The Good Life on a Budget

The Book Challenge

A few weeks ago, I came home from a bad day at work. I was telling my husband about it, and he suggested that I read a book that he has read many times, The 48 Laws of Power by Robert Greene. He’s suggested the book before, and I have always put it off ofr lack of time and lack of interest. This time, though, he made me an offer I couldn’t refuse. He told me that I could pick out a book for him to read. Since my husband isn’t really into personal finance, I knew where to start.

I wanted to pick a personal finance book that I enjoyed and really learned from. In about 2 seconds, I knew what I wanted - The Total Money Makeover by Dave Ramsey. Like many more before me (and hopefully my husband after me), the book changed the way I think about money. I first read it in the fall of 2006 when we were beginning our debt reduction, and it really helped us get started when things weren’t looking so bright. Now that my husband is planning to read it, I decided it was worth the money to buy so we could use it as a reference for years to come.

I can’t wait to see my husband’s reaction - and to read it again myself. What book would you recommend to my husband?

Frugal Food Friday - 6 Ways to Save on Meat

It seems like every time I go to the grocery store the prices are going up. Now, more than ever, I need to work to keep my grocery bill low. One of the biggest money pits is meat. Here are the strategies I hav been using to keep meat from busting my budget:

1. Only Buy Meat On Sale. Every week one or two meat will be on the front page as a “loss leader”, where the store actually takes a hit on the price in an attempt to bring people into the store. These are the meats I buy, then plan my menu around.
2. Know the Good Prices. This comes from experience, or by creating a price book to keep track of the lowest prices. For example, I know that the best price I can get boneless skinless chicken breasts is $1.99/lb. They are on sale for that price once or twice a month, and that is the only time I buy them.
3. Your Freezer is Your Friend. When you find a good deal, buy enough meat for a few meals. Once you bring it home, separate the meat into single use portions and pop it in the freezer. My husband is not a fan of frozen meat (he says it tastes funny), so I freeze it in marinade to prevent the meat from drying out. As the meat thaws, the marinade penetrates the meat and keeps it nice and juicy.
4. Be Creative. It can get a little boring when you buy a large value pack of meat and try to eat it all before it goes bad. To mix it up, I put the leftovers into an entirely different meal, such as chili, quesadillas, stir fry, or tacos. This keeps leftovers from being dull.
5. Experiment with Cheaper Cuts of Meat. Often the less expensive cuts of meat are tougher or more difficult to prepare. A great way to get around this is by using a slow cooker, which can tenderize the meat. One of my favorites is to pop a whole chicken ($0.69/lb) in the crockpot before I go to work with a cup of water and cook it all day. When I get home, the meat is falling off the bone with juiciness, and the crockpot is full of homemade chicken broth. I separate the meat from the skin, bones and other chicken parts and use it in tacos, chicken salad and soup.
6. Don’t Buy Lunch Meat. At $7.99/lb, I skip it except for the rarest of occaisions. I pack leftovers for lunches most days.

What do you do to save money on meat?

Health Insurance Savings Over $2000

My husband switched jobs a little more than a month ago, and one of the perks of his new job is the amazing benefits package. Aside from 3 weeks vacation (woo!), his company completely covers health insurance premiums. 100%. And the health insurance company is Harvard Pilgrim, which we had a few years ago and LOVED. So we jumped all over this and signed up immediately.

I was a little nervous to cancel my health insurance, because I thought I would have to jump through hoops. My company has Open Enrollment every January, but I didn’t want to wait 3 months (and have 2 health insurances). Fortunately, a spouse gaining coverage counts as a “qualifying event” for my health plan, so I was able to cancel my coverage. (Other qualifying events included spouse loss of coverage & new dependent.) All I had to do was fax in a form and a letter from Harvard Pilgrim stating that we had new coverage.

As soon as it was officially cancelled, I calculated my savings. Every paycheck I pay $89.76 for my health insurance. This doesn’t include dental or vision insurance, but I am keeping those with my company for the time being. I get paid every other week, or 26 times a year. Thus, over the course of a year, we will save $2333.76! Now, if I got lazy and waited until January to cancel my health insurance during Open Enrollment, I would have paid another $538.56 before 2009. That money sure will come in handy for Christmas debt payoff!

Debt-O-Meter

Slide your eyes over to the right and check out my shiny new Debt-O-Meter! I found a tutorial on one of the sites in my Google Reader, Clever Dude, and spent 3 hours last night putting it together and tweaking it to my liking, with a little help from my computer engineering husband. Of course, the numbers still need a little tweaking…

For anyone out there who is a math geek like me, it’s pretty obvious that the “Total Bad Debt” amount that we have paid ($27,614.36) is smaller than the paid sum of the parts ($53,865.21). This is because one of our debts hasn’t been there since the beginning. I count the Total Bad Debt starting point to be when we were at the beginning of our debt payoff. It is our rock bottom. Since then, we have paid off huge chunks of debt, but we have also accumulated more debt. I don’t add any new debt into the Total Bad Debt Start, and I only count the net debt payoff towards the Total Bad Debt Payoff. So even though we have paid off about $30K of the credit cards, we have opened a new debt as well. Our debt was essentially redistributed, not eliminated.

The new debt would be Car Loan 2. No, it wasn’t necessary. Yes, it goes against everything Dave Ramsey has ever taught me. I will go into more details and rationalizations soon.