Your favorite money saving tips?

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So I thought I’d look for advice here - what are your favorite ways to save money around the house? I’ve got cooking down pretty well (and I’d be happy to share a few recipes), but what else is there to do? Cleaning and laundry supplies are the big ones for me right now, it seems it costs so much to keep everything clean! And of course trying to keep the electric down too, but of course the heat here is electric and it’ll be very cold soon.
 
Panera’s (at least in our area) has a special on Tuesdays where you can get 13 bagels (a baker’s dozen) for $6.99. Then I freeze them and we use them throughout the week. I always get a lot of the cheesy Asiago ones, which are huge and just about enough for lunch in a pinch.

My more general advice (which may not suit your personality type or situation) is that the best way to save money is not to save money. What I mean by that is that I’m the sort of person who LOVES spending money and it’s so easy to go with the “It’s on sale!” or “It’s such a deal!” attitude. I save money by not buying stuff, not by getting deals on the stuff I buy.
 
For laundry I’ve found the best detergent is one of the cheapest. It’s also one of the few that is scent-free which is a necessity for me. I use white vinegar for the rinse.

Buying all my clothes 2nd hand - except underwear. I draw the line there! And not too much clothing. Just because a blouse may may cost under $5, there’s no reason for 10 of them.

Wearing clothes several times before washing. If they are not dirty, just hang them up. I have “at home” clothes for dirty jobs.

Hanging clothes to dry whenever possible - the dryer uses a lot of electricity. When I need to hang laundry inside, I put all the shirts, blouses, and dresses on hangers. Takes up a lot less room.
 
Some of ours: (Sister and myself.)

Stop eating out. It is too expensive and unhealthy due to excess salt, sugar and fat.

Stop buying bottled water: This is also too expensive and damages the environment. On average a liter of bottled water takes 8 bottles to process.

Set your heat to 68F and wear sweaters. It does make a difference.

Rather than drive to the local store go for a walk. (I mean the local store that is one or two miles away.) Saves on gas. We also make sure we consolidate trips to the grocery store and other shops that are local and have what we need. No double trips that way. If we have a doctor’s appointment we figure out what grocery store is closest on that trip and stop to shop on the way home.

If you are good a cooking and like fresh herbs grow them in the house. A few seeds go a long way and you have the best fresh herbs you can imagine. I actually want to convert our house plants to such things as carrots, cherry tomatoes, chives, radishes and lettuce. A home grown salad all year round.

Related to cooking: sunflower seeds, radish seeds and even pinto beans make great sprouts. Use one of those plastic containers from the produce department and start your seeds in those. Keep them moist, in a semi sunny location and before you know it you will have some sprouts to add to that salad.

Sew our own clothes. Go to the second hand store for some clothing like sweats, t-shirts for working in the yard and even towels for the dog beds and cleaning rags.

Stop, stop, stop using credit cards. Pay off the ones with the lowest balance first and work your way up the lot of them. I used to have 7 cards. It took a couple of years but I now have only 2. Just stop using the things. You will save tons of money and learn more about need versus want.
 
Lots of good tips here and I don’t know if this would be feasible for you but I’ll add another. In our community we have these sites on FB where people trade goods and services with each other. I have not used it yet but it seems like a brilliant idea.
 
Use strobe lights. As they are on only half the time, they use only half the power.

Keep one eye closed. That way, you are only using half as much light to see by. Along with the strobe, you can cut your consumption by 75%.

Red light has the lowest strength in the spectrum, so use red shades on your lamps.

Sit closer to your TV so the photons don’t have to go as far.

Don’t have black furniture, drapes etc. It absorbs all the light, so your lamps have to work harder. Also try to avoid reading books that use too much boldface or other heavy black fonts.

High-pitched sounds have more energy than low-pitched, so play heavy-metal music, or at least stuff with a lot of bass. Avoid Bee Gees and Supertramp.

In Canada, the further north you go, the colder it gets, so stay warm by keeping to the south side of your house.
 
Buy cloth diapers/dish towels and use them instead of paper towels. They are great for window washing, cleaning up spills, etc. You can also make cleaning rags out of old tee shirts, towels, or other old cotton clothing. Polyester doesn’t work as well.

A lot of cleaning products can be used at half strengh.

Also, buy some borax (good old 20 mule team). It makes a great water softener, which will allow you to use less soap if you live in a hard water area.
 
Cricket2 said:
Some of ours: (Sister and myself.)

Stop eating out. It is too expensive and unhealthy due to excess salt, sugar and fat.

