Sharing insights since 2007 on carefully saving money, investing, frugal living, coupons, promo codes because the little things matter in achieving financial freedom!
Last week, I wrote on the four financial benefits that one could gain from decluttering their homes. It is amazing the power that clutter can have over our finances and mental health. Why not just throw it all away or donate it?
That’s where things get tricky.
Many times our clutter is not easy to deal with because they come with baggage. The clutter in our lives is like a bad relationship we just can’t shake off. Here are four types of clutter and some suggestions with how to prevent it from draining your life. [ continue reading… ]
Consumer rip offs can seem like the domain of conspiracy-theory-obsessed taxi drivers. But when you begin to notice less and less cash left at the end of the month with no real addition to your lifestyle, who could blame you? These ‘rip offs’ also have a more technical term coined by economists, and are known as ‘market inefficiencies’ where the price of something is far removed from its actual value.
The value to price ratio could be out of whack for a number of reasons, but in this case your suppliers and retailers are not doing anything technically wrong, they are simply using a situation to their advantage where you have no choice but to use their goods or services, or you are simply too time poor to worry about being cash poor.
Therefore, to help you spot these rip offs in your everyday life and hopefully keep more money for yourself, rather than the salesman, compiled here are the top 10 ways you could be getting ripped off right now. [ continue reading… ]
For several years through the 90s, I would leave school, drive to a local craft and garden store, and work until 9 pm as a cashier. There was nothing particularly unusual about this. Most of my friends had after school jobs, on top of our demanding academics, extracurricular activities, and the all-important social lives that consumed us.
However, some experts are looking into whether after school jobs are always a good idea. In particular, students from middle- and upper-middle-class families who work after school — that is, students whose families don’t count on them for the income — might actually be shortchanging themselves by taking jobs during the school year. If your teen is considering an after school job for the next school year, here are some questions you might want to talk over together: [ continue reading… ]
Hosting a party is a fun way to express hospitality to friends and family, but the expense can also be a strain on the budget. The concern with trying to throw a party on the cheap is that it will end up looking or feeling just as cheap.
So how do you pull off an amazing, classy party that’s much less expensive than it looks?
I threw a holiday party recently and came up with quite a few ideas. Here are seven simple ones for you to try next time you want to host a gathering: [ continue reading… ]
Receiving the perfect gift is awesome, but giving it can be just as rewarding. When you’re planning on buying a gift, where do you turn? Picking out the perfect item at the perfect price can be difficult. Here are a few things that you should keep in mind:
A few months ago, a group of my husband’s online gaming friends mentioned they’re planning to take an Alaskan cruise next spring or fall, and invited us to join. While we’ve mentioned the idea of taking a cruise some time in the future, this conversation put the decision, place, and time right at our doorstep.
After some thought, we decided… why not? We have almost a year to save for it and plan the details, and if we don’t go now—while we’re still without children—it might be a long time coming.
But then came the fun part: how are we going to finance it? Since we don’t own credit cards, and don’t want to finance anything, we plan to pay for it all out-of-pocket.
We don’t immediately have the funds for this kind of expenditure, especially considering the required round trip plane tickets and likely hotel costs, too. But we do have a solid history of being able to save for large expenses in the past, so I know we can do it again.
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