Luckily, my heat is included in my monthly rent. But what if you don’t have that luxury? Today, we’re going to look at some things that you can do in order to take that chill out of your heating costs, whether you live in a 1 bedroom apartment like I do, or have a two story home.

First, make sure that everything in your home is up-to-date. Shingles on the roof, insulation in the walls, whatever it is that needs to be updated in order to keep the heat in and the cold out, do it. It may feel like a financial burden at first, but in the long run, it could save you more than you’re spending for it.

Another thing to consider when getting ready for the winter time cold is doing those extra things that can help keep heat in your home. Put down your storm windows, put that plastic covering over your windows, and put draft dodgers in front of your doors. Keep that cold out!

One bad habit that I have is the fact that I will adjust the heat up and down according to how cold it is. Don’t do that! If it warms up for a couple days, keep it at the heat you had it; the heater takes a lot more energy when trying to catch up quickly then it does to maintain a specific temperature. So, don’t follow my bad example; keep the heat at 68 or 70. It’s okay to turn it up and down 2 degrees, but 4 or 6 can increase those costs by 10 to 25 percent.

Another thing to watch out for is how open your house is. I have a four bedroom apartment where, if I have all of the doors open, it’s essentially a big open box. It’s hard to heat a big open box efficiently. So, I close some of my doors during the winter. It helps keep each individual part of the house warmer while using less energy.

If you own your home, look at the type of heat that you have and consider switching if you are able to. Some types (heating oil especially) are more expensive than others.

Finally, I always jokingly say that you can always put more clothes on. It’s cold, put a sweater on, use an extra blanket, wear slippers. You don’t necessarily have to use your heating for all of your warmth, use the other things that you already have in your home.

So, stay warm, it’s cold out there! Bundle up, enjoy the warmth of your home, and have a great weekend in this arctic chill!

The few days before and after Christmas are hectic. Stores are packed; the days before Christmas involve getting last minute gifts, while the days after are full of returns. Because of this, many retailers take advantage of the moment and put out some amazing sales. Hey, if people are going to be there anyway, why not take the time and get them to buy other stuff while they’re there, right? If you’re brave enough to fight the crowds, there’s a few things that you should go out and look for in the few days after Christmas.

- Holiday items. Many of the holiday decorations that I possess are from post-holiday sales. This isn’t only the case for Christmas; many retailers will greatly discount holiday and/or seasonal items after they occur. The Christmas tree that sites in my living room was only $10; the decorations on it came to a dollar total.

- Electronics. Did you not get the TV that you wanted? Well, check out your local electronics store and see if it’s on sale. Manufacturers of electronics usually put out new products during late January/early February. So, after Christmas is the best time to slash prices and get the old stock out of there.  Also, in the same token, video games usually get reduced by a lot after Christmas, even if they’re ones that came out just in time for the holiday season.

- Vehicles. Like electronics, the new models are brought out toward the end of the year. Clearing a car lot of old models has been difficult in recent years (the most difficult since Cash for Clunkers a few years ago), so end-of-year sales that fall right after the holidays have become popular. If you’re even thinking about getting a new car, after the holidays may be a great time to look.

- Getting fit. Manufacturers and retailers alike take advantage of New Year’s resolution-makers in this regard. Home gym equipment, fitness videos, gym memberships, and even simple things like dieting journals and pedometers can be found for big discounts.

These definitely aren’t the only things that are great to buy after the holidays roll around, but they’re definitely some of the most popular. Also consider looking at jewelry and candy (maybe get ready for Valentine’s Day early?), baby items, and winter clothing (especially coats). There’s probably a ton more that I’m missing, but at least this gives you a starting point. So brave the crowds and look for those great end-of-year deals. Happy Holidays!

Why should finances add to your stress? We’re going to share 4 tips that can save your end of year budget from crashing and burning like so many other people deal with every year. Here are a few things that you can do to make your end of year a little less stressful for everyone in your family.

