(February 19, 2009) – Avoid impulse buying and you’ll avoid impulse checkbook balance reduction.  Before you go shopping, make a shopping list.  Check out sales, particularly at the grocery store. [continue reading…]

(February 17, 2009) – Let’s face it – the big banks are in trouble.  For year’s they’ve made profits by charging their customers additional fees for everything.  When I had an account with a bank, it greatly annoyed me to see the bank charging a fee for savings – often the fee was higher than the interest earned. [continue reading…]

(February 15, 2009) – Here’s an easy way to avoid impulse purchases – make a 30-day list.  When you think you want to buy something, put it down on your calendar for 30-days later.  If you still want to buy it on the day it pops up on the calendar, go ahead.  Or just keep the list in your memory – maybe you’ll forget about the item. [continue reading…]

(February 13, 2009) – I suppose this one goes in the maybe category – maybe you can get away with it.  Instead of spending all that money on cards, flowers and gifts, why not surprise your honey with a hand-made gift?  O.K., hands down. The question was rhetorical. [continue reading…]

(February 12, 2009) – Here’s an idea that sometimes works to save – pill splitting.  It works like this.  If you normally take a 10-mg. dose of a medication, you might be able to buy a 20-mg pill for only slightly more.  If you cut the pill in half, you get two 10-mg. doses from the one pill. [continue reading…]

(February 11, 2009) – I just paid my automobile insurance and examined something for the first time.  If I paid the entire six-months, I saved several dollars.  Before, I had paid the extra thinking that I would make up the difference by keeping the second payment in a savings account. [continue reading…]

(February 10, 2009) – In the go-go days of a roaring economy, it was easy to just order movies, music and books from Amazon, Netflix or Blockbuster.  We aspiring tightwads, however, know a much cheaper way to entertain ourselves. [continue reading…]

(February 9, 2009) – Some owner’s manuals say certain automobiles require premium (expensive) gasoline.  Sometimes that’s bunk.  Sometimes the requirement is placed in the manuals so that the manufacturer can advertise a higher horsepower – horsepower that you probably don’t need. [continue reading…]

(February 7, 2009) – You can find deals at the grocery store in many ways.  First, there are those fliers – they’re stuffed into my mailbox every Wednesday.

But, like everything else, you can also find deals online.  [continue reading…]