New Phone, New [money-saving] Technology!

So, until recently I've had a dumb phone. And I've been perfectly happy. But, B proved to me using math that if I wanted a smartphone, it was only going to be about $8 more per month. And we got a great deal on the phones themselves... like they were both free. So I said sure, I guess I have to get with the times at some point right?

Since then, I've been experimenting with money-saving apps I've heard so much about. So far, my favorite is Ibotta.

The way it works is you download the app onto your device and sign up. From there, you're able to pick your favorite stores, browse what deals are available, and do short activities to unlock savings on the items you're planning to buy anyway.

Once you're at the grocery store, or at home after you've made your purchases, all you have to do is let Ibotta take a bar code snapshot of the item you've unlocked and take a picture of your receipt. They do the rest!


Other highlights that make me a big fan of the rebate app:

- They have savings categories for grocery, health & beauty, apparel, electronics, pets, babies/kids, movie tickets and restaurants!

- When I signed up, I earned $2 for doing a rebate within a week, plus I got a $.50 rebate on milk. Usually, in order to find savings on milk, you have to make a huge cereal purchase, or something of the sort. So the fact that this is on any brand and any type of regular milk makes me happy.

- They also offer several ways for you to cash out, in terms of gift cards (a relatively short selection at the moment), PayPal or Venmo. Right now they have a deal where if you sign up for Venmo and cash out the first time using it, they'll give you an extra $5!

- At Publix, you can still use a Publix store coupon, a manufacturer's coupon, AND an Ibotta rebate on a single item.  Since the Ibotta rebate is done after you've already checked out, it's not considered coupon savings, so you can save even more!

- For every friend who signs up through your referral link and does at least one rebate, Ibotta gives you $5! (Wanna help a sister out? http://ibotta.com/r/BLRuvg)

Are there any other money-saving Apps a newbie to smartphones should definitely have?

It's MATH Time!

This is a post about Kroger. Shocking, isn't it?

While in recent days I have noticed several things about Kroger I do like (for instance, the price of milk, their free Friday download, other digital coupons for necessities you don't see often), I'm a Publix fanatic through and through.

And when I tell people this, along with my reasons for Publix-shopping, I most often hear "Well I shop at Kroger for the fuel points."   I usually just stare at them, and here's why:

Kroger fuel points is a scam. 


Ta-da!  That's it. They market the discount in the same way that gas prices fluctuate so it seems like a good deal. I.E., if Gas Station A is 10 cents more per gallon than Gas Station B, obviously you're going to go to Gas Station B to fill up. But, if you think about fuel points in terms of a flat-rate coupon, it does not make sense. And I can prove it to you using math, which is my favorite.

Say you spend $100 at Kroger to get your 10 cents off per gallon. Then say you buy 15 gallons of gas. (This is more than my car can hold. But say 15 gallons.) Using your Kroger fuel points, you save $1.50 on gas.

I don't shop at Kroger much, so generally we end a month with about 20 fuel points. But since we still have the Kroger card, we get a 3 cent discount every time we buy gas. So buying the same 15 gallons, I save 45 cents.

You've spent $100 at Kroger, and saved $1.05 more than I did on the same amount of gas.

My grocery budget is $250 per month. Last month, I was about $2 under budget (and spent about $48 at the Farmer's Market).  I also did the math on how much I saved versus how much I spent at Publix. I spent about 49% of what the groceries were worth. That's another way of saying that I got over $400 in groceries and only paid $200.

So, back to the point at hand, fuel points.  If I spent the same $200 at Kroger, I would save $2.10 on gas per month (assuming I bought 15 full gallons each time), but save less on groceries than I do at Publix with BOGO sales, doubling coupons, and using 2 coupons for 1 item where I can.

I still only go to Kroger for gas - it's usually cheaper than anywhere else, and I get the 3-cents-off-per-gallon deal.  I just don't buy into the 10-cents-off-per-gallon fuel point gimmick.

Simple Tips to Start Saving

Going from life as it is now to saving a few more bucks a month, or even to saving up to half of your income (my ultimate goal) is rough. It's hard to change your lifestyle, your current habits, and your routines. But if you have a goal of paying off debt, building a savings account, saving for a home, or whatever, small changes are the easiest to implement to get you started.

Here are some simple tips to start toward that goal:

1.  Quit your cable company.   I've harped on about this already. 

2.  Start couponing.  See previous ramblings here.  In addition, I always recommend looking online for coupons (or Groupons) whenever you plan to eat out, go to a movie, or go shopping at department stores.