1. Stick to your budget and reevaluate for next year. Stick to it! If you have a budget set, you need to try and get to the finish line. Don’t overspend on gifts and groceries because you’re caught up in the moment. Also, take the month of December to sit back and reevaluate your budget for next year. Were you saving enough? Did any of your bills increase or decrease? Are you struggling financially, and if so, what can you eliminate to make your burden a little lighter? It’s never a bad thing to reevaluate, even if your conclusion is that your budget is fine as-is.

2. Get your stuff together for your taxes. I know, you aren’t required to get your W-2′s until January, but what about everything else? Charitable contribution receipts, medical bills that weren’t covered by medical insurance, home office expenses. If you have everything together, it’ll make the whole process easier when your W-2′s finally do come.

3. Cut expenses for holiday travel. It’s too late to buy tickets super early (my usual tip for travel), but it’s almost to the point where you may get the last-minute discounts, if you can find somewhere that has extra seats. Don’t check a bag if you don’t have to; many airlines have increased the cost of checking bags. Don’t eat on the premises unless you’re stuck for a long time. Gas prices have been going down and it’s starting to get cheaper to drive than fly to some places; calculate that before you go.

4. Be creative. If you’re struggling for cash, be creative in all of your end-of-year endeavors. I write letters to the teenagers I work with because there’s too many to get gifts for. Having a New Year’s Party? Make your own favors, get creative with inexpensive appetizers. Utilize free movies you may have access to via your TV or computer. Or, just stay at your house and play games!

The end of the year should be a fun and exciting time for everyone involved. You shouldn’t be stressing in any way, but hopefully, these tips help you out so that your finances are one less thing to worry about. Have a great weekend!

If you’re hosting a meal:

- Set a budget and stick to it. We all like to go all out for the holidays, especially when it comes to our families. But, the economy is still pretty rough. Set a budget; say that you want to spend no more than a certain dollar amount on dinner and stick to it! Coupons and grocery store fliers can help you in making this number a reality.

- Consider hosting a potluck. If you’re hosting the meal, anything goes. If the price may be a little heavy on you, consider asking each of your guests (or, if they’re all different families, set it by family) to bring a side dish or two. Some families have a specific person who always brings dessert, year in and year out. If that will help you from getting stressed and going broke, do it! Everyone else probably appreciates that you’re the one sacrificing a clean house to the holiday festivities.

- Or, just go out to dinner. More and more restaurants are open on Thanksgiving day, to allow for people to eliminate their stress totally and come in for a nice meal prepared by someone else. If your family is willing to change tradition a bit, maybe this is a great option for you.

If you’re buying gifts:

- Consider setting a dollar limit.  Like with making a meal, set a budget for your holiday shopping. My grandmother used to spend $100 per grandchild every year; I have no idea how she afforded that, but she set that number and stuck to it. Whether you set the dollar limit per person or for your overall holiday shopping plans, set that limit and stick to it. 

- Utilize Black Friday and Cyber Monday sales.  The best deals happen on Black Friday and Cyber Monday.  Also, many stores announce their sales way ahead of time; do a search on Google and you will find countless websites that have already done all of the work for you. You simply have to search for the item you seek and see if there’s a sale on it. Also, make sure to stick it out to Cyber Monday; electronics and other big ticket items can be delivered right to your doorstep for significantly less than what you may have spent ahead of time. 

- Organize a gift exchange.  Most of the kids in my family are now adults, and the topic of a Secret Santa-style gift exchange  has come up. No one’s really willing to budge, but, it’s a thought that has come up. Instead of having to buy for everyone, the gift exchange would make it so each of us only had to buy for one person, making each of our Christmas burdens significantly cheaper. If your family is in a similar boat, why don’t you consider doing this too?

So, eliminate the stress of the holidays and enjoy it as you should! Have a great weekend!

Electric: Now, I’m not going to sit here and tell you the common sense answers, but I do want you to know a couple things you may not have known could save you.

