The Simple Dollar Time Machine: July 3, 2010
Many newer readers of The Simple Dollar haven’t been exposed to the hundreds of great articles in the archives of the site, so this is a weekly series that highlights the five best posts from one year ago this week, two years ago this week, and three years ago this week. I call it … the Time Machine.
One Year Ago (June 27 – July 3, 2009)
Personal Finance 101: Why Do I Need Credit At All? Credit isn’t itself a bad thing – in fact, it has benefits besides getting yourself into debt. Mishandling of credit, though, can be a very, very bad thing.
The Best Money Advice, in Ten Words or Less I asked my 5,000 (at the time) Twitter followers to give me their best advice in ten words or less. This was the cream of the crop.
The Cheap Garbage Bag Dilemma I don’t buy cheap garbage bags. Garbage bags are something that I just don’t skimp on. Here’s why.
Blending Work and Family: How We Do It Given that I work from home and Sarah’s been off of work quite often with maternity leave and summer breaks, the lines between personal and professional are really blurred in our lives. Here’s how we deal with that blurring.
Ten Great Ways to Make Powerful Visual Reminders of Your Personal Finance (and Other) Goals Many of our most challenging goals (like changing our spending or eating habits) require constant, powerful reminders to succeed. Here’s how to make those reminders so that you don’t fall off of the wagon over and over again.
Two Years Ago (June 27 – July 3, 2008)
No Time for Frugality: Cutting Financial Corners with No Time Investment There are many frugal tactics you can execute without investing even a bit of time. Here are a handful of them.
A Clever Trick for Automatically Finding Deals You Want at Amazon I use this trick for Christmas shopping and also for keeping my eye out for very specific items that I’d be willing to pick up at a very low price.
The Minimalist Kitchen: What You Need (and Don’t Need) to Set Up Your First Workable Home Kitchen You really don’t need thousands of dollars worth of stuff to have a killer kitchen. You don’t need much at all, in fact.
Is Time the Difference Between Big Spenders, Frugal Folks, and Cheapskates? I think it’s at least part of the difference. I think how people use their time is also really important.
The Net Worth Mentality: The Road Less Traveled If you want a powerful way to track your personal finance progress, net worth is probably the single best number you can use. I use net worth myself, but I don’t use non-liquid assets in counting that number (no cars, no home).
Three Years Ago (June 27 – July 3, 2007)
SmartMoney Magazine’s “7 Money Mistakes” – And The Simple Dollar’s “7 More Money Mistakes” Trust me, there are way more than fourteen money mistakes out there.
Guilty Money: How Much Do You Have To Spend Frivolously Before You Feel Guilty About It? I really don’t have to spend much at all. I don’t like to spend money frivolously. If I know I’m going to go someplace to spend money freely, I put $X in cash in my pocket and keep my spending in that range. For most purchases, I study them to death before making a move (in contrast to how I used to spend freely).
Musings On Spending $3 On A Candy Bar It’s amazing how something so small can really connect with something so big.
How I Made Brown Bag Lunches Work For Me Now that I work from home, I eat leftovers for most of my lunches. When I don’t eat leftovers, I usually make a sandwich out of whatever’s on hand.
Overspending on Children and How to Fight It My biggest weakness – and my son is learning how to exploit it – is when my children behave really well and do everything I ask, then calmly and quietly ask for a toy or something at the store. Even more painful, if I say “no,” they’re starting to learn to just go “okay” and continue being good and mild-mannered.
If you’d like to browse through more of the archives, visit the chronology, where all posts are listed in chronological order.
Ten Ways to Get More out of The Simple DollarUpdated!
This is kind of a FAQ for new readers and is posted each week along with the Time Machine. Here are ten great ways for new readers to dig deeper into The Simple Dollar.
1. Subscribe by email or RSS. Visiting The Simple Dollar’s website is great, but for many people, it’s more convenient to receive the articles in another form. It’s easy to join 60,000 other subscribers and get The Simple Dollar’s content by email or in your RSS feeder (if you’re unfamiliar with RSS, check out Google Reader.
2. Comment. Each article on The Simple Dollar has lively discussion. Just click on the green square in the upper right of each article on the website and join in!
3. Become a fan of The Simple Dollar on Facebook. I put up questions and other materials about once every week or two on Facebook (so you won’t be flooded with Simple Dollar updates). Join in the conversation with other Simple Dollar fans and occasionally get some interesting freebies, too.