3.  Shop smarter.  Assuming that you don't have time to coupon, you can still save money at the store.

           - For example, take advantage of sales on items you'll be buying anyway. If you're not picky about cereal, buy the brand on sale instead of what you usually get.  

           - Try the less "luxuried" brands. For example, try swapping out the super expensive brand of shampoo you've been buying for a less expensive brand like Suave.

           - Also, try the store brand, especially for basic items like sugar, flour, bread, chips, pickles, etc. B and I have found that 90% of the time, the store brand is just as good.  

           - Try local farmer's markets for less expensive produce and meat.

4.  Reuse.  

           -  B and I had been buying flats of water for him as a matter of convenience for his line of work. But my parents got him a light water bottle for Christmas, and he's been using that instead of spending $4-5 every couple of weeks on water. 

            - We also never use paper plates, despite our love for convenience, and we wash and reuse plastic flatware. 

            - We only use rechargable batteries for our gaming systems and cameras. They're a bit more up front, but I can't even tabulate how much we must have saved on batteries!

5.  Save Energy. 

            - Try keeping your A/C a few degrees higher when its warm, and your heater a few degrees lower when it's cold. Running these constantly really jacks up your power and gas bills.

            - Unplug chargers and turn things OFF when not in use, like your printer, Keurig, DVD player, etc.

6.  Limit what you spend.  

            - If you eat out three times a week, cut it back to two, or even one! 

            - Buy a coffee every morning on the way to work?  Make it at home and take it in a travel mug.

            - If you're really prone to impulse spending,  set a spending limit for yourself when you do hit the mall and stick to it.

The MOST important part, however, is to remember that the few dollars here and there you've been saving now needs to go toward that debt, savings account, etc.  It's very easy to splurge with the extra money you've saved, especially if you're not in the habit of saving. Resist it!!!

buy.it.freeze.it.save.it.eat.it

One MAJOR way we save money is by stocking our freezer to the max. Seriously, open at your own risk. 

But there are a TON of foods that I buy when they're on a great sale, and have one for now and freeze one for later. Examples:

- Meat - all things beef, chicken, hot dog, sausage, bacon, etc.
- Old wine, which you can cook with later

- Hummus, guacamole, or other dips
  - Shredded cheese (doesn't work so well for slices - they start to crumble after a while)

- Cookie dough

- Butter or margarine

- Fruits and veggies - Strawberries/blackberries/blueberries are all good for making smoothies later. I also like to pre-portion blueberries in cup-sized servings so I can make muffins with them. One of my BFFs would freeze bananas when they get really brown to make banana nut bread later. Veggies you can steam straight from the freezer to accompany any meal.

- Bread, muffins, biscuits, hamburger buns, or rolls.

- Pancakes - when we have leftover pancakes or waffles, I portion them into plastic bags for B to grab quick breakfasts later!

- Cake. My boss brought in a cake one day - it was beautiful (and delicious), but no one at work wanted any. SO I took it home, cut it into slices, wrapped each slice in plastic wrap, and froze them, for just one slice whenever I want one.

- B's mom likes to make big meals and then portion them out into single-serve containers for our freezer. We appreciate it a lot. And we've even started following suit when we have more leftovers than meals left in the week. We find that spaghetti and pasta dishes (and quiches or stews) reheat the best.

Make sure you check the label before freezing things - somethings say "DO NOT FREEZE", like cream cheese and probably anything Pillsbury that comes in a pressurized roll.


Happy Money-Saving!

Coffee Snobs and Saving Addicts - Unite!

I drink between 2 and 3 cups of medium- to dark-roast coffee a day; I'm a Starbucks Gold Card holder; I receive Starbucks, Coffee-mate, and Bailey's non-alcoholic coffee creamer updates to my inbox; and my favorite coffee flavor is hazelnut. You could say that I enjoy my steamy brew. But the question I hear most often is "If you love coffee so much, why don't you have a Keurig?"

Answer: it all comes back to the budget.

While I have nothing against Keurigs (most of my family has them, my office has one, etc.) and I find them extremely convenient to use, I can't personally justify the expense. You're going to spend LEAST $70 for a Keurig - and that's if you're shopping sales and using coupons. Most range between $100 - $150, whereas you can purchase a regular 12-cup coffee pot for $20 or less. Or if you want to be MORE fancy, french presses range from $20-25.

But, machine aside, it's the expense of the pods that get you. (Not to mention that K-Cups waste an extreme amount of plastic.) Let's prove my point using math.

Here is the standard in K-Cup pricing:

At your standard grocery store, a box of 10 or 12 K-Cups is about $10. That's about $1/cup.
If K-Cups are on sale at the grocery store, it's usually about $7. That's at best, $.58/cup.
If you have a REALLY GOOD coupon, like a $1.50 off to use in conjuncture with that sale ($5.50/box), it takes it down to $.46/cup.

