Adventures in Debt » save money

Nowhere to Go But Up

Jb — Wed, 15 Apr 2009 18:41:05 +0000

This afternoon I checked the status of my various accounts and saw that my emergency fund was much lower than I had previously reported. I had forgotten that I had to pretty much deplete the account in order to pay April’s rent and car payment. Of course this was before I had gotten my income tax refund, but still, the numbers have been adjusted.

Also, I was thinking about the emergency fund in general, and decided to lower my target for the moment. Since I’m pretty much at $0, okay, $8.30, I figured I’d aim for a smaller amount first, and then change the target as the savings grew. I’m the type that likes to see progress in larger chunks, if at all possible. Especially since I’m rather impatient with my debt load these days. So I’ve lowered it to $1000, the classic Dave Ramsay emergency savings amount. Once I get past that, I’ll decide whether to continue to grow it, or whether to let it earn some interest and put the extra money towards my debt repayment.

Plus since I’ll be starting the new job next week, I’m not sure when my pay schedule is, so I’m not sure what my contribution frequency will be. Ideally every pay cheque I would be able to transfer some over, but I’m not sure if I’ll be getting paid every two weeks, or twice a month, or what. I don’t remember what the schedule was when I worked for this company 8 years ago, but of course it could have also changed in the interim, so my info may not be up to date. At any rate, I’m excited about starting the new job on Tuesday, so stay tuned for an update!

This is an official post from Adventures in Debt.

How I Got Free Long Distance on My Cell Phone

Jb — Wed, 14 Jan 2009 01:17:53 +0000

As some of you may know, when I moved to my apartment last year, I got rid of my landline and use my cell phone as my main phone. I’ve been on a pay-as-you go plan simply because I liked the flexibility of being more in control of my monthly payments. If I didn’t use the phone a lot, I didn’t feel cheated about paying for service I didn’t use. If I used it a bit more, then I was happy to pay the extra, simply because I knew it wasn’t every month.

Recently though I was investigating moving to a monthly plan that would give me more minutes in the evenings, so I started looking this week. Turns out my provider (Virgin Mobile Canada) also had these “extra” packs you could add to your monthly plan that would give you extra things, like unlimited texting and calling to certain phone numbers, or let me choose when my unlimited calling block occurs every day (instead of only in the evening), and so on. I spoke to a very nice customer service rep who explained all the details to me, and I decided to go for it. The main selling point was simply that I would get unlimited calling and texting to 5 phone numbers I could add to a list. This means that I can now call my sister in Kingston whenever I want, for no extra long distance charges! Or my friend in Vancouver, with no extra long distance charges. What’s even better is that I can actually change who’s in my list once a month, so if I know I’m going to call somebody in particular frequently, I can change the numbers on the list and be done with it. Isn’t that great? I’m excited.

But what’s even better is that this whole new plan only costs me $2 more a month than I’m paying now. Yep, you heard me right, for $2 more a month, I get unlimited texting and calling across Canada to 5 numbers. That’s definitely worth the extra $2 in my opinion. Yippie!

This is an official post from Adventures in Debt.

Recycle, Reuse and Repurpose

Jb — Sun, 25 Nov 2007 16:58:33 +0000

While crusing around the blogosphere, I happened upon BoingBoing’s post about a truly interesting recycling product: the EcoCentric Camera Bag. It’s a bag made entirely of used leather belts, and looks just fabulous. Some people commented on the blog that the bag might be too heavy to make for practical use, however you could even just use it as a regular purse, as I suspect it’s just the right size for that.

The point in talking about this camera bag is the idea of recycling and reusing. While this particular instance isn’t necessarily the best idea for recycling and reusing because the bag is being sold for over 239 Pounds (UK pounds), it brings the idea of reusing and repurposing items for different uses.

It can be something simple like using an old coffee can as a piggy bank, or pen holder on your desk. Or something as complicated as turning an old computer monitor into a flower pot (I don’t know if that one actually exists, it’s just an idea I had.) The point is, if we try to think of how we can reuse items instead of just throwing them out, then we can help reduce the amount of garbage we send to the dump. And it helps us save money because you’re not buying more stuff, and therefore save some money.

Another way to repurpose items to save both money and the environment is to have a clothing swap. You can do this for yourself, your spouse or even your children. Just pick a date a few weeks in the future, and tell everyone to gather up the clothes they don’t want anymore or don’t wear and be ready to bring it over to your house. On the appointed day, everyone gathers and just dumps their clothes into a big pile on the floor. And then you spend the afternoon picking through the pile, trying on clothes as required, and having fun. At the end of the afternoon you leave with clothes that are new to you, and you have gotten rid of clothes you didn’t want anymore. If there are leftovers, you can simply package them up and either keep them for the next clothing swap, or donate them to one of a dozen charities in your city. It’s lots of fun and can be an enjoyable way to spend the afternoon.

What other things do you do to recycle, reuse and repurpose items from your home? Come on, leave a comment and share, as it helps everyone.

This is an official post from Adventures in Debt.