LexChoice Finance

Financial News and Information

Buy Brand Name and Save

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Alright, I have to take back what I said in a previous post. I wrote an article a while back about how you can save a lot of money buying generic brand foods. I wrote that article before I truly understood the power of coupons.

Recently my sister-in-law introduced my family to a group of extreme savers who used the power of coupons to save hundreds of dollars per month on their grocery bill. At first I was a little skeptical because from previous experience coupons only brought name brand foods down to a price that was almost as cheap as the generic brands. However, after doing some research and some hands on experiements I am now a believer.

The key to the savings is to stockpile a lot of coupons and only use them when something is on sale, as well as combining paper or printed coupons with other incentives. For example there are some websites that allow you to load manufacturers coupons to you Kroger plus card as well as use a paper coupon for the same item. Sometimes you can get items for free or very close to free. My last weeks trip to Kroger yeilded almost a 50% savings in the gorcery bill!

I’m now somewhat addicted to coupon clipping and deal shopping so stay tuned for more information about this money saving topic!

Save money with free trash bags

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Most grocery stores still use plastic bags to package your groceries. Unfortunately where I live I’m not allowed to recycle the bags in the recycling bin. Some grocery stores do allow you to bring them back to the store and they recycle them, but you can reuse them yourself and save a little money. I’m sure by reading the title and the introduction you already know where this is going.

Forget about buying those cute tiny trash bags to put in the trash cans in the bathrooms. Simply use your free grocery bags and place them in the cans for trash bags, after all don’t they just go in the trash? You can also use grocery bags to clean out your car. No need to fill up your kitchen garbage bags with trash from your car. Simply grab an unused grocery bag and start the cleaning process for free.

We have also got in a habit of using grocery bags as our main trash bags. It’s not the best habit to get into but depending on when you show up at our house you might find a grocery bag hanging from the pantry door with that days trash inside. I’m sure it’s not the most decorative trash storage but it’s free and it’s convenient. After all who wants to open the pantry to throw away their trash?

With as many grocery bags as we use for trash bags I bet we cut our trash bag spending in 1/2. Sure it might only be $30 or $40 per year but every penny counts!

Extreme saving with coupon loopholes

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Last week I was introduced to a new world in savings. I’ve always know that you can save some extra money on groceries if you use coupons, but didn’t realize exactly how much until now. My sister-in-law told me about a group of extreme savers who take complete advantage of coupons and sales.

Always save unused coupons until they are expired. Many time grocery stores run sales based on the current coupons in the local paper. They try to avoid offering sale priced items at the same time coupons are introduced. If you save your coupons a week or two it’s very possible that sale priced items will overlap with coupons bringing extreme savings on your grocery bill.

This week I found my own first coupon loophole with Kroger. They are offering 3 – 12 packs of Coke for $10 and you also get 2 free boxes of Ritz crackers. I also found a coupon for $2 off any 2 – 12 packs of Coke. So for $8 I got 3 – 12 packs and 2 boxes of Ritz crackers.

There are entire websites and blogs dedicated to these types of deals. They do the research for you for general coupons. You can however do more research for local coupons and find great deals. From what I see you can save tons of money for a few hours of searching.

If you are the type that thinks saving $0.30 or $0.40 on an item isn’t worth your time, think about the whole shopping list. If you can find a coupon for 20 items you use everyday and save $0.40 on each item this adds up. Saving $8.00 per week over the course of a year is over $400 you will save! Next time you get the weekly paper don’t just throw those coupons away you may be sitting on a small gold mine!

Not as frugile as I thought

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For the past few years I’ve made an effort to track our spending and try to save money. I think we’ve done a great job at reducing our debt and building a good savings. We’ve also managed to purchase a home and also own an acre of land which we plan to build our “dream house” on in a few years. We’ve managed to do this by watching our spending and being blessed with great jobs.

For the past 8 years I’ve packed my lunch at least 4 of the 5 days of the work week. I usually drink the office coffee and only occasionally treat myself to some Gourmet coffee. We also try to eat dinner at home or go for fast food restaurants. We have a planned budget and for the most part stick to it, however recently I realized that maybe I’m not as frugal as I thought.

We’re in the middle of some construction projects at our work which we volunteered to do during our not so busy season. We’re tearing down walls, building walls, laying ceramic tile, ripping up carpet, putting up molding and painting.

After using a roller the entire day I pulled it off and tossed it in the trash. Take note it was an all purpose roller from a hardware store that probably cost about $1.00. A co-worker asked why did you throw the roller away, you know you can clean those out and use them again? Sure, I could have spent 15 minutes cleaning out the roller and using it again tomorrow after it dried, but was it really worth it?

I’ve tried cleaning out rollers before and from my experience they never work as good as a new one and besides, it’s $1.00. He informed me he had rollers that he had been using for years.

Maybe I should have saved the roller. I should have taken 15 minutes of my time and cleaned out the roller to use the next day. I could have saved the company $1.00. Any thoughts?

Our top 5 Cheap Dinner meals

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We all know that college students try to live on a tight budget, because they have little or no income. Finding cheap meal ideas is a must even at the sacrifice of taste. However eating cheap doesn’t mean you have to sacrifice taste. Here is out top five cheap dinner meals to fix for you and your family that will save you a few dollars at the grocery store.

  1. Fancy Ramen Noodles. They are not just for college kids. You don’t have to eat these tasty noodles right out of the pack, you can fix them up to make a gourmet meal, well almost gourmet. Personally I like the noodles and the spice packs, even though not extremely healthy, they can make a good base for a meal. You can add vegetables and even meat to the noodles to give them a gourmet feel. If you are trying to save a lot of money you may have to skip the meats.
  2. Grilled cheese and soup. For about $7 you can easily feed a family of 4 as many sandwiches as they can eat and a tasty bowl of canned soup.
  3. Spaghetti – The classic spaghetti and marinara sauce dinner can easily be fixed for under $5. Noodles are about the cheapest meal you can fix and a can of marinara or even Alfredo sauce is about $3.
  4. Breakfast – Breakfast isn’t just for breakfast. Eggs are less than $2 per dozen, a package of biscuits about $1.50 and a package of bacon about $4. For well under $10 you can feed a family of four a good dinner.
  5. Homemade vegetable soup – Everybody loves vegetable soup! It’s something that’s easy to make, you can freeze the leftovers, and it’s cheap. Don’t have a lot of time to fix dinner? Put some vegetable soup in the crockpot and let it simmer all day while you are at work. There is a vegetable soup starter kit for about $2, a couple of packages of frozen vegetables can be found for $1 each and a couple of cans of tomato soup is less than $2. For about $6 you can have vegetable soup for 4 and probably save some leftovers for you lunch.

Most of our top 5 list isn’t the most healthy meals but you don’t have to eat them everyday. Include them in your dinner plans a couple of times per week and you’ll be fine. Use that extra money you save for a gym membership if you want!