Your Frugal Friend-Tip Six

Money saving tip #6-Do not be afraid to call your cable/phone/internet company to try to get a lower monthly bill and rate.

We cannot take credit for this. We heard it on one of the news shows. I think ABC. So, about a week later, I asked Mr. Wild to give it a shot. He called our satellite provider. He started by talking about the competition. Then, it turned out the competition didn't have as good of a deal. He went back to our provider and asked for their customer retention representatives. Turns out they really have these people. They gave us our DVR service for free, took $5 more off our bill, and, as long as we stayed with them for 24 months, would give us the first, 10th and 20th month free. The catch is that we have to stay with them for 24 months. So, if we wanted to cancel the bill altogether, we'd end up paying a fine. We're not in dire straights, and I don't think that will be necessary over the next 24 months. It was nice to shave a bit off our bill.

The catch is, that you probably should be willing to walk if your company is not willing to deal. Be sure to find some competition that compares apples to apples, so that if you do need to walk, you have an alternative. What was that mom always taught you? No idle threats? Works on kids, would work on companies, too.

I guess the other catch is that you or your spouse can be insistent with your service providers. I know some people are timid when it comes to this kind of thing. Mr. Wild is not, and I'm lucky that way.

So, we're enjoying free satellite this month. I thought Mr. Wild did pretty good. Now, if he would please tackle the phone bill.

Your Frugal Friend-Tip Four

Money saving tip #4: Put something away for retirement and college.

But maybe not all of it in mutual funds, IRAs, ERAs.

Actually, we're not sure about that yet. We're meeting with our finance guy (yeah, funny, we have a guy) this coming weekend, to see what damage the stock market has done. But we have our account set up to automatically take money every month to buy more stock in one of those accounts. Instead of a lump sum at one time, say, at the end of the year. That way, during the down turn, we're buying stock low, so we get more stock for our money at this point. When it goes higher, our account will quickly go higher. But I'm worried about when that turn around in the stock market will come.

We're young. We have at least 30 more years until retirement (maybe more, they keep moving the social security age back). As it is, I don't think my husband nor I feel like there will be any social security once we come of age. You'd think I'd be mad about my Social Security taxes taken from my check, since I don't think I'm getting any? No, because an obligation has been made to the older generations about their retirement. Social Security probably should have been reviewed, recalculated and rehauled once every ten years to keep it healthy, but our representative government is not really conducive to planning ahead. Votes are gotten by things that happen for your constituents here and now. I heard this said about a city council once, and I think it doubly triply quadruply infinity applies to our federal government.

I'm a bit worried though about my son's education. I do not expect to be able to pay for all of it. But I would like to be able to pay for part of it. In addition, I am hoping, no, I'm banking on it, that he will get scholarships. Yeah, nothing like pressure on a kid still in elementary school. I'm actually banking on hoping both of them will get academic scholarships. Because I did. It really does help. A lot.

In addition, I have no pie in the sky ideals about sending them to Harvard or Yale (once, I imagined myself going to Yale. Ha!). Just a good solid public state university, with in-state tuition. I prefer that to community college, because frankly, I don't want them living at home. Hence, I would like to help pay for room and board, on campus, if need be.

So, as everyone says, we should probably diversify more. This probably means that in addition to IRAs and ERAs and annuities, I should look into CDs (the interest sucks), savings accounts (interest sucks) and maybe savings bonds (good for middle term investments, between 5 and 10 years, see about.com; it was a handy article).

But, we need to keep putting aside the money. No matter what. And do our best not to touch it. As we contemplate things like braces, Mr. Wild and I are looking at other parts of our budget and what to cut back. Savings is not one of them, no matter how we are distributing those savings.

Looking for Frugal Favorites

I'm still looking to add to my Frugal Menu from you folks. Maybe my parameters were too tight. Kid-friendly AND adult-friendly might be asking too much. And the ease of preparation to rival getting take out, okay, maybe a bit unrealistic.

BUT, I would like your help with recipes and/or meal ideas. Here, I'll get you started. Mr. Wild's favorite meal to fix (the man loves chopping things up, you gotta love that)

Tacos

Brown the hamburger. Use prepackaged taco seasoning WITHOUT silicon dioxide (the brand we have at the moment is Carlita's, but when we run out, I'm trying to make my own) with whatever water they tell you to use and simmer for 5-10 minutes.

Put tacos shells on a pan (we used Carlita's again [FYI it is a SuperValu brand]) and bake according to directions. Make sure you time it, you might get burned taco shells otherwise (and yes, that can happen).

Chop up any of the following: lettuce, tomatoes, onions

Also, make some SteamFresh frozen veggies (we like the corn), serve in a bowl, and chop up fruit into a fruit salad. Put some shredded cheese on the side, maybe salsa, maybe a little light sour cream, maybe ketchup (don't ask, at least the kids eat the tacos).

