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Money Saving Tips
Former Member
Posts: 1,876,323 The Mix Honorary Guru
A place to share all of our ideas and let others know what has worked for us.
I recently had a lightbulb moment that I had to start working at paying off my £3.5k debt. Since then I have become a bit of a frantic member of the MSE website.
Let us all know any advice you have!
I recently had a lightbulb moment that I had to start working at paying off my £3.5k debt. Since then I have become a bit of a frantic member of the MSE website.
Let us all know any advice you have!
0
Comments
Student discount if applicable.
Selling stuff you don't need on eBay
Pre-drinks at someone's house before going out...
Making a packed lunch/taking a thermos flask of coffee (have to admit I never do this but I'd save myself a fortune if I did)
-- doing everything possible to pay off credit card on time and in full to avoid interest, i.e. if you have savings or a (lower, or interest-free) overdraft use it to pay off credit cards
Making my own lunch saves me quite a bit. Some of my friends spend up to £5-6 a day on their lunches.
Bulk cooking and freezing things - this helped me quite a bit in terms of saving time as well as money. Previously when I was short on food my answer would be to go straight to the shops but now I know it's just a defrost away. It's quite easy for me to do as I've got a greengrocer and butcher close by, but avoiding the supermarkets as much as possible has saved me loads of money.
Cutting down on alcohol. I don't drink anyway, so but some friends who have done this have noticed it saves them some £££, especially when you've reached that point where you're quite drunk and forget how much you're spending.
In the car, check your tyre pressures and coast up to lights rather than always accelerating or braking.
Do your food shopping at the market rather than the supermarket (that's for you Heather!) or shop at lower-priced supermarkets. That knocks a tenner a week off our food bills.
Change all your insurance providers at renewal and try and shop around for the best energy deals.
If you have debt, make sure your debts are with the cheapest credit available to you. With credit cards, look at an overall rate rather than a special 0% deal unless you expect to repay the debt in the 0% period- a life-of-balance rate of 5% may be cheaper than the 0% for 12 months followed by the standard 18%.
Using different bank accounts to budget is a good idea. Our wage goes into the main joint account but from that we have one account for our petrol, one account for our food shopping, and savings accounts for our clothes and college fees. This means we can't get at our money unless its in one of our accounts with a debit card. Having a set amount transferred means it is a lot harder to go over budget.
my good money saving tip is to feel really guilty everytime you buy something you don't need, as it stops you buying other stuff :thumb:
And use coupons with sales. Most times when I shop I save more than I spend. Coupons and sales... get toothpaste for a buck, get pit stick for 2. Find places where you can get coupons too. My pharmacy (which is also a large store), for example, gives me 10% off purchases for a day when I get to 10 prescriptions.
Use websites like www.hotukdeals.co.uk to get vouchers and discount codes.
I wouldn't advise 'coasting' up to traffic lights and junctions - use your engine braking - go down through the gears slowly and smoothly and this will reduce your fuel consumption. If you coast your car, you rely solely on your brakes - and having been in a car when the brakes have failed, i can assure you it is a brown trouser moment and not something i'd recommend!
Don't be afraid to haggle - for example with insurance and mobile phone contracts as hardly anyone does and you are sure to get a discount.
Shop around for goods - for example, don't buy cds at hmv - check out sales or online stores for the same goods - always ask yourself if you need the item.
Do you not have a cooling off period where you can just pay it straight back?
Well why don't you check? Why the fuck did you accept it if you didn't want it?!
............................. if you don't blow it all, that's not too bad. Put it into an ISA (that's if you can't cancel the loan) and at least you will come close to making a chunk of the interest back that it's going to cost you.
If you got it to fall back on, just don't spend it.
Which is what we did say when you said you were thinking about it last month. Still, keeps me in a job...
You probably won't have a cooling-off period but you can repay the full amount at any time. The sooner you do that the better. Do that and take out a new loan for the amount you owe ONLY if you will save money after interest. Because of how loans are structured you probably won't save by switching.
If you see any money off vouchers in magazines etc, save them and when you come to pay hand them over and they will take the amount off your total bill regardless of whether you have bought the thing the coupon was for or not.
They don't advertise this one much, but i do it all the time!
That doesnt doesnt seem right, it seems a little to like steeling to me, because the company that gives the ticket out is still having to pay the super market for it even if u havent paid for there Product.
Wow how does that work!
Asda will sell that product, just to someone else. At the end of the day they round up all the tokens and give them to the supplier, who takes money off their bill. It makes no odds to Asda if person A or person Z buys the product as long as someone does, and in a big store they will.
Its absolutely nothing like stealing.
See my easy to follow description up the page.
Well we've all learnt something new today haven't we?! :thumb:
I havent because I already knew it, and you probably could have worked it out with a little thought, its quite simple.
By the time you've had to pay for petrol money to et to the supermakret, getting it delivered is probably cheaper.
Don't buy branded name stuff. The cheaper stuff tastes just as nice.
Not all the time it doesnt.
If you shop the sales, brand name stuff is often cheaper than non brand name.
Not the somerfield 47p massive tins of sausages and beans.