4. Follow me on Twitter. I post interesting articles, quotes, follow-up material, commentary, and other material on Twitter. Follow me! If you’re unfamiliar with Twitter, it’s essentially an open discussion forum for people to share ideas and thoughts with other like-minded folks – you just choose the people you want to listen to and their ideas and thoughts are all delivered to you on a single page.
5. Read my story of financial meltdown and recovery. The Simple Dollar isn’t based on what I’ve read in books or learned in school. I’ve made a lifetime of financial mistakes – The Simple Dollar is a record of what works for me during the process of getting my life on a better track.
6. Download my free 49 page e-book. Everything You Ever Really Needed to Know About Personal Finance On Just One Page is completely free. It summarizes all of the key lessons I’ve learned along the way about personal finance in one tidy package – in fact, all of the main principles can be found right on the cover.
7. Dig through “31 Days to Fix Your Finances.” 31 Days to Fix Your Finances is an article series that outlines how you can get a grip on your finances over the course of a month.
8. Send me your questions and suggestions. Send me an email and let me know what you’re thinking, what you’d like to see, and any questions you might have. I try to respond to as many emails as possible and I read them all. I may even use your question in a future article!
9. Become a “Friend of The Simple Dollar.” If you find the stuff on The Simple Dollar valuable and are willing to spend five minutes or so a month to help me out with small things, please consider signing up to be a “Friend of The Simple Dollar”.
10. Email a great article you find to a friend. Find an article that you think your friend would love? At the bottom of each article, you’ll find a link that says “Email this” – just click on that, type in your friend’s address, and send it right along to them!
Continue reading The Simple Dollar Time Machine: July 3, 2010 …
From The Simple Dollar.
Tenor Saxophone
I know this is a long shot but I always say “at least ask”.
My daughter is dying to have a tenor saxophone so she can play in jazz band next yet. She plays flute but of course that’s not a jazz band instrument.
I’ve looked at pawn shops and e-bay and just can’t find one can afford, under $200.
Would anyone happen to have one in good working order you would want to trade for books? The books make great gifts so you Christmas shopping could be done in one deal! 
If your interested please email me! Click the contact button above. Tawra
Continue reading Tenor Saxophone …
From Living On A Dime Blog » Living On A Dime Blog.
Your After-Christmas Shopping Checklist
A few days after Christmas, Sarah and I will usually head out to the store to stock up on post-Christmas sales. It’s often easy to find many items at bargain-basement prices in the days after Christmas – items which can easily be saved until next year.
We usually make a list of things to look for (as we do virtually every time we go shopping). I thought it might be worthwhile to share that list with you, to help you if you’re out and about the next few days and looking to shave some dollars off of next year’s Christmas budget (and maybe even net a few dollars right now).
Christmas lights If you need to replace some lights – or even just intend to hang more lights outdoors, as we do next year – now is the time to pick up Christmas lights, as many department stores deeply discount such lights. Even better, many energy companies will offer you a rebate for buying LED Christmas lights, so save your receipts and check with your energy company.
Wrapping paper and supplies Wrapping paper is an obvious thing that many people look for at after Christmas sales, but you can often find many other supplies on deep discount as well, such as gift wrapping tape and ribbon.
Cards We usually make our own Christmas cards (so if we see blank cards, we might pick them up), but for many people, Christmas cards can be a spectacular bargain right now as many stores are offloading them.
Non-perishable gift baskets Unsold gift baskets often go at a tremendous discount and if you can find ones that are non-perishable (like bath supplies and such), they can easily be stored for a year and given the following December. Many people often exchange such gift baskets with professional acquaintances and such, so this can be a tremendous savings. If you know you’ll be giving gift baskets of this kind for Christmas 2010, get them now and save yourself some cash.
Electronics – but only if you’re patient The Consumer Electronics Show takes place early each January. During that show, electronics companies unveil their product lines for the coming year and usually eliminate some product lines to replace them. Quite often, retailers know what lines are going to be cut and start trimming the prices on those lines to clear space for the new lines to be unveiled at CES. Thus, late December through January are great times to pick up home electronics.
Of course, you have to be careful with this type of sale. For starters, do not be afraid of the word “clearance” or other such words. Almost always, there’s nothing at all wrong with the model – it’s just being replaced by a different model in the coming year – one HDTV being replaced with a very similar HDTV with a higher price, for example. Also, different stores tend to handle such clearances differently, so you may want to simply shop around for a while to look for what you need. Don’t lock yourself into a particular brand or model – keep your eyes open. Write down clearance models, then research them at home.
