Get Up Edina!

The past year or so of my life has found me in some interesting financial pickles. Although these have not been very fun, I’ve taken the opportunities to become more creative with what little I have, and how to stretch it even further than I was before. After many harsh realizations of how little money I really do have, I was shocked into a budget. This was hard, but now I’m realizing that it’s for the best, and I’m way ahead of most people my age financially, even though I’m making way less than them.

I was quite accustomed to splitting the bills with my ex-boyfriend…however, when things went sour, and we broke up, I was the one who ended up keeping the apartment while he left. This doubled my financial burden every month, and this was a major shock to me. I was still spending as though I only had to pay half of what I actually was. Stupid, stupid, stupid me. This was a hard lesson learned in itself – not only about relationships, but with my own personal finances. I am thankful, though, as it’s forced me to be more creative and to take new financial routes and risks.

SAVING

Regardless of how much money you make, start saving now! Whether you make minimum wage or $30/hr, saving is the smartest thing you can do with your money. Try to find a high yield savings account or a money market account with a high APY (annual percentage yield). If you put $5 or $50 in it a month, it’s something. This will accrue interest, and grow over time. Your money is making money for you. I started out with a few hundred dollars less than a year ago, and I have $20 taken out of my account automatically every single month. I don’t even notice. It does it underneath my nose. Now, I’ve gained nearly $200 since then from the bits of $20 and interest. How cool is that? I can raise the amount taken out or make individual deposits. If I ever get money for an occasion, I deposit it in my bank account, and then transfer it to my money market account. This is excess money that I know I’ll do something stupid with, so I’m putting it to good use instead of buying a records or dinner out. I’ll be very glad I have this money set aside in case of an emergency, or possibly later on when I’m looking to retire or something. I don’t plan on touching it. Take my advice on this – you’ll be happy you did. Starting a nest egg as soon as possible is the best thing you can do for yourself later on. I know many of our parents do not have much savings, and it’s sad that people are retiring later and later in life. Do you want to work until you’re 80? I don’t think so.

WHAT ARE YOU SPENDING?

When I realized I was living outside of my means, I started a strict budget. I started this by saving my receipts and realizing what I was spending my money on. My grocery bills were equal to what I was spending on clothes. My ebay bills were even higher. I was spending more on records than food. Yikes! So, to keep myself in check, I started using expensr, an online money management tool that makes keeping track of your spending painless. At the end of each week, I take all my saved receipts and plug them into this to see how much I’m spending each month compared to my paychecks. This has worked quite well to make sure I’m living within my means.

It’s so easy to swipe a card and not think about it. If you want a more extreme budget, stop using your debit card. Set an amount for how much you want to spend for a week or month. Take that out of the ATM in cash, and only spend cash. Forking over cash and seeing how much you have left is a physical reminder to stay within your means.

LIVING SITUATION

When you split utilities, it’s not a huge deal. However, when you live alone, you have to be a bit more conscious, as a $150 electric bill SUCKS. So, I started looking into how I could save on utilities and my living situation.

Be more environmentally friendly. It’s simple, good for the environment, and cheaper for you.

Places like Ikea and some hardware stores have options to lower your utilities. Although they may be a tad more expensive, they’ll save you more than you’re spending. I’m a big fan of Ikea’s light bulbs. Although they’re not as bright as conventional light bulbs, they last years, and really do make a difference on your bill.