-        Shop around. In some states, like my home state of PA, you’re allowed to find who provides your electric. Your company stays the same, but they have various providers. Shop around, you could save a few cents.

-        Utilize the sun. I don’t turn the lights on when the sun’s out, except in my bathroom because there’s not any windows in there. The sun is there, why waste your precious electricity if there’s natural light? It’s better for you too. It also helps keep your house warm.

-        Prevent latent electricity usage. Electricity is used when items are plugged in, even if they aren’t being used. Unplug things that you don’t use often, or if you’re going away for vacation.

               Water:  I, thankfully, don’t pay for my water, but here are a couple things you can do to lessen your water and sewer bills if you’d wish to.

-        Enviromentally-friendly toilets. If you own your home, the low-flow toilets are a great idea. They use less water when you flush!

-        Fix leaks. Leaks totally kill your water bill. Calling a plumber to fix it is cheaper than letting it linger.

-        Take shorter showers. I grew up with a well. I learned how to take a 10 minute shower. It’s not as hard as it looks.

               Phone: Most homes today don’t have a house phone because so many people have cell phones. But in case you do, I’m sharing some ways to save on both your house phone bill and cell phone bill.

-        Consider a house phone. I use my house phone for a few purposes, and since it’s bundled with my internet, it costs me like $10 a month. This has helped me reduce my cell phone bill, first cause I can use it

-        If you have both a house and cell phone, drop long distance on your house phone. Your cell phone already has a certain amount of anyone, anywhere minutes. Why waste the money on long distance on your house phone?

-        Consider VoIP clients. My best friend and I don’t have the same cell phone provider, so if we can, we chat on Skype instead. Skype’s free if you aren’t using it for actual phone calls, but you can also consider it for phone calls for a small fee.

So, there you have it. Some easy ways for you to reduce necessary monthly bills. Until Thursday, have a great week!

-        The Internet. The internet is quite a good alternative for cable. Between finding silly videos on YouTube, playing games on various websites, and using Hulu and station websites to watch my favorite shows, I’m highly entertained for much less a month. I also listen to baseball games on there for $20 a year, satisfying my sports fix as well!

-        Netflix. Netflix and Blockbuster Online are both high-quality services that offer both movie rentals and online streaming. I don’t use the rental service, I only use online streaming, and I don’t feel like I’m missing anything. Newer movies aren’t on there, but I’m not a huge movie watcher, so I’m satisfied watching all of the great options they have… seasons upon seasons of various TV shows makes me quite happy.

-        Digital Converter Box. I have said I was going to invest in one of these for about a year. I still haven’t, for one reason or another. It’s just like the old rabbit ears you used to be, but in a little box you hook up. You get like 5-7 channels, depending on what’s available where you live, and it’s only for the cost of the box (approximately $50).

-        Books. Some of you are going to look at this and say that you don’t like to read. I understand… but everyone does like a good story. If you don’t like to sit and read on paper, then join an audiobook club like Audible. For less than a month of cable, you can get tokens for 1-2 books a month that you can listen to. It’s TV for your ears!

-        Radio. One of the biggest reasons that I watched TV in college was to make background noise while I was studying or writing a paper. After college, I realized that that same thing could be accomplished by something that I could get for free… the radio. Whenever I do work or chores, I turn the radio on, and all it costs is the minute amount of electricity it takes to run it.

If you’ve ever considered dumping your cable, these are some solid options for you. It’s worked for me thus far, maybe you should consider it. Have a great week!

Now before you think “oh, she’s one of those crazy couponers that you see on TV.” She’s totally not, she holds her PhD and is a Professor at the university I graduated from. And you too, can be an entirely normal person and benefit from the wonderful discounts that a little extra time can help you find. Here’s a couple tips for couponing effectively.

