10 Ways To Save Money Now

Times are certainly tough and whether you have lost your job, nervous about losing your job or your totally safe, saving money is always a good thing, right? Below you will find a list of 10 ways to save money now. None of them are rocket science and in fact are probably things we've all even thought about doing, but were just to lazy to do so.

The list is not in any particular order of importance.

Pre-paid Cell Phones
I'll admit it. I basically think all cell phone companies are demon spawn that initially used the "put the fear of God" into people marketing technique to get us all to buy one. You know what i'm talking about. You just HAVE to have a phone in case you have an accident, or need to get in touch with little joey to let him know you'll be late. Now they are all about texting, and gaming, and ringtones. Not so much the talking to other people directly anymore. Either way, your probably spending upwards of $50-100+ each month just for the random chance you will actually wet your pants and need to quick ship a new pair or shorts to yourself from Amazon. That or your paying for minutes that you just never even utilize. Well screw that action! Save yourself some coin and go buy one of those pre-paid phones or pay as you go. You might pay a bit more for the air time but who the hell cares? You'll still end up saving money based on what you were doing before.

Pizza Coupons
So I went and got 2 large pizzes from our ex-favorite pizza chain (blog posting for another time) and it cost me $37 bucks. $37 bucks for two fricken pizza's? Are you fricken kidding me? I have since learned that this chain actually has a website, and they have online coupons that you can print out, thus getting those 2 for $20 or 2 for $15 deals you always see the chains advertise on TV. In short...NEVER pay full price for pizza. Your a fool if you do. Just jump online to your favorite chain and print out their coupons.

Newspaper Subscriptions
WHY on earth do you still have a newspaper subscription? If your reading this it is because you have noted the fact Al Gore invented the internet, thus making the availability of the news, for free, just a click away. I know, your excuse if you still need it for the Sunday comics and all the advertisements. (Guess what, those are all online too!)

Balance Transfer Credit Cards
So not a week goes by that I dont get snail mail junk mail asking me to apply for the next best titanium platinum gold plates iron man card. Normal procedure is to insert into recycle bin. Out of bordom I actually opened one up a few weeks ago and along with the card offer was a advertisement to also do a balance transfer and get 0% interest on that part of the balance for like 6 months. Interesting. If you stop and think about it, and you feel you can pay off that balance within the 6 months...you can save yourself some nice coin by opening up the card and pushing the balance from the high interest card over to it. Basically you get a interest free loan for that 6 months on a balance you otherwise would have paid that fun interest fee. I found this list of balance transfer credit cards on the web, that Al Gore created of course.

Buy Pre-Viewed DVD's
Do you buy lots of DVD movies? If you can wait a couple of weeks after the initial release you can buy the movies at roughly half price at your local blockbuster store on their pre-viewed movies tables. Recently they had a 4 for $20 sale at my local store. I probably have 10 or so movies this way now and I've never had a problem with any of the discs. In fact, they are probably in better shape then most of the other DVD's I own. Hey, I have kids...what do you expect?

Buy Gas at Costco
Next time your picking up that 50 pack of toilet paper and the 20 gallon jar of mayo at Costco check to see if they are a part of their gas club. If they do have pumps we've noted they are at least $0.10 less per gallen then all the local gas stations. May not seem like a big deal but when gas spikes back up, which we all know it will...every penny counts.

Bring your lunch to work
As a working stiff I've noticed that the vast majority of people at work just go out to eat instead of bringing something from home. The average lunch seems to be anywhere from $5-10 so if your doing this 5 days a week your looking at anywhere from $25 - $50 a week or $100 - $200 a month depending on how often and where you go. Now THAT is not chump change. Think what you could do with an extra couple hundred bucks a month.

Consolidate Insurance Carriers
Not sure everyone has this option but one thing we did was consolidate all of our misc. insurance items (car, home, life) with just one provider. By doing so we actually get a discount from the carrier. Aside from that I'd totally suggest you just get a free quote from a company like progressive.com to make sure your not getting screwed by your current company.

Get Some Exercise
Hey fatty...get off your butt. Huh? What did he just say? Well, think about it for a second. Looks how many health issues, minor AND major are caused simply by being out of shape. Diabetes, high blood pressure, etc. Now if we all just got off our lazy butts a couple of times a week maybe we'd all be a little healthier, we'd be less stressed because exercise helps lower that and we'd be visiting the doctor less. Seems like a silly idea but hey, it's true dont you think? God knows I could lose a few pounds.

Dump Starbucks or make a Ghetto Latte
Love em' or hate em' Starbucks is coffee king and if your like me you might as well just have your paycheck auto deposited into their company account each month. Are you drinking 1-2 Vente Latte's a day? If you can quit you just gave yourself $100-$200 a month raise. Cant stop? Has the drug got you? No worries. Just save yourself some money and buy a large coffee but have them leave a ton of room for cream and make yourself a ghetto latte. Basically it's a poor (cheap) latte.

- Scott