• Try going for energy star appliances if you’re in the market.
• Lower the temperature on your fridge & freezer.
• Adjust the temperature on your thermostat, especially when you’re not home (or turn it off completely when you’re not home). In the summer, I keep mine at 79*f at almost all times. If I get warm, I turn on the fan. The A/C sucks up a TON of energy, and I want cool air in the room I’m in, not all over the house.
• Run energy-sucking appliances outside of peak hours. Write down peak hours per season on a sticky note and stick them to these appliances as a reminder. Do your laundry during non-peak hours. Do it back to back. Dryers are more efficient when ran back to back, as they don’t have to heat up to a certain temperature over and over.
• Maintain your electronics and appliances. Clean them out, fix them, get them checked up on. This will save you money down the line, and will keep them more energy efficient.
• Unplug things!! Everything that's plugged into an active outlet is taking up a little bit of electricity. Electronics are huge culprits. Do you really need 50 LED clocks going in your house at once? Think about it - you're paying for that little clock to glow all day. It's not necessary. Even things that aren’t physically showing they’re sucking energy are. Put things in power strips, and have them attached to on/off switches to a room. This will save you tons, and it’s easier to turn everything off when you leave the room.
• Put your computer on sleep mode. This is very easy, and can save you about $30 on your electric bill – and save your computer! All you have to do (if you’re running windows) is go into control panel, click “Display”, and go on the “Screen Saver” tab. There should be a monitor area, click the “power” button. On the “power schemes” tab, there’s a field to put your system on standby. I have mine to go to standby after 15 minutes. You can also manually put your system on standby by clicking “turn off computer” on your start menu and clicking “standby”. This doesn’t affect your computer at all, but it saves a TON of energy and wear on your computer.
• Use fans and space heaters instead of kicking on the A/C or heater. You really don’t need the whole house to be one temperature. Also, if you’re putting them on when you’re sleeping, or you’re on a tight budget, get one with a timer on it.

Also, if you’re in the market of moving, try to find a place that includes extras, such as utilities, internet, cable, whatever. This can cut off a tremendous amount of your utilities. Say you spend $100 on your electric. Get a place that includes utilities, that’s like saving $1200 a year, if not more. If your rent is about $700 a month, that’s nearly two months free rent. See where I’m going? These places are out there, you just have to look hard. It’s really worth it in the long run. Try looking for guest houses in peoples’ back yards (which can be rather nice!) or duplexes on craigslist. Let everyone you know that you’re looking for someplace new. You may come up in conversation and they’ll find a place for you!

BEING SMART

Nothing is more empowering than learning something new each day. I don’t care how long you’ve been in school – learn something new each day. Being smart about living your life and how to get things done is priceless. If you do things correctly the first time, that technically saves you money, as “time is money”.

Lately, I’ve been really getting into blogs that have tidbits of very useful information. A few of my favorites are Lifehacker, The Consumerist, Design*Sponge, Ikea Hacker, Not Martha, and occasionally, Jezebel. There are blogs about EVERYTHING out there if you just look. I’m discovering new ones all the time. I must tell you – I’ve learned a lot about saving money, achieving goals, managing my day job, and just general things to make life easier for me. Give ‘em a try. I have them assigned on days on my firefox’s morning coffee plugin (another great little thing that I learned about from a blog!)

Another piece of advice I have is GO TO SCHOOL. Going to school will earn you more money in the long run, and with the way the job market in the United States is going, you’ll pretty much have to have a degree to get a decent job by the time you’re middle aged. Going to school will open new experiences, new people, and new opportunities (ahem, dream job through your internship?) to you. I was only meaning to take off a year between high school and college, but here it is three years later and I’m in the middle of getting my FAFSA processed. Look for loans, grants, and financial aid. There IS a way out there you can manage it – just look into it and DO IT. It’ll be worth it in the long run. High school graduates – DON’T WAIT!! It’s harder to get back than you think.

Do your research – on everything. With the blessing of sweet lady internet, you can know everything about anything you want. I always do my research on things before jumping into them…Anything I’ll be buying, anywhere I’ll be going, I scour the internet for the best deals on flights, recommendations on jobs, places to go, restaurants to go to, coupons for everything….it’s so easy, it just takes you a little time. Going into any sort of situation with some prior knowledge doesn’t hurt. Going into a store with a ton of coupons certainly never hurt your wallet.

LEISURE

If you’re one to travel, sign up for your favorite airline’s frequent flyer program. It may take a while to get something, but it’s worth it. There’s also all sorts of places online where you can earn free rewards by taking surveys (e-rewards and e-miles). It’s that easy. Also, there actually ARE decent credit cards out there that earn you miles. American Express has a great one. Check it out.

