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Free Haircuts = Save Money – DFA Tip of the Week – 4/27/2009

04.30.2009 by Matt Jabs //

There are many ways to reduce costs in our every day lives, so to help do just that each Monday I will post a money saving “Tip of the Week”.

“And he said unto him, Well, thou good servant: because thou hast been faithful in a very little, have thou authority over ten cities.” Luke 19:17

This weeks tip involves…getting free haircuts!

haircutI have always hated having to pay for haircuts.  To me getting my hair cut is kind of like mowing my lawn, it just keeps growing & we just keep cutting, over & over & over. As a matter of fact, I sort of wish I were bald.  There I said it…and I think I may actually mean it!  Any bald men out there please chime in with reasons why I should not wish to be hairless. Although quite necessary…to me cutting my hair once a month just seems like a big waste of time and money.

If I break it down, including tip haircuts were costing us around $20/month.  Here is what my wife & I did to cut that down to $0/month!

  • We purchased a decent pair of hair clippers for $45
  • We purchased a hair cape for $10
  • We let my wife loose on my hair
  • If you are not confident in your ability (or maybe your wife’s ability) to cut hair, check out this post on instructions for the tapered haircut, which is the most popular mens haircut.

For an initial investment of $55, which we made back in just three short months, we are now able to put the extra $20 into our savings or toward debt repayment…and every penny counts.  Let me add that my wife is doing an excellent job to date.  I think she is giving me better cuts than my barber…after all she does cut it with love!  Thanks again baby.

At this point I am not cutting my wife’s hair…yet!  She won’t let me near it, although I think I could do a very good job given the chance.

Lastly…gentlemen, please make sure that you “get right with your wife” before you give her clippers & sit in her chair or you may end up looking like the kid in this picture!

Click here to see all our past DFA Tips of the Week.

DFA is passionately dedicated to helping others break the bondage of debt using biblical principles.

Categories // Expenses, Tips Tags // free, frugal, personal, products, reduce, Reduce Expenses, Savings, totw

Beans Beans and More Beans – How we plan to reduce our grocery bill

04.25.2009 by Matt Jabs //

Beans – healthy, delicious, and cheap

Sure…beans make you fart, and deep down inside we all know that farts are funny…well…most of the time!  Let’s move on shall we.

Due to our recent but ongoing financial fast (which I recommend everyone try for at least one solid month) my wife & I have not been spending money on anything outside of our normal bills and expenses.

We stopped going out to eat which is saving us over $5,000/year.  We subscribed to Netflix and stopped going to the movies which saves us $600/year.  We are working diligently to reduce our monthly bills which has helped us cut at least another $600/year.  All told, since January of 2009 we have reduced our monthly spending by over $500!

I of course keep pushing by wondering…how I can cut this down even further?  Looking over our budget it appears that one of the few categories I can still reduce is our monthly grocery expenditures.  Enter “Beans Beans and More Beans”!

The remainder of this article is a quick break down of how beans, which beans, and why beans – with a core goal of – how to use beans to reduce costs.  Our specific goal is to reduce our grocery budget from $400/month to $250, mainly by using a ton of dry beans. An additional benefit my wife & I stand to realize from our great bean adventure is increased health.

The Low Cost of Beans (dry) vs (wet a.k.a pre-cooked)

Yes beans are cheap, but did you know that buying dry beans is a much more frugal choice than buying wet beans?  Wet beans cost more because of their swollen size & water weight.  You actually get about 66% less beans by weight if you buy them wet.  Companies selling wet beans actually have a brilliant business plan.  Take something they can get for SUPER cheap, soak it in water overnight, then sell 1/3 the amount at double the price.  It works for them because the wet beans are STILL super cheap!

Basically dry beans will yield 3x their volume once they are cooked.  This in turn means that you will get three times your money if you purchase dry beans versus cooked beans.

Okay, I’ll buy dry beans, what does this have to do with my grocery bill?