Now, granted, any of the above is a better price than a tall drip coffee at your local Starbucks. But let's assume I drink 3 cups of coffee a day. At $.46/cup, I'm looking at $45 a month drinking coffee from my home. The best price I've ever seen for K-Cups was $.35 each, and you don't come by that very often... but even still, that's $32 a month. [Note: I'm not sure of pricing at membership clubs like Costco or Sam's; I find it not worth the membership price and investment to run a household of 2!]


As we all know, I shop Publix, and the best part about Publix, besides it's customer-based culture, is the BOGO sales. And ground coffee OFTEN is included in these (though I've never seen K-Cups included...).

Ground coffee pricing; let's run it down:

One pound of ground coffee makes about 50 cups of joe.
A bag of one pound of coffee averages about $8 (or less!). That's $.16/cup
One pound of coffee, on BOGO at Publix, goes to about $4. That's $.08/cup
Now add in that $1.50 off coupon, making it $2.50 for 1 pound of coffee and $.05/cup.

Now, according to my calculator, that's $4.50 for an entire month's worth of coffee (drinking 3 cups a day). Recall our number for 3 K-Cups a day? $45? It's literally 10 times more expensive [TEN. TIMES.] to use the Keurig system than to use regular ground coffee.

And if you're not a couponer or sale-shopper, let me lay it out like this. For 50 cups of coffee, ground coffee will cost $8, and K-Cups will cost between $42 (12 per box) and $50 (10 per box)... Maybe not ten times more, but at least 4 to 5 times more expensive than grounds.

+ $40.50 per month NOT toward coffee = $486 per year toward debt.

7 “Luxuries” I’ve Found I Can Live Without (And 3 I Can’t)

7 "Luxuries" I Can Live Without:

1. CABLE: I’ve explained my thought processes [with math] here, but the gist is we prefer to pay $16 per month for Netflix, Hulu Plus, and free streaming from network websites instead of spending $100 each month for cable.

2. BUYING MUSIC: In the digital age, it’s really hard to keep track of how much we spend on music when it can be ours at the click of a button. But, it’s just not in our budget to spend frivolously, and at this point, music is frivolous. Both B and I have Pandora accounts, so we can listen to music for free via phone, tablet, bluray, whatever. Plus, there’s always the radio, which there are now apps for as well. And you need a song right now? One word that should be two words: YOUTUBE. Seriously. There’s even an app for THAT. Not to mention that Amazon and iTunes both offer free music downloads all the time.

3. EATING OUT: We eat out about once a month, usually either for a family gathering or out of dire necessity. It’s just really hard for me to justify going out to eat when I think that instead of spending $10 on one trip to McDonalds for unhealthy burgers and fries, I can literally make steak and mashed potatoes at home for the same price. I also think about it like this: I generally spend about $5-8 to make one (non-steak) meal, all components included, that yields 4 to 6 servings (we go through a lot of leftovers!). Why go out and spend $10 on a meal for each of us, when I can make 2 to 3 times as many meals for less?

4. SWEETS: We still eat our fair share, but you’ll be amazed as how much you save [and how much better your pants fit] if you cut your sweets budget in half. Instead of buying a package of America's Favorite Cookies for $3.50, I can buy prepackaged chocolate chip cookie mix for $1, and make cookies myself. Don’t get me wrong, we still spring for Oreos every now and then, but definitely not as much. 

5. HAIRCUTS: A couple of years ago, when B and I were still dating, he revealed to me that he gets his hair cut every 2 to 3 weeks. WOW. Okay, so I never had brothers. Who knew? So I whipped out my calculator. $7 per visit, plus, say $3 tip. So call that $10, 20 times a year. That’s $200+. At that rate, I’m pretty sure I can cut your hair. So I invested into clippers and good barber scissors, (spent about $40 total) and have been cutting B’s hair for several years now. I’ve also started cutting my own hair. Fortunately for me, my hair has a lot of texture and is very forgiving if it's not precise.

6. SMARTPHONE: I have a dumbphone that calls, texts, and takes pictures, and that’s all I really need. I invested $200 of graduation money into an Amazon Kindle Fire (which are now even more reasonably priced), that can do literally everything else I would want from a smartphone as long as I have a WiFi connection…. and I don’t have to pay for a data plan. Due to B’s career, we both feel he needs one. But, as for me, I’m good saving my money.