Exercise equipment These items are usually on sale due to the upcoming New Year (and related New Year’s resolutions), but there are often spectacular bargains on basic exercise equipment in the week between Christmas and New Years.
The absolute most important thing to remember when considering sales is to focus only on stuff you actually need or have a direct use for. Buying things you don’t really want merely because they’re on sale is a sure way to put yourself in a worse financial position. If you’re intending to replace a flaky television, for example, now is the time to do it – but if you’re thinking of dumping thousands into upgrading your television by 4″, consider other uses for your money.
Continue reading Your After-Christmas Shopping Checklist …
From The Simple Dollar.
DetNews columnist shops at a dollar store
Brian J. O’Connor, columnist at the Detroit News, has a video clip of his Christmas shopping trip at a dollar store.
Brian has been writing the Save a Grand series in which he is cutting back on family budget category by category.
Continue reading DetNews columnist shops at a dollar store …
From Monroe on a Budget.
Don’t toss those sales fliers yet
The personal finance story that’s been making the national headlines last night and this morning includes statistics of how many people have not completed – in some cases have not started – their Christmas shopping.
Now the giggle factor is on those who procrastinate when Christmas is the same day every year. But behind the scenes …. some families have to wait for the next paycheck or a Christmas bonus check before they can finish up their shopping. Others hold off on errands until they go on Christmas break from work or college and have more time in their day.
If you are in those circumstances, don’t toss your sales fliers yet. I’ve been too busy with family matters this week to keep up with daily sales and deals reports for the blog …. but look in your newspapers and mail for the drugstore, grocery and toy store fliers before you go shopping. They aren’t just in the Sunday papers this time of year.
Rite Aid for example had a sales flier in the Wednesday edition of The Monroe Evening News. That’s not the normal sales flier cycle for that drugstore.
Continue reading Don’t toss those sales fliers yet …
From Monroe on a Budget.
Finding the Perfect Gift Without Spending Too Much
As I write this, I’ve spent about five hours online hunting down “perfect” gifts for various people on our Christmas shopping list.
In almost every case, I wound up spending less than our target dollar amount on our list. In almost every case, as well, I found a gift that I think is utterly perfect for the recipient.
Just a few years ago, I would have spent a crazy afternoon at a shopping mall taking care of my list in roughly the same time period. Two problems with that: I would have spent a lot more and the gifts would have been a lot worse.
What exactly did I do this year that was so different? This year, I tried an approach that I’ve been slowly building over the last few Christmases.
Instead of just coming up with gift ideas for each person right off the bat, I spent some time just thinking about each person on my list. What do they care about? What interests do they have? I used the internet to help me in this regard to research a few people and see what they were talking about.
If I didn’t know much of anything about them, I realized that (a) maybe I shouldn’t be buying them gifts in future years or (b) I should spend some time getting to know them better. After all, if you can’t come up with at least some framework of what the person is passionate about or interested in, what basis is there for the relationship? Why give a gift at all?
So, one result out of this is that I know a few gift exchanges I’m going to drop out of next year and I know a few relationships I need to work on in 2010.
Back to the main point.
For each person on my list, I tried to write down five to ten words that describe them in some fashion. I’ll list the eight words I came up with for someone on my list: funny, board games, video games, quiet, smart, chemistry, outdoors, bicycle, camping.
I dropped that list of words into Google and read the first few pages of links.
Virtually every time, one of those pages pointed me straight to an idea I hadn’t even considered before as a gift – something that just worked perfectly for that person. It worked on the order of 90% of the time. The best part was that, once I had that gift idea in mind, I was often able to find that gift for an amount less than I expected to spend on them.
On the occasions when it didn’t work, I just went back to the list of words again, eliminated half of them that didn’t seem to fit as well, and then worked on other ones. I would try different smaller sets of the words. Each time, within two or three tries, I found myself on some path towards a really great, surprisingly inexpensive gift.
Here’s the real truth: great gifts come from caring about people as individuals and thinking deeply about that person, not from just trying to find something so you can knock another person off of your Christmas list. Lead with the person, not with the gift, and let the tools we have at our fingertips lead you towards the right gift. Time and time again, you’ll find something perfect – and you’ll save money.
And no, I won’t mention the gift idea I found. That person is a Simple Dollar reader, after all.
Continue reading Finding the Perfect Gift Without Spending Too Much …
From The Simple Dollar.
CNNMoney: How to give when the giving gets tough
Are you wondering how to support your favorite causes and charities when your income has dropped?
