PLAN to SAVE!

If you fail to plan then you plan to fail. PERIOD! The fact of the matter is we all have quirks, hobbies, overpriced toys that we would like to indulge in. For me personally, I love to shop and travel. I’ve never been one to go into a store and buy things full priced but I still would like to have a closet of nice things!

It’s also my plan to take yearly vacations; preferably 2. One with the family and the other with my girls! Also, one of my hobbies is taking pictures and I have a dream of becoming a photographer. With the lenses costing more than the camera…this is not going to be a cheap hobby to get into!

Another goal that I have is to have a substantial savings for Kennedy so that when she gets of age, I’ll be able to buy that first car outright or if she decides that she wants to take a year before going to college to travel the world, she’ll be able to. And not only that and probably most importantly, I want a substantial savings for emergencies! So when the brakes on my car goes (which they are now :( ) I can dip into my emergency fund and fix them rather than driving around scared out of my wits!

So since I PLAN to accomplish all of the above, I obviously have to figure a way to do so and the most simplistic way is to save! It doesn’t matter how small the amount is, the only thing that matters is consistency!

I divided my savings goals into 5 categories: Kennedy, Long Term Savings, Short Term Savings, Vacations and Holiday. (see budget spreadsheet)

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  Kennedy is pretty self explanatory. I plan on using this account for those big purchases that need to be made in the future. I also plan on using this as a learning tool. For every dollar that she gets for a birthday or holiday, we’ll go to the bank and deposit a percentage of it so she’ll know the value of savings early on!
• Long term savings will be for my emergencies and rainy day
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  The short term savings is for my splurges! We work hard so don’t feel bad about putting a little aside for YOU! Just make sure you PLAN for it! So right now, my big splurge is my Nikon D90 and I’m excited to say that I have saved already $116 towards my goal! Other options are the new wardrobe you’ve been wanting or that ipod touch that you just have to have!
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  Holiday- I just recently opened up this account with my credit union! The money that I put into it won’t be available for withdrawal until each November. No more breaking the bank running around at the last min buying Christmas gifts! Even if you don’t’ have a tons of gifts to buy, you can use this money for Black Friday! I was so disappointed this past year when Wal-Mart had those great deals on flat screens and I couldn’t purchase one! Well I’ll be more than prepared next year because I would have PLANNED for that purchase!
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  Vacation- Although I don’t’ have an official vacation account I do have an account dedicated to this expenditure but I do plan on opening one. It usually works the same as the holiday account but the money is available each June/July.

The easiest way for me to keep track of my individual savings goals is to have separate accounts where a portion of my check automatically goes into each one. I know that’s a lot of accounts but it works for me! I even go so far as to label my accounts so when I log in online, my goals are clear and visual. My short term savings account is actually marked “Nikon D90” and when this short term goal changes so will the name of my account!

Also, it’s important to be realistic! Don’t’ have 40% of your salary going towards your “wardrobe” savings when you’re 3 months behind in your credit cards. And with that said, don’t feel trapped in your initial allocations! Use my spreadsheet on the right to tailor your goals on a weekly, monthly or quarterly basis! If you know that you have a big bill approaching in April (although with this savings structure you would have already prepared for that that expenditure!) rather than having 20% of your income going towards savings, scale back to 10%. The most important thing is to remain consistent!

Couponing 101: Triples!

I just wanted share a picture from my shopping trip over the weekend! One of the most vital tools in reducing debt is to stop paying for things that you can get for dirt cheap or free!

If you’re in the charlotte area, or live next to a Harris Teeter, Loews, or Bloom then you’re in luck! This is not to say that other grocers don’t participate in triples events b/c I’m sure they do and if you visit www.hotcouponworld.com then you’ll be able to get the entire scoop on your local stores.

Harris Teeter on a daily basis doubles manufactures coupons up to .99 but quarterly, they will triple them! This is the most opportune time to get free products….again, just maximizing your coupons to the best of your advantage! Well, I made several trips during this past triples event and pictures is just a fraction of the cheap/free items I got! NOTHING pictured cost me more than .45! Yes, cereal that normally cost an arm and a leg cost a total of .35 per box! Jelly- .32/jar! Collard Greens-.45/can! Hot sauce-FREE! Mash potatoes- FREE! Tea-FREE! Mustard-FREE! Cookies-FREE!

Keep the Change!

A couple of years ago I had a part time bartending job and when I first started the prices consisted of whole dollar amounts so my tips were usually in dollars. Well a few months into it, they decided to change the prices so rather than drinks being priced at $6, they were instead, $6.50 which of course affected my tips! Instead of going home with dollars, I was going home with cents! Annoying at first, until I saw how much coins I was accumulating!

Well what I decided to do was every time I would get change, whether it was from a purchase made, change I found on the ground or from my tips, was put it in a jar and watch it grow for a year! At the end of that year, I would pick a credit card and apply whatever amt I ended up with towards that particular debt. Well the last time I did this, I was able to apply $170 towards my debt!

