A huge thanks to Darlene for telling me about Frugal Village. I spent the majority of the day yesterday there reading tips and hoping to get some great advice. That advice was found!
I have set up a whole list of our credit cards and the monthly amounts and such, including the honest truth of how long it will take to pay them off. Wow! That is all I can say. But I have also learned a few tips and want to pass them on to all of you out there!
1. Budget Billing with your Power Company may not be a good thing! We were on budget billing until yesterday. I was looking over and noticing that over the past year we paid more on our “budget billing” then our actual usage amount would have been. I added this all up and I want you to know that we have paid in this past year, $450 more then what we should have!! I called the power company and they said that it doesn’t go for just that year, but overall. The lady said also that last year for 3 months we paid less with budget then our actual amount, yes, but that was only 3 months! Plus look at what we paid more this past year. So, starting next month we will be on actual usage. Yay!
2. Cutting power bills. We had already started doing this trying to get the budget bill to drop. Now we will be paying less a month. But, to pay even less, we are going to keep our heat set to 68 degrees at night. (we all have flannel sheets on the beds, plus the kids sleep in long sleeve and long pant pjs) And then during the day, we will keep it at 70 degrees. Plus when lights, tvs, etc. aren’t in use we will keep them turned off! So starting tonight no more leaving the computer on all night. Our actual amount for the power bill would have been $176 so, let’s see how much we save!! : )
3. Instead of throwing away left overs, we are going to feed them to our outside dog. She is called the outside dog, because well she lives out doors. She is a lab/chow and big! She loves the outdoors, and we are spending a fortune on her dog food. Just giving her a little left overs every now and then will keep us from completely wasting our food and save us money on her food.
4. Our grocery bill is pretty cheap for a family of 4 as it is. We only spend about $260 a month. I know! Well, I am going to try and do better than that. We won’t starve, I promise, but I think that trying to eat more frozen fruits and veggies and less fresh ones will result in lower costs. Plus, eating more soups for lunch instead of sandwich’s and more oatmeal for breakfast instead of sausage and biscuits will help!
5. We aren’t going anywhere! I mean that too. If it’s not a necessary trip, like to the grocery store or to pick up Kayla from school, etc. We will just stay home. We tend to spend something every time we step into a store. So this way, we won’t be spending any extra money!
6. Planning ahead. Every year we take our tax return and pay our taxes and insurance for our house. This year it’s no different. But, we also will be paying off Best Buy, the tv that Zack just had to have. And then the rest, I was thinking of paying off something else, depending on how much we get back.
7. Credit cards…I have transferred half of a balance to another credit card and will be saving about $40 a month plus however much in interest from one of those cards.
Wish us luck! We will need it. If you have any other advice…Please feel free to let me know!
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