Car Insurance
I have been meaning to call my car insurance company for some time to see if there was a way to lower my car insurance costs. I had done a couple of online searches that said I could save quite a bit if I was willing to switch car insurance companies. The main issue was that I really didn’t want to switch since I like the current company I’m with and they give quality service.
After talking with the agent and letting him know that I would not be driving nearly as many miles this year as I have in past years, plus my good driving record with them, they were able to lower my insurance rate by $150 ($75 for each 6 month period) without lowering any of my current coverage. I doubt I would have changed carriers if they weren’t able to offer me a better deal, but I didn’t have to let them know that during the conversation. The agent worked hard to keep me as a customer (I’d mentioned that I had found a number of better deals from other companies searching on the Internet). That $75 put me over the $52 which was the most on my 52 week chart.
If you haven’t called your car insurance agent lately, I would highly suggest that you do. It’s a competitive business, and even if you don’t wish to change companies (as in my case), you can still save money. Get a few quotes online to give you some bargaining power and see what you can work out. The worst case scenario is you spend 15 minutes on the phone and don’t get a reduction, but you could also save hundreds.
Saved: $75.00
House / Pet Sitting
I had another pet sitting opportunity this week for two days which meant that I didn’t need to pay for any food for those two days. While it really doesn’t matter this week since I already reached the $52 goal, that would have been an additional $10 I could have added had I not already reached the goal. The good news going forward is that I actually have quite a few house sitting opportunities lined up for the next couple of months that should help quite a bit with saving money on food costs.
Saved: $10.00
Money Jar & Pay to Use My Car
Since I reached the goal, I decided not to add the amounts I’d saved in change this week, or the dollars I paid to drive the car. I will leave those to accumulate even more and roll them over to the next week. it will be nice to let them build for an extra week.
Saved: $0.00
The total amount I was able to save for the week came to to much more than $52, but I will only cross off $52 (below in red) for this week. I was tempted to cross off two numbers (and I probably would have if I was trying to save as much as I could), but I decided that it was a better approach to stick with the challenge the way it was meant to be. I now have a total of $132 saved over the first four weeks.
Total Saved Week 4: $52.00
$1 $2 $3 $4 $5 $6 $7 $8 $9 $10
$11 $12 $13 $14 $15 $16 $17 $18 $19 $20
$21 $22 $23 $24 $25 $26 $27 $28 $29 $30
$31 $32 $33 $34 $35 $36 $37 $38 $39 $40
$41 $42 $43 $44 $45 $46 $47 $48 $49 $50
$51 $52
Goals for the Coming Week
I should be getting the utility bills this week which will allow me to compare the amount paid this month to the same month last year, since I dug up all those old bills. This should be a good test to see if simply being aware that I’m trying to save, plus being away a few days for the house sitting, equates into lower utility bills. If not, I will need to come up with some further ways to try to save money in these areas.
For those who have decided to participate in the challenge, how did you do during week four?
The 2014 Challenge
Week One
Week Two
Week Three
It did not occur to me to haggle down my insurance, due in a week. D’oh! I’ll know better in July. My payment’s already on its way.
I made some chicken stock, and with the exception of yesterday, when I was too exhausted to make dinner (kids, even though the experts say there are no side effects to megadosing with methylcobalamin form of Vitamin B12, when I did it on Friday I became dizzily incapacitated), we ate down the pantry. So what I did this week was start with $26.50, the average of 52 weeks of saving, and subtract splurges (coffees), add saves (discount on frozen vegetables, keying $25.19/lb basil as $9.99/lb oregano, free Starbucks 12 oz. drip for returning an empty bag of 12 oz whole bean coffee). I paid nothing for getting my clothes mended by an alterations professional.
Some nice things:
I answered the call to procure for a school auction, and learned that gift certificates to a local store are at 50% discount when procured for school auctions. $12.50 savings.
Free 12 oz. tea for me when I buy a can of specialty tea offered by a local company. $2.00 savings.
So $25 is the 52-week savings challenge deposit for me today, owing to ambiguity and fluidity of budget surprises. Next week will be the end of the month, so I can just gather some surpluses from budget categories.
Job well done. Definitely set a reminded the next time payment comes up on the car insurance. It’s in their interest to do everything they can to keep you if you’re a good customer.