What are your best money saving tips that people don't take advantage of?

[msomnipotent]

I do this on Amazon. When I shop, I add stuff to my cart and leave it. Mostly because I want to have enough qualifying purchases to get free shipping. When I think of something else to buy, I go through my cart and usually end up deleting stuff. When I'm ready to make a purchase, my cart is well-curated.

I keep things in my Amazon wish list and I made a Christmas list to keep track of ideas. I also check camelcamelcamel and use their price tracker to make sure I'm getting a good deal, along with checking other stores' prices. There have been a few times when I get an email from the price tracker and think, "Why am I tracking this???" so you know I don't really need it. The wish list gets narrowed down a lot, too.

[Gailete]

It's important to review your insurance coverage [term life, auto, home/rental]. If you have an Emergency Fund, it may be cost efficient to increase your deductible on home and auto. With rising home building costs, is your coverage adequate? Do your policies cover sewer back-up, flood? What is your risk factor?

Is your auto coverage commensurate with the KBB value of your vehicle[s] Insurers do not care how much you owe, in case of a claim only their evaluation, less deductible will be paid out. Ask your agent to send your policy coverage needs 'out to bid,' or check on line for premiums for at least 3 insurers, for current and adjusted coverage. How much do they charge for the privilege of monthly or quarterly payments?

The difference in premium is primarily the commission paid to the agent as claims are really paid out by one of the 3 giant re-insurers.

Is your [term] life insurance policy adequate to serve your family's future needs? If you carry other types of life insurance...why?

This is something my son keeps bugging me about. You want to stay on the straight and narrow financially, raise a high functioning autistic kid to be frugal!!

But he is usually reminding me of this while we are in the car going shopping, and I forget. Seeing it here made me write it on a list of things to do. Thanks.

[Gailete]

keep things in my Amazon wish list and I made a Christmas list to keep track of ideas

I do this as well so that my kids when they want to get me a gift, know what I want. Especially since it is 6 pages long I think at this point.

As far as saving on groceries, study the ads. They are on a cycle when they put things on sale. If, for example, you like a certain pasta and the grocery has it on sale, buy enough of it on sale to have and use until the next time they have it on sale. And if you can, shop around. There are weeks we wind up going to Aldi, Kroger, and another store because of what is one sale or where it is cheaper.

I used to do this along with coupons and rebates. Physically I just don't have the oomph any more, but my son that knows what I get will let me know when something I buy is on sale. I used to never buy anything but block cheese, now with rare exceptions I get the shredded on sale as I can't handle grating it myself. He tracks frozen items (he used to manage the frozen food dept. at the grocery store) and he always tells me when Prego or Ragu is on sale as a joke since I wouldn't buy that even if it was listed for a quarter. Now he does most of the work to make spaghetti sauce while I supervise.

Take advantage of credit card rewards. Either cash back or some form of points for air miles or hotel stays, etc.

The other day I could have kicked myself. Our car inspection ran over $700 and knowing we didn't have cash to cover it, sent my husband off with a credit card check. If I had just handed him a card I wouldn't have had the transaction fee and would have also gotten the points. I had to get something at Amazon today and was able to cash in around $13 of reward credits to bring the whole order to less than $10. I hate using credit cards and have been working hard to pay cash as much as possible, but if I have to use one, I want to get the most out of it.

2) Cut the cable, use Netflix, Sling, Amazon prime, Hulu, etc.... I can't tell you how many of my friends, who earn similar or less than me, still have $160 monthly cable +net bills. My internet is $40 a month, and netflix + Amazon prime is $18.25. I'll take the extra ~$100 a month, and use it to pay down debt or invest.

We have rabbit ears and bought a $40 converter box way back when. We get more than enough channels for what we watch and we have plenty of videos and DVDs when there isn't anything on TV that we might want to watch. We just can't see forking out money every month just to watch TV.

I've also little by little decluttering. I had a brand new bed with mattress that we sold on Craig's List for $400 earlier this summer and we got our new renters through it as well. I didn't even realize that our area had CL until I went looking for it. As I declutter things that don't go into the trash or to the thrift store will get sold on CL or online.

[GrimJack]

I throw all my change and 'ones' into a jar; when I am bored, I paper-clip the ones into $10 stacks; it is amazing how quickly that adds up. I have over a hundred dollars ready to deposit to savings after only 3 or 4 months. When I need quarters for the laundry (renter here) I put a fiver in and take the quarters out. I used to only save change and that was good for about $70 per year.

[Gailete]

I throw all my change and 'ones' into a jar; when I am bored, I paper-clip the ones into $10 stacks; it is amazing how quickly that adds up. I have over a hundred dollars ready to deposit to savings after only 3 or 4 months. When I need quarters for the laundry (renter here) I put a fiver in and take the quarters out. I used to only save change and that was good for about $70 per year.

At one point when I was married to my ex, I kept a change jar on my kitchen counter. I didn't have much change as it was hard to even have a dollar spare due to ex's bad spending habits. At one point I noticed that the change level had lowered. Since it was MY jar, I knew I hadn't taken anything out. So sat down my boys, the stepson and the husband. Who has been getting into my change jar I ask. Funny look on stepsons face. I knew it wouldn't be my boys as they understood boundaries and you don't taken someone else's money. Hubby actually looked innocent so I asked Stepson if he had taken any. He said, "I thought it was for anyone that needed it!" Then I asked him did he ever put money in it? NO, so why are you taking money out? It isn't your money leave it alone. You have to understand this kid to really get it. He was happy to take anything handed to him, but not to happy to put any effort into anything to make a buck. And when he finally did get a job had no money sense whatsoever. Just like his dad it evaporated out of his hands.