Stop buying bottled water: This is also too expensive and damages the environment. On average a liter of bottled water takes 8 bottles to process.

Rather than drive to the local store go for a walk. (I mean the local store that is one or two miles away.) Saves on gas. We also make sure we consolidate trips to the grocery store and other shops that are local and have what we need. No double trips that way. If we have a doctor’s appointment we figure out what grocery store is closest on that trip and stop to shop on the way home.

Stop, stop, stop using credit cards. Pay off the ones with the lowest balance first and work your way up the lot of them. I used to have 7 cards. It took a couple of years but I now have only 2. Just stop using the things. You will save tons of money and learn more about need versus want.
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…This is way more money than I have if you’re even considering doing these things in the first place. A car? Multiple credit cards? I’ve got one card that I barely use just for credit score reasons and I’ve never owned a car in my life. That’s why it’s so hard to cut things from the budget, there’s very little in there to begin with. I’m actually on food stamps which is letting me eat, but other expenses are so hard. All my winter tights have gone nasty and scratchy and I’m hoping I can scrape together enough to replace them.
 
One of my favorite ways is to use the library for entertainment. They have books on paper and on audiotape, plus they have movies in every format. Other free forms of entertainment include going to parks and outdoor entertainment open to the general public.

Another way to save money is by planning. Planning your meals in advance saves on wasted food. Planning car trips saves gas. Planning to buy what you need when it will be at its lowest price saves money. I don’t just mean to know when the white sales are. I mean that it is good to know that car dealerships are more likely to be flexible on price on a rainy Thursday at the end of February than they are on the first Saturday of the month. Especially have a plan for those big ticket items

Check prices, and check them often, particularly on those items that take up a large fraction of your food budget (which will differ from one family to another). If you save 3% of something that represents 25% of your food budget, that will save more money that saving 10% on something that represents 1% of your food budget. (I mean that you shouldn’t neglect meat prices because you are spending your limited time pricing jalepeno peppers.) The places that make their reputations for offering low prices are notorious for having wildly different profit margins on different items, and even for different brands of the same item on the same aisle. Sam Walton invented this strategy, but everyone uses it now.

As for cooking, recipes that use meat in condiment amounts are becoming more and more of a money-saving proposition, because meat prices are just going through the roof!
 
Seriously, though…

Stopping drafts is a good way to save money in the winter. You can find drafts cheaply with an incense stick.

The door to my apartment has a gap in the bottom where drafts get through; I have an old pair of jeans with one leg tucked down the other, stuffed with rags (see below), which will be a draft stopper.

I’m also going to put one of those sheets of plastic over the living room window, the one you use a blow dryer to shrink tight (we lose a lot of heat through the window).

Make sure you don’t have drapes hanging either in front of or over heaters. Heat can rise straight up the wall and be trapped behind the curtains.

Extra blankies on the bed is cheaper than heating the room. Use heat sparingly: we use just enough to keep the room from getting mildewy.

If you use your oven to bake or roast, after cooking, leave the oven door open: the leftover heat will heat up the room.

I normally wear T-shirts as daily wear, so when a T-shirt gets to the point where it’s no longer presentable in public but still serviceable, it becomes a bed T-shirt. When it becomes too baffed out for even that, it becomes a cleaning rag.

I don’t shave. I save money on razor blades, shaving cream, and aftershave.
 
DarkLight said:
…This is way more money than I have if you’re even considering doing these things in the first place.
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Without lots of details about your personal life, it’s hard to make suggestions that will fit your needs to a T.

That’s the basis of those magazine articles that trumpet: SAVE 2K A MONTH WITH THESE MONEY SAVING IDEAS! Of course, if your income is barely 1k/month (as is our situation), most of the ideas will be useless.

We got our first credit card in 25 years so we could attend our daughter’s wedding and pay for needed car repairs. But that thing is insidious! Somehow we’ve racked up over 1k of debt, and I don’t think they were all necessities. The card is on ice right now (metaphorically) until the bill is paid off.

Mountee mentioned the facebook site for trades. There is also freecycle on-line - you’ll have to do a search to see if there is one for your area. Some communities and even larger cities have a radio sell & swap program.
 
DarkLight said:
…This is way more money than I have if you’re even considering doing these things in the first place. A car? Multiple credit cards? I’ve got one card that I barely use just for credit score reasons and I’ve never owned a car in my life. That’s why it’s so hard to cut things from the budget, there’s very little in there to begin with. I’m actually on food stamps which is letting me eat, but other expenses are so hard. All my winter tights have gone nasty and scratchy and I’m hoping I can scrape together enough to replace them.
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Your library probably has a copy of The Tightwad Gazette, which may be more your speed.
 