Voila, dinner!

What?! You want me to tell you what it cost per serving? Pshaw! At least we ate at home around our dinner table. At the very least, we didn't spend any money on gas.

What's on your table?

Your Frugal Friend--Your Frugal Tips

We like to eat out occasionally, but with some family economics creeping in (kid needs braces), we're cutting back on some things. One of them is the eating out. Instead of once a week, I am trying to cut it to once a month. I just find that sometimes it feels so much easier to go grab something from some local restaurant and not have cooking dishes to clean up. We also suffer from the "What's for dinner" syndrome, where I come home and Mr. Wild says, "What do you want tonight?" One of the ways I try to alleviate this is to come up with 4-5 meals that we can buy groceries for and then Mr. Wild can pick one for that night and work on it. It is much better for my overtaxed brain after work, than trying to think about what food to make right when I arrive back from work. We only do 4-5, because we want to leave a night or two to allow for a leftover meal. No reason for all that food to go to waste if there's extra.

Any of you have suggestions for quick and tasty, kid and adult friendly meals that can make little mess (that may be a more difficult challenge) and be done quickly? If you have recipes for one dish meals, or the like, please leave them in the comments section. We will all appreciate it! I'll do a follow up post and get you all to vote for your top three-five, maybe post a five day planner of our favorites.

Have at it folks!

Your Frugal Friend--Stuff you need to know

Economic Stimulus Plan: Do you know what's going on? I'm not sure I know or understand all of it. But Skywriter over at November Fifth is putting together a nice summary. But beyond the summary, she asks you, the reader, to look it over as well. So I have. And I think I need to read it through more carefully. I have some thoughts on the economy that I'm working on for a post. I am not an economist by any far stretch of the imagination, but I can tell you what I see and what I think from my view point, here in small town midwest.

Do yourself a favor and instead of ignoring the politicians, pay attention. And pay attention to your representative. And start making comments to him/her. If you're on-line reading this, then you probably have email and email isn't that hard to use. Many people spent the last eight years ignoring. The new administration is promising transparency, so demand it from your government.

No, you may not get everything you want or believe in, that's why there is compromise, but also, don't sit and hrumph around just because you didn't get what you wanted, keep talking (and not shouting and not accusing and not participating) or life will move ahead without you and you'll wonder what happened.

Your Frugal Friend-Tip Three

Money saving tip #3: Don't spend more than 25% of your monthly income on your housing.

Housing=mortgage payment+taxes/12+home insurance/12+private mortgage insurance (try not to have this though) or monthly rent+renter's insurance/12

Bankers want you to think you can spend 28% or 30% or even more on monthly housing. Or at least they used to. When we went for our first home mortgage, I was shocked that they would let us have a loan that would end up costing us 36% of our monthly income. Needless to say, we looked for a cheaper house that would get us down in the 25% range. I think we were closer to 28%, but I was at least still more comfortable with that. When we moved out of the Chicago suburbs, we had a nice tidy sum from our old two-bedroom house that allowed for us to put down 40% on our new four bedroom house, making our monthly payment within the 25% of our new one-income budget.

Where did I get the 25%? Good old mom! Yup, when she was getting her degree in Home Economics, one of the things she learned was that housing should be no more than 25% of your income. Sure, that was in the late 1960s. But why should that advice not continue to work now? She gave me that piece of advice at some point. It stuck.

How can this translate for you? Well, check what your current housing payment, plus a twelfth of your insurance and taxes is at the moment. Is it around 25%? Maybe a little higher? Maybe really high? If it is really high, it might help to think about refinancing, which will work if you plan on being in your home for at least another five years. A lower interest rate can really help to bring down the costs. Also a re-evaluation of the equity you have in your home might also get you off of private mortgage insurance, which will also bring down your monthly payment. But you also should have cash for the closing costs. Rolling it into the mortgage can cost you lots more in the long run. On our first house, we did refinance and brought down our payment by $400. That was a huge help.

Hmmm...maybe we need to bring Home Economics back. It seems lots of people have ended up on the ropes, because they don't understand how to manage their own home economics. They aren't learning it on their own either. Maybe it should be in schools again. And not just the sewing and cooking, but the managing budgets. If they had forced us all to take something about managing budgets in junior high or high school, maybe the average person's economy might be doing better.

Your Frugal Friend-Tip Two

Money saving tip #2: Do not pay for anything with a credit card that you couldn't pay for with cash.

Well, that's what we do. That's what my parents did. Mr. Wild's parents did not have a credit card at all until I think we were dating, or even married (this would have been in the early or mid 1990s). So obviously, we come from very cautious credit card users who try to make sure that every month's balance is zero.

