Tips for saving up money?

[PCXT]

-$140 - Cable and internet. Might be time to cut the cable, but I do like sports.

What connection is it? A two-way satellite?
I have 4MBit/1MBit for smaller than quarter of that price, but per year and it's perfect for everyday tasks, videos if planned and even remote admin of my workplace machine. You can cut expenses there. Or consider shared line, I don't know about your conditions, but sometimes buying a faster line with neighbors is cheaper than buying few cheap slower lines.

 

[klapse]

beans and rice, potatoes are cheap food

try to avoid processed stuff

most furniture can be had for free if you cast your net

 

[Pickle]

Pickle tip number one: dont spend it
[doublepost=1499131520,1499131265][/doublepost]Pickle tip number two: dont get a girlfriend

 

[comradekingu]

+$1200 - Yay monthly income!
-$350 - HUD apartment rent and utilities. Yep, living in the PJs.
What are PJs? Could you move to somewhere cheaper?
-$various - Pharmacy bills come in at seemingly random times and amounts.
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
-$250 - Groceries. At least, I used to be able to survive on this much food.
What is this, in detail? I'm sure things could be removed and changed around without even beginning to go overboard.
-$140 - Cable and internet. Might be time to cut the cable, but I do like sports.
You like watching them. Do them, and watch them at other peoples houses. It could be you would feel better using the time you spend going to a psych too, but that may be a dangerous cut. You know you.
Cut cable alltogether, and if that isn't possible, it should be, as the US has good tying laws (?).
You could cancel it all, and up your cell phone service to include data. More nomadic, more ping.
-$100 - Cleaners come by twice a month at $50 a pop. If I just stopped being lazy about cleaning, this could be in my pocket.
Are you kidding me? This is 1200$ a year. Rich people have cleaners. You have gall.
-$25 - Cell phone service. On my older sister's family plan, so I get unlimited talk. Not bad.
-$50 - Data for cell phone service.

You could even within comfort, save $500 a month.

List of things to do:

• Cancel cleaners.
• Cancel cable and internet.
• Add data plan for phone.
• Detail what groceries you buy.
• List what bills there are to pay at regular intervals.
• Detail the furniture you need/want. We can help look for used stuff.

 

[elw3]

One can really get used to slow internet, i am mostly on 7kB/s since several years. Costing only 4€/Month.
The only things that wont work is youtube and maybe ping sensitive gaming.

 

[rygD]

Now I feel really broke.

 

[ible]

i hate data plans on phone (i use a dumb phone), since i pay for internet at the house.

i'd cut cable, but that's something i wouldn't want anyway. (i hate commercials...) you could save up and pay for tickets to a real game every once in a while instead.

so i'd go for just internet and avoid a data plan on a phone. phone plans will kill you after a while in the states... but it sounds like you have what you need already there. i pay around $5/month using T-mobile using their pay-as-you-go plan but i don't talk to many people. but there's a social stigma against someone with a phone like mine . ("smart phones" were advertised too well!)

at the end of the day, you can determine what's important to you in life and what you want to save up for.

 

[FBnil]

Edit: I do sometimes wonder if making it a monastery or something would help.

Maybe, or create your own Non-profit organization "trustfound for the admiration of Pyra", and be the director. These guys get paid well above what I get.

The only things that wont work is youtube

I download them for viewing them on the pandy. Also, at 144 they do not stutter.


Internet Prices in the Netherlands:
my ISDN went 10 euro's up in 1 year. Now paying 27.50 euro for ISDN, 43.70 for Ziggo (Cable TV and Cable Internet) and 14 euro's for air-TV.
You might think double internet is overkill, but I had to support banks. The ISDN is about 5MB/s, the cable is about 30MB/s. Maybe in the hollidays I merge them back to one, then I can get a mailserver for that money, who knows.
Ziggo also gives hotspots, so that is nice for the Pandora...

Food here in Amstedam is about 200 euro a month (including bath things like shampoo, washmachine thingies). The problem is, if you eat takeout, it's more than your 6 euro daily budget (usually around 10-14 euro). So to compensate, I buy discounted meat (30%off, but still smells ok), I make my own icecreams with water and syrup, cook for 2 days, stuff like that...

 

[rygD]

For mobile stuff I use Ting. I like their customer service people, as they aren't completely scripted, and they actually listen to what you say, and work with you. They also seem to be pretty tolerant, which is why I think they may be fine with using the Pyra for everything once it comes out and we get everything working well.

The downside is that you pay for what you use, and there isn't an unlimited everything option, so it could get pricey if you use a lot of everything. I mostly stick to text messages and occasional calls, and my bill probably averages $15 a month (usually less, sometimes more). I just convinced a family member to switch over since they think their usage of everything on a heavy month (for them) would be less than $30. If anyone decides to switch over, let me know so I can send you a link and get referral credit, and you can get $25 on your account.