Also, if you're under the age of 25 or a student, check out STA travel. STA travel is awesome - I went in and booked, chatted with the agent, was generally friendly and he gave me a HARDCORE hookup and saved me over $120!!!!

If you patronize any mom & pop shop or any sort of artisan (like a tattoo artist), spread the word about them. Take their business cards. Let them know you support them and love what they do, and you’ll be a faithful patron of theirs. I let record shops, little clothing stores, and tattoo artists know that I fully support them. I do take their business cards and hand them out to people all the time. They notice this – trust me. I get discounts like mad from some places. My tattoo artist appreciated me recommending people, so he gave me great prices on my work. Record stores appreciate me sending people their way. I get a little discount here and there (and some stuff set aside). Little clothing stores let me know they’re putting in an order, and ask if I’d like anything in particular (at wholesale price). Be nice. Be supportive. Be their own personal sales rep. You’ll reap the benefits, and be promoting small business owners, which is great, especially if you like to “stick it to the man”.

If you have a pet – I only suggest taking them to the vet for their annual and if health issues arise. For shots and everything, there are clinics at petco and petsmart where you can get shots for less than half the price than at the vet. I wish I had known this when I got Bella – I was paying nearly $100 a month when she was a puppy taking her for her shots at the vet every month!

Also, with your pets – do preventative maintenance. Get heartguard and frontline. These will protect your pet and keep from unneeded heartache and vet bills. Also, I suggest taking a look at your pet food. What are the main ingredients? Most foods have lots of carbohydrates as their main ingredient. Most animals cannot be healthy off of that. I HIGHLY recommend trying out Nutro and Dick Patten’s pet foods. They may be more expensive, but you’ll definitely see a happier, healthier pet who loves mealtime. Take care of your animals!

SHOPPING

This is going to sound crazy…but this is my new favorite thing:

CVS takes returns on EVERYTHING. I love it. I no longer shop in fear that foundation won’t match, that face wash will sting, that deodorant will smell funky and I’ll lose my hard earned dollar. Their policy is that if you’re not happy, you can return it. Have your receipt, (you’re saving your receipts, no?) and it’ll go faster. There are a few other stores out there that do this as well – such as Ulta. Shop at these stores, and don’t add to your massively growing collection of shampoos under your sink.

Speaking of shampoos…and lotions and other girly stuff. How much do you really have? Probably way more than you need. Use all of what you have before you buy more. Wasting is like throwing away money. Would you throw away a $5 bill? Of course not! Use what you have, and then buy some. I’m still chipping away at my Bath & Body works collection that I accumulated from their last giant sale when lotions were $1. I regret buying all that. It’ll take me ages to use that much lotion.

Don’t get more than you need. It may be a better deal to buy a gallon of Listerine…but seriously…be honest with yourself! Yeah, you’ll use it…but it’ll take you three years. Giant bottles may be a great deal, but buy within your means.

Staying within your means applies to many things with shopping. Some things may seem like a better deal, but please, ask yourself – “Do I really need this much/many?”. Get singles on photos. Buy singular or 3 packs of undies. Buy only a 10 pack of pens. Buy a 500 sheet pack of paper (instead of the giant boxes). You may use all of it, but how long will it take? If it’s food or beauty supplies (as in, buy one get one free), it may go bad. Keep that in mind.

BEAUTY

I think the secret to living on the cheap with beauty (aside from the returning tip above) is keeping low maintenance. Try Veet (at your own risk, only get sensitive formulas) so you only have to shave once every ten days. Get long lasting lipstick. If you use tanner, get the gradual lotion (basically streak free and moisturizes!). Just keep it simple. I’m sure you don’t want to be wasting time getting ready or shaving or anything when you could be doing better things. Plus, I guess guys find chicks who spend three hours getting ready to be high maintenance kinda annoying and unattractive.

So, with all that said, these have been some of the lessons I’ve learned on trying to live a low maintenance, cheaper life. I hope these tips have helped you!