1. Utilize your store’s flyers and bonus cards. I love my local food store. It’s less than 2 miles from my house, they send me their flyers and I have a bonus card. Not only do I get great discounts, I accumulate points to get discounts on my gas too! And with how much gas costs nowadays, I need that.
2. Shop around. You shop around for a car, you shop around for a computer… why don’t you shop around for groceries. Now, I understand if you live in a small town with only one grocery store, there’s no point in driving a half an hour to a different one to save 10 cents. But if you live in an area with several stores, like I do, find where your staples are cheapest, and take a grocery tour instead of just a grocery trip.
3. Buy before the sell-by date. I got a half pound steak the other day for 2 bucks… it was originally 6. How did I get such a steal? Well, first, I had a coupon for 5% off my next purchase of $20 or more, but I also got it the day before the sell-by date. Bread and meat go for cheap at this point; if you’re worried about it going back, just freeze it! The sell-by date is also usually a freeze-by date.
4. Use the web. The internet has tons of websites for coupons and to compare deals. Why run between stores if you can get all the information that you need online. Always check with an anti-virus before downloading any programs that you may need to get in order to print your coupons, but most are reliable and safe. You can also get some pretty good deals for groceries on Amazon and other sites that offer online grocery shopping. Yes, it may feel like the lazy way to do things, but with Amazon’s free shipping for most orders over $25, you may be saving yourself both money and time.

Your food budget doesn’t have to break the bank. Follow these tips and know that couponing isn’t just for crazies… it’s a great way to find awesome deals! Have a great Labor Day weekend!

This week, there was well over 50 submissions and 37 made it to the festival. I had a great time reading these articles, they were awesome, but in order to keep the festival’s theme consistent, I had to omit articles that had no relevance to frugality. But I want to say that I tried my best to fit each article in this edition. First off, I want to share with you the definition of frugality from wiki:

Frugality (also known as thrift or thriftiness), often confused with cheapness or miserliness, is a traditional value, life style, or belief system, in which individuals practice both restraint in the acquiring of and resourceful use of economic goods and services in order to achieve lasting and more fulfilling goals. In a money-based economy, frugality emphasizes economical use of money in meeting long term personal, familial, and communal desires

I think this is a great definition of frugality. That is why I have chosen this definition as a baseline for this festival and have broken down into 7 strategies for frugality. This way, reader can pick what part of frugality they want to read about. But before we start, I want to thank all the contributors for their submissions, I learned so much from reading all the posts. I hope you can get out as much information out of this festival just as I have. Many great tips and suggestions here, also I made an asterisks(*) on the ones that I particularly enjoyed.

Okay, without further delay…

Welcome to the Festival of Frugality #83
*********************************
1.) Changing costly habits and/or suppressing instant gratification

Lower Your Cable and Internet Bill Today

Cutting The Cable Cord

Cut your Spending Today

2.) Reduction of wastes and bartering

House obsession

“Found” Money

Save Money by Using Less than Suggested Amounts

The Cost Of Living With Pampered Pets In Luxury And Some Really Weird Pet Products

3.) Seeking efficiency

7 Habits of Highly Effective Money Managers

Present Simplicity

*Ten Commandments of Frugal Living*

Resourceful West Virginians

*Are Poor People More Frugal Than Rich People?*

4.) Defying expensive social norms

Day 435: Riding the Rails

Clean your whole kitchen with baking soda and vinegar

Comfort and Style on a Cheapskate’s Budget

*Trash to Treasure: My Flower Power Pants*

10 Ways to Pay for College with OPM (Other People’s Money)

Save Money and Eat Healthier: Buy Frozen and Canned Produce

5.) Embracing free options

Libraries Are Not As Bad As You Think

*5-reasons-not-to-drink-bottled-water*

Frugal Fridays: The Library is More Than Books

Why MyPoints Is Worth Joining And What I Have Gotten From Them

Free or Low Cost Entertainment Ideas for Families

6.) Staying well informed about local circumstances

Buy American – Frugality Strategy?