Now that I’m a mother, rather than using the change to pay on a credit card, I put all my change in Kennedy’s piggy bank so at the end of the year, she and I will take all that we accumulated and put it into her bank account. Not only is this good way to build the little ones account, but it’s a great interactive tool to teach them how to save!

Turn off the lights!

If you grew up in a household like I did then you can relate to the constant screams from your mother telling you to “turn the lights off”! (and that’s the PG version). Everything seemed so simple back then; I would go from room to room not caring that the kitchen lights are on but I’m sitting in the living room. I also thought it was an absolute necessity for me to sleep with both the fan and TV on! This trend partly carried over to my adult years until recently; I never realized how much money was being wasted until I started living with someone who is fiscally irresponsible! I would come home to a completely empty house yet the TV’s upstairs and downstairs along with the bedroom and living room lights would be on! Well once I was forced to live on my own I realized that I had to make changes and part of those changes included reducing my utilities.

• My first step was replacing all my light bulbs with the energy savers. They can be pretty pricey but you can always catch them on sale!


• Second was so do what my mother told me to do as a child! Turn off the lights! Every time I left a room I would turn the light off. And there was no more sleeping with the ceiling fan and TV on which is hilarious since I thought it was literally impossible for me to get a good night sleep without them!


• Next was to wash dishes by hand! I grew up using a dishwasher so this wasn’t a easy task but taking 10 mins to wash the dishes by hand is a lot cheaper than having the dishwasher clean them for 1.5 hours!


• Did you know that leaving appliances plugged in runs up the bill????? That toaster, lamp, iron, George Forman grill, baby swing and plug-in that you are NOT using is just wasting energy and your paying for it! If you’re not using it, unplug it!


• Utilize your utility company’s online tools! One day while paying my bill online, I decided to poke around the site a bit to see if they offered cost cutting tips and they did! Not only that but they had a interactive tool that analyzed your usage in detail and compared it to the average customer usage.

Trust me, I’m not just preaching to the choir! These are all things that I’ve personally done and I can attest to the results! My bill on average before I started doing all of the above was $130/month. This was based on 2 adults living in a 2 level condo. After doing the above, my bill went down to $60!!!!!!!!!!!! So this is $70 a month or $840 a year saved that I can apply towards my debt! Pretty impressive considering all I had to do was turn off the lights!

Couponing 101: The Intro

While on maternity leave, I came across this online community for mothers in Charlotte. Within this community was a forum dedicated to being frugal and the basis behind this was using coupons! This has definitely been the contributing factor that has allowed me to cut my expenses by more than 50%! Just to give you and idea in real terms, since August, I have not paid for toothpaste, toothbrushes, rice, cleaning products or baby food. And trust me…this just represents a small fraction of the items I’ve received for free! And Please Please Please don’t say that every time you get the Sunday paper and look through the coupons, you never see anything that you need! Ugg! This is the excuse that I hear all the time and it’s just not good enough! The fact of the matter is, there will always be a coupon that you will need, and it’s just a matter of being patient and organized!

Here are the basics that I’ve picked up along the way….at the very least, take what I do and tailor it to your lifestyle/tolerance level because I must admit, I’m a coupon addict and some of my methods are extreme, but it works for me and I have a house full of free food, cleaning supplies and personal hygiene products to prove it!