I’m glad you asked.  If you substitute dry beans in your recipes in place of other protein sources you stand to save big time!  When you are trying to make ends meet in these tough financial times, replacing high cost meats with low cost beans is just sound financial sense.  Don’t worry, beans taste excellent and have a good “meat-like” texture.  I am a big fan of meat in meals and thought I would have a tough time substituting beans, but I have not really even noticed much “missing”.  There are also a ton of health benefits when substituting beans for meat because beans are just so healthy!

The Health Benefits of Beans

Beans are one of the most nutritionally well rounded foods available to us.  They are classed as both a vegetable and a protein and are both high in complex carbohydrates and low in calories.

I know I said we were moving past the fart talk, but I just can’t help myself.  The reason beans make you fart is because they are SO VERY high in fiber.  That’s right, not only does that mean a lot of farts, but MUCH more importantly it means a cleaner colon for you!  More and more studies show that good colon health is directly indicative of good overall health.  Beans are also extremely high in protein; which supports our claim that there is no better meat substitute than beans.  Are you trying to lose some weight?  Beans are incredibly good for the waistline and may also aid in disease prevention!

Simply put, it is obvious why beans should be a part of any person’s diet.

Which Beans are Best?

When it comes to which bean is best it is quite simple, the darker the better.  The darker the bean the more flavonoid antioxidants it contains.  Black beans boast the most, followed by red, brown, yellow and white beans. (Brown and yellow beans are similar to the manteca-type beans widely eaten in Latin America.) A 3.5-ounce serving of black beans contains about 10 times more antioxidants than the equivalent amount of oranges.

Washing & Preparation

I do not want to reinvent the wheel with instructions in this post so I will make this very brief.  That is not hard since washing and preparing dry beans is very easy.

Wash your beans in a colander, then lay them out on a dish towel and scour for stones.  Once cleaned, soak most beans in three times their volume of cold water for six hours before cooking.  I make this easy and just soak my beans overnight…just set ’em & forget ’em.

Once the beans have been soaked I then bring them to a boil in their soaking water and then reduce to simmer for about an hour.  The amount of time can vary for each bean and since I do not feel like listing them go here to see the cooking times for different beans.  Here is another more in depth tutorial on using dried beans.

Recipes

Last week we started our “Bean Adventure” by making a lentil & chickpea stew.  The entire meal cost us less than $5 and provided us with 10 servings or better! Here is the recipe:

Lentil & Chickpea Stew

Ingredients:

  • 1 lbs bag dry lentils (wash & soak overnight before cooking)
  • 8 oz dry chickpeas (wash & soak overnight before cooking)
  • Soak beans in at least 14 cups of water
  • 3 Tbsp olive oil
  • 3/4 cup fresh cilantro chopped
  • 4 carrots sliced
  • 1/3 cup of your favorite rice (I use brown Basmati)
  • 6 cloves smashed & minced garlic
  • 1 1/2 tsp paprika
  • 1 1/2 tsp chili powder
  • 1 1/2 tsp cumin
  • 2 tsp sea salt
  • 2 tsp fresh cracked black pepper
  • 1/2 tsp Cayenne pepper (optional)
  • 1/3 cup lemon juice
  • 3 Tbsp whole wheat flour, dissolved in 1/2 cup warm water
  • 3 Tbsp salted butter

Bring beans to a boil in their soaking water then let simmer for 60 minutes.  Add all ingredients except the cilantro, butter, lemon juice, and flour.  Stir together and let simmer for another 60 minutes.  Heat the butter & lemon juice in a sauce pan over medium heat and whisk in the flour slowly to create a roux.  Once whisked together add the roux to the pot and simmer an additional 15 minutes.  Remove from heat, add cilantro and serve!

I am looking here for a bunch of awesome bean recipe

In Closing…

I will keep you posted on how our bean adventure pans out.    We will also continue to pre-plan our meals, but now plan on basing our meals around our local grocer fliers to save even more.  I am confident that these slight changes will enable us to cut the desired $150 from our grocery bill each month.  I am excited to have this experiment underway and am also pretty excited to be getting the added health benefits of all these beans!

DFA is passionately dedicated to helping others break the bondage of debt using biblical principles.