For the Frugal Mind: Cheapest days to shop

Staple Rewards – How to Save Money at Staples

10 Ways to Save on Travel Expenses

7.) Market and Products

The Dollar Store

Don’t fear the warranty

Eco-friendly consumerism is still consumerism

Frugality, Morality & Harry Potter

Free Software Roundup: Not All Freeware is Created Equal

Frugal Way to Save Money on Lipstick

Do My Frugal Ways Harm Workers?

A Great Alternative to Buying Expensive Cameras, Lenses and other Photography Equipment

Clean, Safe, NonToxic Cleaners

Cost Effectiveness of Homemade Laundry Detergent-A Reader’s Question

Well that’s it. I hope you had a great read here, take with you as much as you can. If you see any articles here you enjoyed, please share it with your readers. Also, if you do not see your article here and think that it should be, please email me and let me know. I’ve been known to make mistakes every once and a while. Once again, I want to thank all the authors for their fantastic articles and don’t miss out on the next edition over at The Frugal Law Student.

1. Big Awareness. Through budgeting, it keeps me aware of how much I spend on the daily basis.
2. Saves me money. By knowing whats coming ahead and being able to plan, it helps me to spend less and less every month.
3. Smart planning. Knowing how much money I have allocated, daily budgeting keeps me financially aware of my situation.
4. Puts me in the right direction. Helps me to reach my financial goals.
5. Helps me Prioritize. By keeping a nice balanced budget, I don’t have room to always buy things that I want. Instead, I need to make sure that I am able to buy the things that I need first before being able to buy anything else.
6. It just feels good. The satisfaction of spending within my allocated funds is a great feeling and an accomplishment.
7. Helps reduce debt. Financial planning and strict budgeting is a great way to help reduce debt.
8. Keeps me in a positive financial mind set. When I’m consistently around numbers and percentages, I’m always being reminded to keep going.
9. I love numbers. I love to calculate and to see how I’m improving from month to month.
10. Organized. Being able to plan my budget has definitely helped me to be more of an organized person.
11. (Extra)I’m ready for those emergencies. Life is unpredictable and you never know what’s heading your way. Being on a budget prepares me for those emergency times when I need those extra few bucks.

Budgeting is a very nice way to keep track of all your expenses and it also helps you stay organized. The best thing is it only takes about 20 minutes per week. I recomend using this program called pear budget. Its an excel spreadsheet that keeps track of how much you spend on the daily casis. If you want to give it a try, you can download it for free here.

[Photo Credit]

Living well for less money is frugality. Leeching off of people to get by is cheap.

For example, I want to get a book for my brother for his birthday. Say I saw a nice book in new condition at a garage sale and I only spend $1.00 opposed to the $24.99 price at Barnes and Noble. Some people would see this as being cheap, only spending a dollar for a gift, however if this is something that my brother would like, it doesn’t really matter how much I spend. There is no point in spending more for the gift if I could get something the person would like just as much for a lot less. Now this kind of giving is just good money management, it’s not being cheap.

Some more example of frugal vs cheap:

• Frugal - Going to a buffet and eating enough to get full and satisfied.
• Cheap - Getting full and satisfied, then filling your pockets and bags before leaving
• Frugal - In a group, a person with 10 dollars would order at a restaurant taking in consideration of tip and tax.
• Cheap - In a group, a person with 10 dollars would order 10 dollars worth of food and intentionally leave the tip and tax for others to pay.
• Frugal - Satisfied with only spending a dollar on a kids meal for your child.
• Cheap - Ordering an extra kids meal for your self to avoid the regular price.
• Frugal - Deciding not to go out to eat because you don’t have enough for the food + tips, instead you go to buy something to make at home.
• Cheap - Intentionally going out to eat when knowing you don’t have enough to tip.

Important note: frugality is not just for those who are on low income. Take Warren Buffet for example. Big Warren, with a net worth of more than 42 billion dollars still live in the house he bought more than 40 years ago at $31,500. He also prefers a burger and a coke over an expensive lunch at his desk.