 

[blimpsgo180]

Have you thought about food stamps? I know there's serious stigma attached to this in America, but if you get it, most states give it to you in the form of what looks like a debit card, and no one will look at you differently at the grocery store. Should be about ~$200 a month for food.

Also, I know your phone bill isn't that much, but there's something called the "Obama phone", which is a free smart phone with unlimited talk & text and 500 MB data. Learn more here:

http://www.obamaphone.com

Last thing I'll say is saving money gets easier as you get older. I really struggled with saving in my early twenties, but now I'm thirty and I barely spend any money. The library has free books, the internet has (practically) free entertainment. Obamacare is free health insurance. "It all gets better when life is straight, it's bigger than you the welfare state".

 

[kuru]

Obamacare

Is that still a thing? I thought I heard the trumpet play a different song.

 

[blimpsgo180]

Is that still a thing? I thought I heard the trumpet play a different song.

Republicans are reaaally struggling to take away health insurance from the millions who now have it through Obamacare. Hillary Clinton won the popular vote in the U.S. and she wanted to give people a public option. The truth is, universal health care will likely be debated for years to come (in presidential and congressional elections), but I don't think we can turn back the clock on it's existence.

 

[rygD]

Well, shit...I guess I might need to be a bit of an asshole.

Have you thought about food stamps? I know there's serious stigma attached to this in America, but if you get it, most states give it to you in the form of what looks like a debit card, and no one will look at you differently at the grocery store. Should be about ~$200 a month for food.

Stigma is there, that's true. The food stamp cards here look more like a weird phone card, and it is kinda obvious to onlookers who know what they look like. It also has to be run a different way. I think there is something about that which can cause embarrassment if it is done wrong (I don't know the details, I have just heard the story from someone that was on both sides of that). Really, though, just don't worry about it if you get them, and just use them. As a kid we got the ones that were bright colored (like red or pink) and came in a little book. I didn't know that it was an embarrassing thing at the time, but it explained why I was always sent to get the stuff from the store. Also, some places try their hardest to avoid giving them (my county uses a different calculation than most of the rest of the state to determine eligibility). You also have to meet certain requirements, like working a certain number of hours a week (for obvious reasons), not sure if that is relevant to this discussion.

Also, public libraries cater to mainstream popular interests. That will work for some people or subjects. There are things I research that I am lucky to find a vague passing reference to in most libraries (I have been checking whatever libraries I end up near around the country for a quarter of a century for some of them...that is how I became an internet junkie).

 

[Exophase]

-$140 - Cable and internet. Might be time to cut the cable, but I do like sports.

Most or maybe even all of what you watch you can get online (legally) through subscription services or even free ad-based streams. Should save you at least $50 so long as your ISP doesn't have too serious bandwidth caps, and if you can pay more to remove them it may still be worth it.

You may be able to save some money on utilities through some usage cuts, depending on what your current lifestyle choices is like, eg you can:

- Keep lights off as much as possible, and gradually switch to LEDs if you haven't already
- Hibernate your computer/turn off display when not in use
- Use your cell phone for casual internet usage instead of powering on your computer
- If it's in your control, keep the AC off unless you really need it. If you need it to sleep either set it for a bit before going to bed then turn it off when you do, or use a timer to turn it off later.
- Same kind of thing with heating.
- Take quick showers. 3 minutes is doable.. you can use the stopwatch on your phone to make sure you don't go over.
- Be conservative with how much laundry you do. Not saying to be a dirty slob but some people do too much. It's better to do larger loads less frequently if you can, and air drying instead of using the dryer helps.
- Drink mostly tap water (if the taste is a problem filters are pretty inexpensive and go a long way). If you need more try tea and if you must, powdered mixes.

You already know you'll benefit in a lot of ways from eating less, so I just want to say that if you start it'll get easier. It'll help if you can count calories.

 

[FBnil]

I started showering with cold water. That helps to keep you under 3 minutes.

- Use your cell phone for casual internet usage instead of powering on your computer

Once I started using the Pandora for light entertainment, it means I do not have to turn on my normal PC (where the big screen sucks out 120 watt/h and the computer around 60, so it almost consumes like a 200 watt lightbulb). Saves up lots (especially if you charge at night, on low tariffs, instead of in the day, high tariffs)

 

[rygD]

I started showering with cold water. That helps to keep you under 3 minutes.

Maybe it depends on the person and the water. I just got done with a "cold" shower that I am pretty confident is longer than the warm showers most reading this take. Not sure why the cold water is as warm as it is. It reminded me that I need to get around to looking at the water heater again. (I killed the power to it the other day due to a small leak, and found that the leaking stopped if the power is off even though the tank is full of water. I have been trying to locate the leak for a while since it started after putting new heating elements in, but it doesn't seem to be coming from those. I really suck as a plumber...where are Mario and Luigi when you need them?)