What Mr. Wild and I found is that if you use some of those cards with rewards this way, it is like getting free money. We have an Amazon card we pay off every month. For every $2500 in purchases we get a $25 gift certificate for Amazon.com. Since we don't have a balance, and don't carry interest on it, then the $25 is like free money. Those certificates have come in mighty handy at Christmas time. Or on the occasion that we want to pick up something rather expensive. We save up our certificates and then can get something. You can buy lots at Amazon.com. We got our PS2 this way.

We also have one main credit card we use. We try to close other credit card accounts as we decide we don't need more than one. I say no to all the store cards and so forth. They don't really offer anything more special than our Amazon Visa and we really can use Visa everywhere.

If you're carrying a balance on your credit card(s), get that balance down to zero, cancel all cards but one, then use the one as if you're paying with cash. If you're not sure you will have the money to pay it off at the end of the month, then don't go ahead with that purchase until you can be sure you have the money.

I know these are repeats of what you may have heard on TV or read about, but it is absolutely true. Try to treat credit cards as a convenient way to handle your cash. Don't treat them like "credit" cards, because using them for credit is essentially highway robbery. If you are one of those people too tempted for using them as credit, then get rid off all but one and then put it away in your house and try to pay cash always. If you can't stand waiting until you have the money to buy the next new thing, you need to seriously double check your priorities. There is nothing wrong with deferred gratification and it is going to be a really good thing for your kids to learn.

Your Frugal Friend-Tip One

Ok, this is not my idea. This was totally my mom's idea. She thinks we're pretty responsible with our household spending (thanks, Mom, we appreciate that) and thinks we could share something with other people. But I liked it and I wanted to see if I could help anyone out in these economic times. I intend to share some money-managing/money-saving tidbits with you folks and anyone else out in the ether that is interested. I intend to request suggestions from folks, too. And, I intend to not be totally serious.


Money saving tip #1: Marry someone Dutch.


You know what they say about Dutch people. You've heard of the saying "going Dutch."* They have that reputation for being cheap. You've heard the joke about their dead and bike racks.** See, problem solved! I cannot take credit for this tip, Mr. Wild came up with it.


Yeah, ok, not practical for most of you who are already married. This is a running joke in our household. Mr. Wild is half Dutch. Well, okay his Dutch ancestors came over to the midwest, set up in the Pella area, eventually his dad was born, and his dad married his German descendent mom, so that makes him half Dutch and half German. Since those enclaves of people probably never married outside their ethnic groups until his parents did (shock! gasp! breaking with tradition, yeah, another running joke), I like to point out that he is still truly half Dutch and German.


My practical suggestion is to make sure that you and your spouse understand each other's expectations of spending money and where you are stand in the bank account and what you each will accept for being involved in the decisions for big purchases. We are lucky in that our spending habits actually mesh and our appetites for "stuff" are about the same and still fit within our means. I know of some other couples where there is tension due to very different attitudes about spending money, what is acceptable debt to be carrying, and what are appropriate large purchases for the family unit. If you feel that there is tension and you avoid talking about it, you need to talk and both sides need to listen to the other. It also helps if you budget, or, at least, add up all the expenses for a month and look at your monthly income compared to that number. Do not forget your car insurance, divided by six for a monthly cost, house insurance divided by 12 for a monthly cost or taxes divided by 12 for a monthly cost. You need to talk and you need to try to get on the same page. And you don't need to buy everything you think of exactly right now, at this moment. Kids, either. Practice deferred gratification. You'll thank me for it and your kids will thank you for it.


We are practical modern people and we enjoy our perks to life as much as everyone else. We are not off the grid, grow/make our own food, heat with wood pellets, avoid restaurants and avoid cable type of people. We both have done living history, and neither of us want to "live history" everyday. We could, but we don't want to. But we also know what our means are and stay within that. Some things might have to go or be set aside for a much long time than we anticipated. We'd like a newer, bigger TV, but the two we have are working just fine, we don't need to convert for the HD switch over, so we'll continue as we are.

So, look for more tips in the coming weeks. Once a month, I'll try to come up with a "tips" theme and have everyone write in with their own.


*A "going Dutch" story: When Mr. Wild and I were first dating, on one of the dates, when we were done, I offered to pay for coffee, dinner, something. Mr. Wild was sooo incredibly excited that I offered to pay. He doesn't really remember this, but I remember he was like you could knock him over with a feather when I offered to pay. I always figured that's what sealed the deal on our relationship.
**Dutch joke (I apologize if this offends anyone): Why do the Dutch bury their dead with their butts sticking out of the ground? Because they need bike racks.