by Trent Hamm
Available in 24 free installments
Owner:
65. Cut your own hair. I can cut mine myself with a pair of clippers, for example. I just cut it really short every once in a while and don't worry about it too much. Just put a garbage bag over the bathroom sink, bust out the clippers and scissors, and get it done. Two or three cuts will pay for the clippers, and then you're basically getting free haircuts. With a bit of practice, you can make it look good, too.
66. Carpool. Is there anyone that lives near you who works at the same place (or near the same place) that you do? Why not ride together, alternating drivers each day? You can halve the wear and tear and gas costs for your car - and for your acquaintance as well.
67. Cut back on your oil changes. If you're methodically following your dealership's recommendation and getting an oil change every 3,000 miles, you might want to take a peek at your car's owner's manual. Most modern cars only need an oil change every 5,000 miles and many models use one even less frequently than that.
68. Get a crock pot. A crock pot is perhaps the best deal on earth for reducing cooking costs in a busy family [72] , You can just dump in your ingredients before work, put it on simmer, and dinner is done when you get home. There are countless recipes out there for all variety of foods, and every time you cook this way, you're saving money as compared to eating out.
69. Do some basic home and auto maintenance on a regular schedule. Instead of just waiting until something breaks to deal with it, develop a monthly maintenance schedule J73_l where you go around your home (and your car) and perform a bit of maintenance where it's needed. This little activity, taking you just an hour or two a month, will keep things from breaking down and help you see problems before they become disasters.
Everything PF
http://www.thesimpledollar.com
70. Pack food before you go on a road trip. Have everyone pack a sack lunch for the trip. That way instead of stopping in the middle of the trip, driving around looking for a place to eat, spending a bunch of time there, and then paying a hefty bill, you can just eat on the road or, better yet, stop at a nice park and stretch for a bit [74] . Plus, you'll save a lot of money and a fair amount of time this way.
71. Go through your cell phone bill, look for services you don't use, and ditch them. Sit down and go through each item on your bill and see if there's anything there that you don't use, like a surfeit of text messages or web access or something to that effect. Then call your cell phone company and ask to have those services eliminated. Boom, you're saving money.
72. Consolidate your student loans. Interest rates are quite low right now, so it might be worthwhile to consolidate your student loans into one low-rate package. Look into the various student loan consolidation packages - even a 1% reduction on a $10,000 loan saves you $100 a year - and your loan is probably bigger than that (and the rate cut you could get is probably bigger).
73. When buying a car, go for late model used. These are typically cars coming straight off of leases, meaning they were cared for by reliable owners. Look at late model used first and foremost - and use those prices as your baseline when comparing older used cars and new cars (don't exclude those options - exceptional deals and particular market conditions might point you towards another option on occasion). My truck was purchased with this criteria and has lasted me several years already with only one significant issue - and I saved a ton of money on the purchase price over buying new. Only now is it beginning to show significant signs of aging - and with the money I saved on that purchase, I was able to get out of debt that much quicker.
74. Hit the library - hard. Don't look at a library as just a place to get old books. Look at it as a free place to do all sorts of things [75] , I've used it to learn a foreign language, meet people, use the Internet anonymously, check out movies and CDs, grab local free newspapers, and keep up on community events. Best of all, it doesn't cost a dime.
75. Use a simple razor to shave. I've been a big advocate of the basic safety razor for a long time [76] , but that's just one piece of the puzzle. For "normal" shaves, I just shave
in the shower and dry off the blade afterwards, using just soap for lather - incredibly cheap, since I only swap blades once every few weeks. The real moral of the story? Use a simple razor - not an expensive electric one that stops working in three years - and shave your face when it's wet. You can get a very good shave with some practice and save a lot of money over the long haul.