Bonnie said:
Without lots of details about your personal life, it’s hard to make suggestions that will fit your needs to a T.

That’s the basis of those magazine articles that trumpet: SAVE 2K A MONTH WITH THESE MONEY SAVING IDEAS! Of course, if your income is barely 1k/month (as is our situation), most of the ideas will be useless.

We got our first credit card in 25 years so we could attend our daughter’s wedding and pay for needed car repairs. But that thing is insidious! Somehow we’ve racked up over 1k of debt, and I don’t think they were all necessities. The card is on ice right now (metaphorically) until the bill is paid off.

Mountee mentioned the facebook site for trades. There is also freecycle on-line - you’ll have to do a search to see if there is one for your area. Some communities and even larger cities have a radio sell & swap program.
Click to expand...
Yeah. I’m in a situation where I’m disabled and not working, but not eligible for disability assistance. (Long story short, not permanent enough for SSI and don’t have the work history for SSDI.) I’m eating off of food stamps and relying on a friend for housing costs - though I’m trying to help him save money too to make up for the extra utility bills (for starters I actually know how to cook). Electricity really, which includes heat. Water is included with the apartment. No on-premise laundry so have to head over to a laundromat to do that.
 
My wife has become a devotee of second-hand shops. She’s also gotten interested in sewing. What she’ll do is buy clothing in fabrics and patterns she likes, then cut them up and use the material for sewing projects.
 
A good enough grocery will have excellent store brand products. You probably already do this, but you can buy almost everything from the store brand and do fine.
 
John_Lazarus said:
Use strobe lights. As they are on only half the time, they use only half the power.

Keep one eye closed. That way, you are only using half as much light to see by. Along with the strobe, you can cut your consumption by 75%.

Red light has the lowest strength in the spectrum, so use red shades on your lamps.

Sit closer to your TV so the photons don’t have to go as far.

Don’t have black furniture, drapes etc. It absorbs all the light, so your lamps have to work harder. Also try to avoid reading books that use too much boldface or other heavy black fonts.

High-pitched sounds have more energy than low-pitched, so play heavy-metal music, or at least stuff with a lot of bass. Avoid Bee Gees and Supertramp.

In Canada, the further north you go, the colder it gets, so stay warm by keeping to the south side of your house.
Click to expand...
:rotfl:
 
DarkLight said:
…This is way more money than I have if you’re even considering doing these things in the first place. A car? Multiple credit cards? I’ve got one card that I barely use just for credit score reasons and I’ve never owned a car in my life. That’s why it’s so hard to cut things from the budget, there’s very little in there to begin with. I’m actually on food stamps which is letting me eat, but other expenses are so hard. All my winter tights have gone nasty and scratchy and I’m hoping I can scrape together enough to replace them.
Click to expand...
I don’t know about where you are, but the Oregon Food Bank has classes about how to get the most food out of a dollar. If you are on public assistance, call around to see if there are classes in your area that will help you.

If you have friends that belong to club membership stores such as Costco, ask them if they would consider taking you shopping with them in exchange for some service you might be able to do for them, such as babysitting or house and pet sitting when they are on vacation. I have had very good luck with the quality of Costco clothing, and the prices have been good, too. Babysitting and house and pet-sitting are also a way to leave the heat off at your place in the evening, so it is a form of giving that can save you money, too!

BTW, be aware that many appliances and electronic devices still use power when in “standby” mode. Don’t leave your TV or computer plugged in when not in use and don’t leave chargers plugged in when they aren’t charging anything. Have them on a power strip, and switch that off when you’re not using the item.
 
Xantippe said:
A good enough grocery will have excellent store brand products. You probably already do this, but you can buy almost everything from the store brand and do fine.
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I’ve found it matters less the more raw material type stuff you buy. Dried beans, canned goods, pasta, peanut butter, that sort of thing.

My favorite soup is a bag of dried lentils, a can of diced tomatoes, a few spices, and some brown sugar. Costs maybe $5 for about 3 quarts of soup. Maybe $7 if you really must put meat in there. Split pea and potato is good too and about the same cost - maybe a little more because it requires a bag of fresh spinach. Melted peanut butter and oil makes a good pasta sauce for another cheap dish.

Fun fact - a lot of “ethnic” foods are really really cheap, at least if they’re aiming at people of that culture. The goods from the hispanic aisle are often cheaper than the same thing in the regular aisle. And real asian stores (ones aimed at actual asians) can have some cheap food. Dried seaweed is a good cheap substitute for green stuff.
 
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