Savings Stories

[pedersoc]

What are your favorite savings stories?

Here is mine:

The "Dora Vanity" list price was $120. It was on sale for 50% off which brought the price to $60. I had a Kohls coupon for 15% and then they gave me another 10% off which brought the price to $45.90. I then had a manufacturers coupon for $15 off which brought the price to $30.90. I used three different types of savings (sale, store coupon, manufacturers coupon) and saved $89 off the list price!!!!


Cheryl

[rob62521]

Good deal and smart shopping!

[gamecock43]

great shopping....I went to a baseball fields website and completed a survey to be awarded a $25 gift card in stadium money... even though he works for the team. Thats kind of frugal shopping

[Coleroo]

I haven't shopped in a retail store (cept for basic necessities) in a long time, but I did hit upon some nice savings a few weeks back...

My hubby came home one night after hearing about a blood drive going on...he wanted to give blood (bless his good heart..giving blood would have been the last thing on my mind after a day's work!). Well, we went there and I sat with the baby while waiting for him to donate. As he was signing in, the lady gave him two tickets to our local farm team baseball game. We ALWAYS go to those games anyway, so at $5 a ticket, that was nice right there. But that's not all....after he was done, they gave him 4 more (he asked them for more, lol). THEN, on the way to the car, we were walking with two of the volunteers who were going home and they gave us even MORE tickets. We ended up with 12 tickets ($60 worth) that night.

They were all for the same game, so after inviting a few friends to go with us, we stood in the parking lot giving 6 tickets away. One couple we handed them to had a 2 month old baby (same age as ours at the time) and they were out for the first time by themselves since the birth - celebrating their anniversary! So we felt really good after learning that, plus they liked their free tickets.

Anyway, we saved ourselves (and some really nice people!) money that night, and had a fun, free time at the game.

[pedersoc]

Good deal and smart shopping!

Thanks!

[jIM_Ohio]

When we bought our new house in 2005, we had been anticipating the move for about 18-24 months. Over that time we were eying various furniture for various rooms.

We sold our condo in August, at that time we received a check (I think for between 18-25k) and moved into an apartment ($1700 mortgage payment became a $500 rent payment, utilities cut by 1/3 or to 0 in some cases.

We then did furniture shopping.

One day sale at sofaexpress- sectional couch which was $3500 on sale for $2000. For the amount we saved we bought leather couches for living room for $1500.

Bedroom set at woodcraft was $10k, we bought it for $6000- dresser, armoire, piers behind bed, pedestal for bed. 100% solid oak.

Wall unit for surround sound at woodcraft was also purchased on sale for about 25% off- spent about 3k on that.

The one day veterans day sale at sofa express was our best savings. I remember that day- I came home and wife said we had to go out then- one day sale- after I had already put in close to 14 hour day.

[disneysteve]

My favorite savings stories generally involve thrift shops and yard sales, not retail stores. When my wife was pregnant, for example, we shopped a lot of yard sales for baby stuff. We bought a bassinet for $15. One small plastic piece was cracked but I figured I could make something to replace it. I used a scrap of wood I had to make a duplicate piece. Cost me nothing. Worked like a charm. We later saw the same bassinet in a catalog for $150.

And there are always the ebay stories. Like the time I bought a cruise ship model at a yard sale for $1.00. It wasn't even displayed. It was in a junk box. I put it on ebay and it sold for $213.00!

[marvholly]

Several weeks ago DD2 called me at work. Target was having a 75% off toys sale. hit my on route home (NO extra gas) 1/2 mi from work Target.

Result: have bought Christmas gifts for both grandkids for well under $50, do not remember exactly how much AND have 1 item put away for DGS's bday.

[michaelo]

Having a growing CD collection, I was abut ready to buy a large unit to hold all of them.

While $200 at the time was affordable, it was hard to justify spending that kind of money that had only one practical use.

So, my brother (admittedly more handy) and I decided to build our own. We went to the local home store and got one long board and several 1/4" dowels. We cut the board into thre equal lengths - one for each side and one for support in the middle. Then we figured out the placement for the dowels by using a few CDs.

Anyway...the whole thing holds over 700 CDs, and cost about $12 to make. That was over 10 years ago, and it's still holding up fine.

~michaelo

[maat55]

My best savings experience was making around 200.00 after my wife wrecked her car and the loner.

We recieved around 5200.00 after our 1k deductable, spent 700 fixing the loner and 500 fixing my daughters car. Bought another car like DW had before with 24k less miles on it for 3700 and spent 150 for new windshield.

[MonkeyMama]

I don't remember the numbers, but kind of unusual for us, we were shopping for bed for our older child when we saw the "perfect" theater seating at a "Going out of Business" furniture sale. (Unusual to make such a spur of the moment large purchase. But it was just PERFECT for our house).

Anyway, It was a little on the pricey side so we decided to put our haggling skills to the test. I was very pregnant and we had a small child so we kind of looked at it longingly and said how out of our budget it was, with the new baby and all. Then dh noticed the leather had a tear in a spot no one could really see once it was in our house. We could care less! We thought we struck gold but the salesman offered something ridiculous like $50 off for the damage.

Anyway, we know most consumers are a little pickier than us, and the tear was only worth a substantial discount, even to us. So I elbowed dh and told him to call his bluff (when the guy walked away for a bit). So we were getting all checked out for the bed and told them "nevermind," on the seating.

So the guy comes back and offers something like $200 off. We're like, "eh." At this point he might as well be on his knees. $300? $400? We're like, "okay." We put him out of his misery once he got to our price point.

My spouse and I are happy to walk away from a bad deal but that was the first time it every really WORKED. So it was kind of fun.

I think we got $2k seating for $700. Probably the nicest piece of furniture we own.

I am sure we could have paid a little less, but it's an art. We didn't want to make him feel like we were just toying with him either. So once we got to a mutually agreeable price, it was good enough for us.

[Ima saver]

We had bought property about 15 miles away, but in another state. It was 10 acres, but had an old farmhouse. I got a post office box in that town. When we went to buy our new car, we bought it in that state, using that address and paid about $1700 less in tax because the taxes are less in that state.