7. Dinner and a DRINK: I REFUSE to buy alcohol at restaurants and bars. Drinks there are WAY over-priced, especially considering I could literally go out and buy a whole bottle of rum for the amount we’d spend on one Captain-and-coke and a Mai Tai. So if we drink, we generally only drink at home.

...And 3 I Can't....

1. HEAT: Okay, truth time. It’s December, and our thermostat is set at a balmy 60 degrees. Yeah, no it’s freezing. So we bundle up in our sweats and have 3 blankets on our bed (one is electric to get it warmed up before getting in!), but if it saves us some cha-ching, okay. So it's still cool, but not nearly as bad as outside!

2. WiFi: Internet is much more reasonably priced than cable, and provides access to all of our tv/movies, social networks, my blog, news, humans, etc. Especially if you buy your own router (or steal it from that beloved sister who has like 3 old ones in a box in the closet - thanks!) and don’t rent one from the cable company.

3. SECURITY SYSTEM: Given that B works really strange hours, some really late and some really early, we both feel better knowing having a security system. We purchased ours outright (whiiich was more than I was expecting), but now we pay about $16/month to monitor it. That $16 is totally worth the peace of mind.

How I Save: Cable Edition

B and I LOVE our TV shows. Like any couple, we have those special ones that we can't wait to watch together every week.  But unlike most people, we don't spring for cable. I'm not going to bore you with bylines like "we can't afford it," because it's probably about 40/30/30: "it's way too expensive" / "I hate cable companies" / "There's a better way to do it."

Our solution is simple: streaming. We pay the monthly subscription fees for Netflix and Hulu Plus (which both have apps for Bluray, Wii, Xbox, etc), for about $8 each. With a Netflix streaming account, we have access to movies and TV shows that are somewhat older or not as popular, but we still find plenty of options to interest us. And with Hulu Plus we have access to MOST currently airing TV shows, with the exception of one major cable network, which allows you to stream these shows from their website. For free. Boom.

So, I'll whip out my mental calculator real quick: we pay $16 per month for access to 1000s of movies and TV shows, including currently-airing favorites. We watch them whenever we want after the original air date. Cable companies charge between $100 and $150 per month for cable channels - after the 3 to 6 month promotional rates sky rocket again. And don't forget those extra fees.... $10 here for "HD channels,"  $10 there for your DVR, $5 every few months to see if you're paying attention to your charges...

Why would we pay $100 + per month to gain access to the same content we can get for $16 per month? 

Plus you can find plenty of special free-month trials for each.  This plan may not be for everyone, but it works for us. We may go back to cable one day for the convenience factor, but for the moment, the extra money toward debt is totally worth it.

+ $84/mo = $1008/yr toward feeding Everest.

How I Save Money: Grocery Edition

If you're like me, living on a budget with debt piled higher than 29,029 feet above sea level, you probably are looking for ways to maximize every cent. You know, a penny saved is a penny earned and all that. 

Well, as the main purchaser of groceries in our household (seriously, I let B buy milk and that's it), I have unilateral control of our grocery budget. Recently, I've instated a new goal to whittle my grocery spending from $300/month down to $250 [read:  extra $600/year toward debt]. Did I mention this budget also has to include paper products, cat food/litter, hygiene products, medicines, office supplies, stamps, etc? 

...yeah.

I'm not an extreme couponer (though I do have a coupon binder for grocery shopping, and a dining/shopping coupon envelope that lives in my purse), but I do shop sales weekly and coupon at Publix to regularly save between $30 and $60 per trip. For those of us keeping score, that's up to $240 per month, which is approximately my grocery budget. AKA I get up to twice as much food for the amount I spend.

How my process works:

STRATEGY:

With $250 per month to spend on groceries, some shoppers would think "I have $62.50 each week," or "I have $250 once a month." I can't operate on either of these. I go shopping every week because Publix has new BOGO sales every week. We go through a LOT of things that regularly go on BOGO like juice, oatmeal, cereal, cat food, cookies, rice, soup, etc. Sometimes the ad has a lot of stuff we go through regularly so I stock up, and other weeks, I only buy things we've run out of. By weeks, my monthly budget usually looks close to this:

Week 1:  $35 - $40 at the farmer's market (see Tips and Tricks below), $40-50 at Publix
Week 2: $70-80 at Publix

Week 3: $30-40 at Publix

Week 4: $50-60 at Publix

If I spent the upper end of the range in weeks 1 and 3, I usually spend the lower end of the range in weeks 2 and 4. Which is, lo! and behold - $250.

STEP 1: ESTABLISH A LIST

 - I begin with a list of things we NEED that we are out of or almost out of.

