education. Normally, in the real world, attributes like this would be discouraged upon being laughed at. However, there is a fundamental disjunction in how these things work: in the real world, it’s a brute force method. You attempt to spread the word, and statistics indicates that it’s likely that at least some of the people you ultimately talk to will be foolish enough to take what you’re saying as extensively brilliant. But most won’t. Most will laugh. And it requires a lot of work.
On the blogosphere, the sewer of all human endeavors, you transmute your useless ideas into a digital form, and the idiots come to you!
Observe here the faceless multitudes lavishing praise on a particular blog post anyone could have written, not just a neurosurgeon or, dare I say it, a “solutions architect.”
You might be inclined to ask that I explain why these things piss me off, sans the sarcasm. The reason is quite simple: Mr. Fisher is not innovating. He’s not saying anything new. What he’s doing is rehashing data, and then dressing it up to make it look amazing to dullards. The truth is, it’s not hard to think of ways to do x such that x does not require as much money, especially when you go into such absurd and largely inapplicable specifics as Fisher does (like buying cheap toothpaste, because I buy toothpaste so very often. Honestly, how much could that possibly save me? A dollar a month?). He’s just taken this opportunity to simultaneously satisfy his liberal guilt and his ego while being able to insert a few snide remarks about smoking and laude the importance of working out, which I’m sure he does religiously. In fact, it seems little more than a vehicle to say “I use Linux. I’m smart. I work out. I’m so very, very green and progressive.”
I’m resentful because people like him make it harder for people like me, who are still in college and preparing strategies for their careers, to be taken seriously. After all, this stuff is just as vacuous as the high school cheerleader cliché. The 25-35 year old set seems composed of humans at the level of a philosophical zombie or a great number of Chinese rooms. In other words, they stare blankly and repeat things they’ve heard. Not unlike tape recorders with eyes.
Please, Alex, if you’re going to say something, why not try and make it something new and valuable? Next time you sit down to post, think “could a Markov chain using a self-help magazine write this better than me?” If yes, think of something else. But I’m sure nothing will change.
Let the red-herring arguments and ad hominem attacks being!
Nick,
Why are you so hostile? If you don’t like what you reading, move on. Or start providing content to BC that meets your standards. You be the one to set the bar.
Most magazines follow that X things to make you Y format because it works. It provides quick, easily to digest facts. You can’t provide new information every time, sometimes I run across one thing in a list of 10 that I haven’t seen before. I don’t discredit the 90% of the article that wasn’t relevant to me; I enjoy that one new piece of information. Then I might take the time to find a blog/magazine that advances, not just maintains, my knowledge base.
And in the blogosphere, you’re looking not only at content but at connectivity. How does the writer relate to his or her audience? Six bloggers could share the same information six different ways — different strokes for different folks.
To illicit such a strong reaction, I can only conclude I’m doing something right.
Thanks for your criticism Nick.
Hey Nickster,
Yeah, this is not rocket science - but then, how often do we know what we “should” do, yet not do it until someone suggests it?
As far as the emotional stuff goin’ on with ya, check out tenlittlefoxes.com to figure out which “little fox” is causing you to upset yourself.
Oh, and ah, “Have a nice day!”
Nick,
Your pontificating is quite remarkable, though you are trying way too hard.
Let’s first address your nice little “let the red-herring arguments and ad hominem attacks being (sic)”. See, I can use (sic) too, just like you tried to do when being a condescending ass over the line “Go out for matinee (sic) movies”. The difference is, Alex did not add an e-acute, while you got an entire word wrong. I suggest you stop trying so hard, because your self-righteous tone really doesn’t work when you’re not really that good to being with (did you see what I did there? I used being, not begin. I am very clever). But i digress. Later on, you claim “simultaneously satisfy his liberal guilt and his ego”. Ad hom much? Or it’s ok, because you are out to save us all from the blogosphere? I suspect you actually know nothing of Alex, his readers, or much of anything else. You were trolling on this sewer of human endeavors and spent I presume quite a bit of time writing your response (unless idiocy comes easy?). Based on your contempt for us “dullards”, one can only conclude, you really have no bit of authority or prominence in “the real world”, and thus felt like you had to put down the author and readers.
I think though that you miss the point entirely, which is not surprising. Are some tips rather obvious? Sure. We all know turning off lights is a good thing. But some tips are designed to spur other ideas, which might not be obvious to all. It is also designed to teach a different thought process.
Does the cost of toothpaste really make a difference? No, probably not. By the way, regarding your toothpaste retort, you should have actually been smart about it and tried to give a proof, though I suspect you are actually not clever enough (i.e. the average serving size is 1mL. A 6.4 oz tube has 189 servings, at a cost of $4.50. Given brushing 3 times a day, in a household of 4 people, that amounts to a tube of toothpaste lasting 15 days. Truthfully though, I doubt many people use 1mL, so let’s estimate it at about 10 days (this is a Fermi problem, so we use order of magnitudes. If you have a problem with it, take it up with Enrico Fermi, or something). In a given month, a savings of a couple dollars per tube can amount to $6-$7 savings. Over the course of a year, it approaches $100 savings (again, order of magnitude). If you begin to use this thought process on other goods, and just evaluating the active ingredient, you begin to see how these savings can compound.
(A bit of note, I googled around for the serving size of toothpaste, which actually was hard to find. I have no idea of 1mL is correct, but again, order of magnitudes here. Someone claimed 1mL was pea sized, so, I’m going with it).
I really don’t feel like addressing any of your other points, since they are equally as lame. Based on your Markov chain comment, my guess is you probably just had a math class and learned about Markov chains, and you want to show us all how smart you are. You are going to throw a fancy freshman year scary math term at us, and we won’t know how to respond. By the way, it’s clear that was your intention, based on your overall tone, and level of contempt. Your comments on Markov chains are nothing more than a Frobenius endomorphism to your other nonsensical comments (see, I can do it too).
nice list.