“Cheaper Than Cheap” is a recurring tip series about frugality. The idea is to provide helpful frugality tips that border on fanatical to the point of being humorous. Love them or hate them, let’s hear what you think. Cheaper Than Cheap Tip #2 – Hypermiling In the age of $3.00 /gallon gas we are bombarded with tips for increasing our fuel economy. I have mentioned how keeping your tires inflated can increase safety and fuel consumption. Other common tips for better gas mileage include using cruise control, avoiding traffic, and driving less aggressively. Hypermiling takes getting the best MPG to [...]
Read MoreJuly 2007
This is a guest post by Tehn Yit Chin over at @ Cheap as Chips, “a personal finance blog with an Australian spin”. Lend him some support by checking out his site. We, as parents, have an enormous responsibility to our children. As soon as they are born, we are responsible for their well being. Initially, we give them care and ensure that they are healthy. As they grow, our responsibility shifts to their behavioral development, and one aspect of this is the way our children see financial matters being handled. One of the ways that children learn is [...]
Read MoreThis is a guest post by Mark over at @ Financing Your Family, a newer blog that focuses on helping readers to be “smarter with their money, closer to their family, and willing to work towards worthwhile goals”. Lend him some support by checking out his site. When I talk with people about there financial goals, there is one thing that tips me off as to whether or not they will be successful or not, and that is how they describe their goals. Some examples of goals I’ve heard are: “I want to be rich someday,” “I want to have [...]
Read MoreThis is a guest post by Double Eagle over at @ Life in the Rough. Life in the Rough is a golf blog. One of the best in my opinion. A good place to visit if you are looking to learn a few things about golf or drop a a few stokes off of your game. The golf tips are intermixed with his personal journey to fulfill a dream by becoming a golf professional. Double Eagle is very active in his comments section and enjoys answering his readers questions. Lend him some support by checking out his site. When [...]
Read MoreThe Happy Rock was a good little rock, but always very curious. Today he leaves for the mountains of Pennsylvania with his friend the Man with The Yellow Hat, 8 children, 4 sister-in-laws, 3 brother-in-laws, and 2 grand parents. Enough with the Curious George references. I will have a great time. The weather should be nice, and I will cherish the break and family time. In my absence three guest posters will fill in the gaps Tuesday, Wednesday, and Thursday. Please treat them kindly and give them some feedback on their excellent articles. I will be back and answering emails [...]
Read MoreThe government always seems to be taking our money, but sometimes they do get things right and pass legislation that beneficial. US government legislation that has been in the works since the 2000 tire recall will require auto manufacturers to install tire pressure monitoring sensors on all new models for vehicle’s under 10,000 pounds. The bill, which affects vehicles for the 2008 model year, is being phased in September 1st of this year. The system is such that when the pressure of any of the four tire drops below 25% below the recommended pressure, a warning light will display on [...]
Read MoreI am starting a recurring tip series about frugality called “Cheaper Than Cheap”. The idea is to provide helpful frugality tips that border on fanatical to the point of being humorous. Love them or hate them, let’s hear what you think. Cheaper Than Cheap Tip #1 – Pretend You Are Running Out Yesterday, I noticed when items like shampoo, dish soap, and toothpaste are running low I become much more conservative in my usage. I squeeze out the minimum drop needed to wash my hair as the shampoo begins to run low. When I have a brand new bottle I [...]
Read MoreI will be on vacation Tuesday – Friday of next week. I wanted to see if anyone would be interested in guest posting @ The Happy Rock next week on short notice. What you will you get in return? The joy of helping out a fellow blogger who gets about 60 hits a day, and has about 70-75 readers. At the top of the guest post I will link to your main site, and at the bottom of the post I will link up your RSS feed. Finally, I will submit the post to a carnival the following week for [...]
Read MoreYesterday I posted some eye opening statistics about TV viewing. Today I wanted to wrap up the canceling cable experiment by searching the blogosphere for some bloggers that had already tried giving up cable or had relevant posts. Here is what I found : Gary Lee just recently canceled cable and is still adjusting. Boomie @ The Wastrel Show downgraded to basic cable just a week ago. Lazy Man tried to hack a cable free solution. Clever Dude talks about not upgraging his viewing experience. FMF @ Free Money Finance admits he doesn’t have cable. And finally Trent @ The [...]
Read MoreHere are the highlights of some research to add some discussion to the cable canceling experiment. I found a great website called Trash Your TV. It is your one stop shopping experience for anyone thinking of canceling cable or getting rid of their TV. TV viewing stats, success stories, effects of TV articles, and much more. Let’s start with some eye opening stats about the about some real costs of watching TV: Nielsen Media Research Inc. reports that the ‘average person’ watches TV for 4 hours and 35 minutes every day. Furthermore, the average household has a TV playing for [...]
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