 - Secondly, I go to publix.com to make a list using their weekly ad. Personally, I start by looking at sales that align with my list of needed items and that we go through regularly (to stock up while it's on sale). Publix has between 30 and 60 BOGO sales every week, and when you can couple a sale with coupons, you save big. So even if we don't NEED a BOGO item now, I still stock up on it. [I also like using the Publix site to make my list because it tells you on which aisles to find the items on your list = time saver!]

 - I then go back and individually add things from my list I NEED that did not coincide with what happens to be on sale this week.

STEP 2: COUPONS.

Publix Coupon Policy = Publix will double all coupons $0.50 and under. Publix will also accept up to 2 coupons PER ITEM - one manufacturer and either a Publix store coupon OR a competitor coupon (each store varies on who they consider competitors - mostly all say Kroger). Check out their coupon policy here.

- I check the manufacturer coupons I've collected from newspaper/mail/etc. [Whip out coupon binder here.] 

- Then, I pull out whatever I have in Publix store/competitor coupons - Kroger mails coupons out pretty regularly, and Publix ALWAYS has coupon fliers (which you can find in-store) with special promotions and store coupons in them. 

- Next, I check Southernsavers.com's Coupon Database - literally search for the brand on sale for each item on the list, and if there's a coupon for it, Jenny's found it. I print out whatever coupons I can find for things I'm buying. 

Other sites to check out coupons on:

- coupons.com

- redplum.com

- smartsource.com

- kelloggfamilyrewards.com  (more info below in Tips and Tricks)

- commonkindness.com

- Company-specific websites (ie, Campell's usually has soup/V8 coupons on their company site)

The ultimate goal is to find a store coupon and a manufacturer coupon for the same item that happens to be on sale. Most of the time, the stars don't align. But every now and then they do. [Example: Yesterday, All Laundry Detergent was on sale for Buy One Get One Free. I had a manufacturer coupon for $2 off the purchase of 2 All products, and had two $.75 off the purchase of 1 All product that were PUBLIX store coupons. So I purchased 2 bottles of All (33 loads each) for about $2 total. Cha-ching!]

STEP 3: GO TO THE STORE.

Pretty self-explanatory, right? NO. 

These are the rules I have to follow to stick to the budget:

1. The List is Law. If I don't need anything on aisles 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, or 10,  then I skip straight from 3 to 11.

2. If it's not something I need and it's not more than 50% off, don't buy it. Seriously. What really gets me in this area is snacks. So, I avoid that by planning on purchasing 1 to 2 snack items while I'm making my list and looking for coupons. That way, since I know I'm going to buy them anyway, I limit WHAT I buy by pre-planning and I also save money on them with coupons and shopping for what's already on sale.

3. If the Publix brand is less than the name brand on sale that I have coupons for, buy the Publix brand. [Example: I was looking at Duracell Batteries - which were on sale, I had a $1.50 off manufacturer coupon, and a $2 off Publix coupon. The Publix brand batteries were still $1.50 less.]

4. Smile as the cashier rings up my coupons and tells me how much I saved.

OTHER TIPS AND TRICKS:

- The Publix ad changes in the middle of the week, either on Wednesday or Thursday depending on your region. BUT for most places, Publix will do a penny item the day the ad changes. I take advantage of this when I can if it's an item we use. The gist is that if you spend $10, you can get the chosen item of the week for a penny! My region doesn't actually put a paper coupon in their ad and just take the price off for you. Some regions do require that you have the coupon. The items itself ranges from a Velveeta dinner kit to a 4-pack of toilet paper. Either way, it helps!

- Make sure to utilize the shelving price tags. They have a cents-per-unit section where you can quickly scan to see which brand of honey (or whatever) costs the least per oz (I'll give you a hint - it's NOT necessarily the Publix brand, in this case!). 

- FARMER'S MARKET. I only purchase meat and produce from our local farmer's market. I make one trip at the beginning of the month and give myself a $40 limit to buy all of the beef and chicken (and/or ground turkey/steak/lamp chops/whatever) we'll go through in the month, plus our first week or two's supply of fresh fruit and veggies (like bananas, onions, potatoes, spinach, etc.)

- We also eat a LOT of Kellogg's products so I'm also a member of Kellogg's Family Rewards - you enter codes found on marked Kellogg's boxes, which give you points. You can redeem these points for higher value coupons. They also have a "coupons" tab for access to coupons you don't have to redeem points to use, but you still have to have an account with them to print!

- One more thing to remember in the weekly shopping trip strategy - if you don't need anything, you don't have to go to the store! Also, just because it's on the list doesn't mean you have to buy it once you're there.

I'd love to hear about your couponing experiences! I'd also be delighted to help you get started!