CNNMoney has lots of tips in this report How to give when the giving gets tough.
The story includes a southeast Michigan angle. A snippet:
What makes the situation especially heart-rending is that charities need help more than ever. And nowhere is that truer than in Detroit.
As the metro area’s unemployment rate has soared to 17.8% vs. 9.8% nationally, the amount of money that most charities there collect has plunged. For example, contributions to United Way for Southeastern Michigan fell 21% in its latest fiscal year. (That compares to a 5% drop for the average United Way.)
Now here is my favorite charity donation tip for families on a budget, and I posted it on the CNN comment board: Let your regular household and Christmas shopping spin off into charity donations.
Link your grocery shopper cards to a participating charity so donations will be made to those causes (Kroger and Meijer will do that); and / or buy your local and national retail gift cards from a church or school that sells those gift cards as a fundraiser.
Continue reading CNNMoney: How to give when the giving gets tough …
From Monroe on a Budget.
Black Friday shopping etiquette
A couple of weeks ago, the Mall of Monroe hosted more than 2,000 people for a meet-and-greet with movie star Peter Facinelli of “Twilight” fame.
One of the things I noticed most about of that day was not just the size of the crowd – but the fact it was a cheerful and well-behaved crowd. That’s despite the fact that more than twice as many people showed up as the mall officials expected. (Here’s the photo gallery at monroenews.com.)
If you were in that celebrity meet-and-greet line, or heard about it, keep those good manners in mind when you go back to the mall and the other local retail stores on Black Friday.
BlackFriday.com has this piece: Shopping Etiquette – How to be Polite and Still Get a Good Deal on Black Friday.
A snippet:
Take only what you need. Many people grab up all of one item in the hopes to eBay it for more money. Remember that others are here trying to provide Christmas for their families and only take the number of the item you actually plan on giving to other people.
Seriously, people. This is not the year to hog the presents. A lot of families in southeast Michigan are on a budget right now – and not all of them qualify for the charity baskets or programs. Let everyone have a little Christmas.
Continue reading Black Friday shopping etiquette …
From Monroe on a Budget.
DetNews: Michigan retailers face chilly holiday season
The Detroit News focused on Michigan retailers in this Christmas shopping forecast story: Retailers face chilly holiday season.
A snippet:
Gift cards, free shipping deals on the Web and no-frills presents such as books and music are expected to see an upswing this holiday season.
But the steep markdowns on electronics, clothing, sporting goods and furnishings that shoppers enjoyed last year aren’t likely to be found. Saddled with extra merchandise after last year’s banking collapse, retailers have scaled back inventory dramatically.
The shift in merchandise specials toward lower-priced items is not entirely a bad thing.
For years, shoppers would be buzzing about expensive gifts that weren’t in my budget even with a Black Friday deal. But this year, I’ve noticed good prices and promotions for items that are usually on my Christmas shopping list or worth considering: Christmas cards, boxed chocolates, movies, books, Christmas tree ornaments and iTunes cards.
So if you are the frugal sort to begin with, it looks like the 2009 deals are made for you.
You’ll find the promotions I’ve found so far for stores in the Monroe, Mich., area under sales and deals and Black Friday 2009.
Continue reading DetNews: Michigan retailers face chilly holiday season …
From Monroe on a Budget.
Quote of the Day
This time of year is beyond busy for me. Besides all of the usually Thanksgiving and Christmas preps we also have one of our biggest books sales at this time and to make things even more interesting I normally bake any where from 3,000 to 5,000 gingerbread men between Nov. 1 and Christmas. No that isn’t a typo. To say I need to be organized and plan ahead is an understatement so I really need today’s quotes.
Be sure to plan ahead. Remember it wasn’t raining when Noah built the ark. That goes for everything. Don’t wait until you have an emergency happen or get in a bind to start getting your debt under control or start saving. Do it now before it starts “raining”.
I had to stick in this next quote because I find this way to true in my life.
Lose an hour in the morning and you will spend the rest of the day looking for it.
Seriously though it really does pay to plan ahead. We expect our children to work hard in school preparing and planning for their future. We expect them to get their homework done on time and keep it organized and other things at school but we don’t do it ourselves in our own lives. ( And we wonder who they learned to procrastinate from and not to plan ahead from. Hummm???)
So start doing a little planning. Whether it is your meals, your Christmas shopping, Thanksgiving dinner or how much you are going to spend on gifts. Get an early start and plan ahead.
Jill
Continue reading Quote of the Day …