 

[blimpsgo180]

Well, shit...I guess I might need to be a bit of an asshole.

Stigma is there, that's true. The food stamp cards here look more like a weird phone card, and it is kinda obvious to onlookers who know what they look like. It also has to be run a different way. I think there is something about that which can cause embarrassment if it is done wrong (I don't know the details, I have just heard the story from someone that was on both sides of that). Really, though, just don't worry about it if you get them, and just use them. As a kid we got the ones that were bright colored (like red or pink) and came in a little book. I didn't know that it was an embarrassing thing at the time, but it explained why I was always sent to get the stuff from the store. Also, some places try their hardest to avoid giving them (my county uses a different calculation than most of the rest of the state to determine eligibility). You also have to meet certain requirements, like working a certain number of hours a week (for obvious reasons), not sure if that is relevant to this discussion.

Also, public libraries cater to mainstream popular interests. That will work for some people or subjects. There are things I research that I am lucky to find a vague passing reference to in most libraries (I have been checking whatever libraries I end up near around the country for a quarter of a century for some of them...that is how I became an internet junkie).

OK. Well, you don't have to work at all to get food stamps where I live. And it also looks just like a debit card. Just swipe it, enter your pin, and you're done!

And yeah, I think I have a genetic predisposition to being a library / internet junkie as both my parents are chronic readers. I don't even have to go to the library anymore. The two libraries I live closest to use Hoopla and Overdrive, which are smartphone apps that let you take out books on your phone. The selection isn't quiet as good, but hey, I don't even have to leave the house now.

 

[rygD]

Yeah, I guess here, in addition to showing up on the cashier's display*, you have to pick the right type of benefit (food stamps or cash?). I wish I could get free food and not work.

I don't go to libraries too often anymore since they usually don't have books related to more obscure topics or aspects of whatever I am researching, and for the more common stuff most of the info is available online. I still swing by once in a while and spend tons of time browsing (if looking for something specific I can check their online card catalog, which also lists books for other nearby libraries). I still enjoy any chance I get to go to a bookstore (both new and used), although I still run into the same problem as libraries (including a huge bookstore, which is part of a large chain, which had NO translations of Hesiod, while my usual used bookstore had a couple. Sometimes I will find stuff I am looking for, and even better is when I find something I didn't know about that interests me.

I try to avoid doing a lot of reading on LCDs, and I prefer real books (in addition to other reasons, I find it much quicker to find previous sections I need to refer back to since I know where on the page it is, and roughly where in the book it is, whereas it took me a couple hours to track something down in an ebook on my reader last week, and I resorted to skimming a huge section of the book since searching wasn't giving me the right results). My ebook reader is great for things I don't have a copy of, such as some really old books, or if I want multiple translations, and for things I don't need or want a physical copy of. Maybe for some fiction I don't plan to reread or research. Of course I still do read a lot on smallish smartphone screens, like the few hours I spent yesterday and today reading a rather lengthy history article, before eventually moving on to the many included links and references (which I am still digging through, in addition to my own research on specific things mentioned). Somewhat related (very much so for me) museums and big libraries are kind enough to share some documents, manuscripts, and artifacts in their collections online. Sometimes this is not the case, but they may still be viewed under other circumstances, or even buying books where they are collected (well, not the artifacts). It really sucks when those books are extremely expensive or hard to find, such as by being out of print (at which point, if they are not public domain, I will resort to less than legal means of acquiring copies...I am not going to pay $700 for a book just to find out I have no interest in it and it is of no real use compared to easier to get books).

So, be careful, because reading/books can become a very expensive hobby, and not just for collectors. See, I was on topic!



*It really bothers me that some stores have these set up so that everyone in line, and anyone else nearby, can see this info. At one store where I get money orders the screen is pointed at the front windows, and is large enough to be seen. So, if I go to get, say, a $500 money order, it says it on the screen that everyone else in line can see, as well as those coming in the door, or those sitting outside. I guess that is why you should fill it out as soon as you get it.

 

[TrashyMG]

Do NOT buy a Commodore Amiga on whim, it will just make you want to pay big monies to pimp it out.

Also stay sober when browsing ebay, actually just stop browsing ebay.

 

[tigerroast]

For mobile stuff I use Ting.

The power. Linux Action Show put me on Ting.

I like their customer service people, as they aren't completely scripted, and they actually listen to what you say, and work with you. They also seem to be pretty tolerant, which is why I think they may be fine with using the Pyra for everything once it comes out and we get everything working well.

I had 3 issues with them (card not working, help on porting my number over, email not working) and all 3 issues were resolved in 30min total. When my card went through, they even sent me a 2nd SIM card and gave me $15 extra credit on top of the $25 credit they normally give you. Idk if that's the norm, but it left a great impression on me. I even told the rep he's a star.