I've had a change jar for many years, but the most I ever get it up is for change to go to yard sales when I'm up to it. Since we are at the point of mostly having all our money that comes in be direct deposited, I rarely carry cash so that means no change. But it is a good way to save up for small things or even big things depending on what you are putting into it.

[ShineBoldly]

Cut the cable, use Netflix, Sling, Amazon prime, Hulu, etc

Now thats a really good advice. Done that myself, you are totally right about the economy, which is huge. It's really strange lots of people have both old TV coonection and IPTV at the same time, literally paying twice.

[Nutria]

You'd be surprised how often there is no difference/it is cheaper to buy a smaller bottle.

Correct. And for when the store doesn't show the price/oz, your smartphone calculator lives to serve!!

[Gailete]

I see this alot at Walmart where the biggest size is a couple of pennies above the smaller size but they think all we lemmings will have learned the rule and won't vary from it that the biggest size is always the best buy!

[disneysteve]

I see this alot at Walmart where the biggest size is a couple of pennies above the smaller size but they think all we lemmings will have learned the rule and won't vary from it that the biggest size is always the best buy!

Two things about this drive me crazy, and I know they do it on purpose.

1. Different brands will post unit pricing using different units. For example, brand A will list price per oz while brand B will list price per quart so you can't quickly compare.

2. Products get sold in a huge variety of sizes and packages to make comparison even harder. Toilet paper is a perfect example. Regular rolls, jumbo, giant, mega rolls and they come in a 4 pack or 6 or 12 or 24 or 36 pack - all at the same store.

[msomnipotent]

Two things about this drive me crazy, and I know they do it on purpose.

1. Different brands will post unit pricing using different units. For example, brand A will list price per oz while brand B will list price per quart so you can't quickly compare.

2. Products get sold in a huge variety of sizes and packages to make comparison even harder. Toilet paper is a perfect example. Regular rolls, jumbo, giant, mega rolls and they come in a 4 pack or 6 or 12 or 24 or 36 pack - all at the same store.

A few Slickdealers have comparing TP down to an exact science. Toilet paper deals draws a huge crowd, for some reason.

[phantom]

Products get sold in a huge variety of sizes and packages to make comparison even harder. Toilet paper is a perfect example. Regular rolls, jumbo, giant, mega rolls and they come in a 4 pack or 6 or 12 or 24 or 36 pack - all at the same store.

Don't forget about different ply and different absorbencies. So, even if you can figure out how many sheets you get in each package, you still have no idea how many uses you're going to get out of the package. I've decided that toilet paper is a small enough part of my spending that it's not worth worrying about. But, it still bugs me that it's nearly impossible to figure out the best deal.

[GrimJack]

Pay very close attention to the 'net weight' - bottles that used to 64 oz (gallon) are now 59 oz but the same size. I first noticed this happening to alcohol; you could buy a gall and half gallon and quart - then they came up with a '5th', then they dropped alch content from 90 proof to 86 proof and now it is down to 82 proof and being sold in 3/4s liter bottles that look like 5ths that looked like quarts. SIGH! Cans that used to be 16 oz are 15 or 14.5 oz - visually everything is the same but you are getting less and less.

[LivingAlmostLarge]

They did it with ice cream.

[disneysteve]

Pay very close attention to the 'net weight' - bottles that used to 64 oz (gallon) are now 59 oz but the same size. I first noticed this happening to alcohol; you could buy a gall and half gallon and quart - then they came up with a '5th', then they dropped alch content from 90 proof to 86 proof and now it is down to 82 proof and being sold in 3/4s liter bottles that look like 5ths that looked like quarts. SIGH! Cans that used to be 16 oz are 15 or 14.5 oz - visually everything is the same but you are getting less and less.

I've talked about this before. Drives me nuts. I would much rather they keep the package the same and just raise the price. I'd like my half gallon bottle to still be a half gallon. I'd like my 16 oz can to still be 16 oz. That's often a problem to day with recipes when they call for one can (16 oz) but the only cans you can find are 14.5 oz.

As for the alcohol, I can't say I remember when they were in US measurements. I just looked it up and it changed to metric in January 1979 so I was 14, not really paying attention to the size of liquor bottles yet . It's been the same ever since though. So a "fifth" went from 757ml to 750ml.

I can't say that I've seen any brands we buy routinely decrease the proof though.

[Nutria]

Pay very close attention to the 'net weight' - bottles that used to 64 oz (gallon) are now 59 oz but the same size. I first noticed this happening to alcohol; you could buy a gall and half gallon and quart - then they came up with a '5th', then they dropped alch content from 90 proof to 86 proof and now it is down to 82 proof and being sold in 3/4s liter bottles that look like 5ths that looked like quarts. SIGH! Cans that used to be 16 oz are 15 or 14.5 oz - visually everything is the same but you are getting less and less.

OTOH, soft drink sizes have grown from 6oz to 500ml over the decades.