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  First things first…..invest in a coupon binder! This will help on the long run. Since the whole point of this blog is to be fashionable and frugal while reducing debt and creating wealth I recommend finding a binder that is stylish without breaking the budget! I just love going to the grocery store and pulling out my cute binder with all my coupons! I find Target to have the best selection and this is where I purchased mine from. You will also need the baseball card inserts to hold your coupons along with dividers to break out your coupons into categories. The cheapest place to find the baseball card holders are Wal-Mart. Some of the most common categories are Personal Hygiene, Cleaning/household, Sauces, Condiments, Canned Goods, Pasta/Rice, Beverages, Snacks/Desserts, Baby, Frozen, Paper/Plastic Products.
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  Now that your organized, its time to start clipping! Get the Sunday paper and clip the coupons of interest. Now clipping the Sunday paper isn’t’ the only way to get coupons. Below are some other methods that I use and this will be especially beneficial in building up a collection of coupons that you actually use and need for your household:
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  Visit the manufactures website and print them out! More likely than not, just about every product has a website with a “special offer” or “coupon” section. They usually require that you set up an account and if you’re like me and hate getting junk email, then its best to set up a separate “junk” email account. Here is a very useful website that lists just about all the manufacture’s websites out there http://www.gmabrands.com/membercos/membercos.cfm. Another way to get coupons (and free products) from these companies is to compliment on there product! Extreme? Yes…but worth it! One day I spent hours going from site to site complimenting everything from Canada Dry Ginger Ale to Bushes’ Baked Beans. a few days later I received a stack of coupons for .50 off any Bush product (amongst a host of other freebies)!
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  Another way of accumulating coupons is to buy them! I find eBay to be the best spot! But other popular sites are www.hotcouponworld.com and www.thecouponclippers.com. This my seem counterintuitive but just last week, I purchased 15 GUM Toothbrush coupons for $1.00 off eBay. The value of each coupon is $.75. One of the local grocery stores who always doubles coupons valued up to $.99 was running a special on these particular toothbrushes (2 for $3) thus I ended up paying $1 for 15 toothbrushes! I’ll explain in greater detail how to maximize accumulating free products but this is just a small example.
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  If you’re not looking to “buy” coupons, another way of getting them is trading them. The mommy network that I’m apart of has a coupon swap. Every week I mail on the coupons that I don’t need to the person listed below me and so on. They also have an in house coupon swaps on occasion where everyone brings all there unwanted coupons and passes them around and you just take what you need. www.hotcouponworld.com is a good place to trade coupons with others. This is also a good reason to clip ALL the coupons in paper so that you can use the ones that you don’t want as bargaining chips!
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  Now that you have your coupons its time to match them up to sales! This is the best way to get FREE products. A .$.75 off coupon for Success rice that cost 2.99 is menial compared to waiting until that rice goes on sale for $1.50 and shopping at a store that automatically doubles therefore getting the rice for free! (Hence the 30 free boxes of Success rice in my pantry!) Not all stores double coupons but its up to you to get know your local grocery stores policy! www.hotcouponworld.com is absolutely the best resource for this. Not only does it give you the in an outs of just about every grocery and convenience store out there but it will often times give you a sneak peak at flyers weeks in advance along with listing items that will be free when matched with sales/coupons! Off hand, I know that Stop and Shop, Bi-Lo, Lowes Food, and Harris Teeter doubles coupons valued up to $.99 and but please review the coupon polices since some stores have restrictions on the amount of coupons you can double per day. Also, the advantage of looking at these flyers in advance makes it so that you’re prepared! If your favorite spaghetti sauce is on sale 2 weeks from now and you know there is a coupon out there that matches this product, you have plenty of time to go online and “buy” your coupon!

I just want to stress the importance of couponing! My friends think I’m nuts for having 30 tubes of toothpaste, 20 toothbrushes, 10 taco kits, and 30 boxes of rice but if these are things I’m going to use eventually, then why not stock up?????? Not only are you stockpiling (a term I will discuss later) but your getting items that you use for FREE which allows you to take that extra money saved, however small, and apply it towards your debt! It really doesn’t get any better than that!

See below for some of the items I've gotten for free!

Paying down debt $10 a day!

A few months back while browsing in the library I came across a book entitled Pay It Down! From Debt to Wealth on $10 a Day by Jean Chatzky. Although the title pretty much says it all, I highly recommend reading this book!

Have you ever sat and thought about the amount of money you spend daily on Starbucks coffee, breakfast, or trips to the vending machine? Well I did, and I was truly amazed by the money I was spending on these items! What Jean says in her book is to find $10 in your budget by eliminating some of these unnecessary expenditures and instead take that $10 and apply it to your debt on a daily basis. In reality, this really isn’t a hard feat! I did it and it worked like a charm.

For one week straight (yes, just one week and I vow from this day forward to get back on track!) I cut out my daily trip to the vending machine ($1/day), Caribou Coffee/breakfast trip ($4/day…sometimes $8 if I get my Mint condition from Caribou AND breakfast) and brought my lunch to work ($7 per day). Instead I picked ONE of my credit cards and paid $10 a day on it. I specify ONE b/c I truly believe that its easeier to tackle your debt when you focus on one thing at a time….not that your neglecting your other debt, your just choosing which card has your focus at that time. So everyday at 12 p.m.(I plugged it into my Outlook calendar at work so that I would get a daily reminder) I would log into my Capital One account and pay $10! Although this doesn’t sound like much, when the 4th of the month came (credit card due date!), not only did I already make my payment for the month but I paid more than the minimum; something that I ordinarily wouldn’t do!

Just think about it! If you cut out just $10 per day for just ONE month, you very well could have paid off an entire credit card! Or at the very least, put a dent in it! Giving up $300 worth of coffee, candy bars and breakfast biscuits is worth it, don't you think???!

So just to recap:
Pick a credit card of focus- I know people say to pick the card with the highest interest rate, but I’m the type of person who likes to see results fast in order to stay encouraged so in my case, I picked a card with the lowest balance.

Find $10 a day by skipping that trip to dunkin donuts, vending machine, etc.

Set a reminder on your cell phone, outlook calendar or whatever is handy and everyday at the same time pay $10 on your credit card. Even if its just $5, that’s $150 for the month that you applied towards your debt! If your like me and only pay the min $15 then that’s major!!!!