Categories // Expenses, General, Money Management, Spending Tags // frugal, healthy, Money Management, monthly, Reduce Expenses, Savings

5 Minutes to Lower Monthly Bills – DFA Tip of the Week – 3/30/2009

03.30.2009 by Matt Jabs //

There are many ways to reduce costs in our everyday lives, so to help do just that each Monday I will post a money saving “Tip of the Week”.

“And he said unto him, Well, thou good servant: because thou hast been faithful in a very little, have thou authority over ten cities.” Luke 19:17

This week’s tip involves…saving money on monthly bills by simply calling & asking for a price reduction!

How much it saved me…

I started with Comcast and DirecTV whom I have for Internet & television providers respectively.  The reason I use both companies is a little complicated.  Originally I had Comcast for both Internet and television, but was not happy with being changed an arm & a leg for service, so I decided to switch to DirecTV.  Since DTV did not provide Internet service and because DSL is not offered in my new subdivision, I had to keep using Comcast for Internet.  Regarding television, I skeptically entered into a 2 year contract with DirecTV because I didn’t really have a lot of other options.

Now over a year after all my shifting around of services I was paying $63.95/month to Comcast for Internet along with $75/month to DirecTV for television – and so there went my other arm & my other leg.  Being armless & legless was making it quite difficult to get around so I finally decided to get off my lazy butt (pun intended), and make the calls to demand better prices!!  I did just that and ended up getting my Comcast bill reduced to $37.99/month and my DTV bill down to $55 creating an additional $46/month for me to put into my savings!

Now I’m just going to buy an HDTV digital antenna and get TV for free!

Use these tips when calling…

The CSR’s (Customer Service Reps) are trained to try to dissuade you from your dream of reduced expenses so I will now give you a few pointers in dealing with them:

  1. Maintain an excellent spirit when dealing with the CSR – The old adage, “You catch more flies with honey than with vinegar” is quite true.  Just think of how you would like to be addressed then give the CSR the same respect and courtesy.
  2. Maintain separation between the CSR and the company itself – This is quite a successful tactic that I have not ever heard anyone else mention.  Basically you want to create a distinction between the CSR and the company they work for.  This allows you to voice your displeasure with the company, while not attributing any of the displeasure to the person you are dealing with on the phone.  For example instead of saying, “You are charging me too much for Internet“, say something like…”I am just really unhappy with how much Comcast is charging me for service, especially with all the other options out there.“
  3. Get the CSR to empathize with your situation – Now that you have created that separation between the CSR and the company they work for, you are better able to place them in your situation.  Say to them, “What would you do if you were me?” Or simply, “How would you feel if you were in my shoes?“
  4. Use the company’s competitor’s prices and services against them – If you use Comcast for Internet, talk about the low prices AT&T is offering on residential DSL service with similar speeds.  Say to them, “I will stay with Comcast if they can match AT&T’s prices, otherwise I’m going to have cancel and go with AT&T.  I mean, what would you do if you were in my shoes?“
  5. Be willing to discontinue the service – Ultimately if you are not truly willing to leave your current provider, you will be less authoritative and they will be less likely to oblige you.  Make sure before making this decision you discuss it with your wife and/or family.  Be sure to explain the alternatives, and also key on possible benefits of cancelling the service altogether.
  6. Be confident and persistent – Just as you are much more likely to listen to someone who delivers a confident and meaningful argument, so the CSR will be too.  Before you call, make a plan of action.  Write down the reasons why you need the price reduced along with price quotes from several other providers.  If you are prepared and resolved, the CSR will have a hard time denying your request…it worked for me!!

I saved $46/month doing this…how much did you save by employing these tips? Make sure to let us know by leaving a comment below.

Have you already successfully gotten your prices reduced by calling?  Let us know about that too.

Click here to see all our past DFA Tips of the Week.

Categories // Expenses, Spending, Tips Tags // bills, how, internet, lower, monthly, reduce, Reduce Expenses, satellite, television, tips, to, tv

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Content on Debt Free Adventure is for entertainment purposes only. Rates & offers from advertisers shown on this website may change without notice: please visit referenced sites for current information. Per FTC guidelines, this website may be compensated by companies mentioned through advertising, affiliate programs or otherwise. We respect your privacy. Privacy policy.

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