How to Save Money

Why save money?

Improve your quality of living, afford the things you really want. Its about how to get more useful stuff by redirect money that is being lost. Why spend money every night to power devices while you are sleeping? Why give money every month to phone companies for services that you don’t actually use? Just by refusing to pay for things that you dont use, you will then be able to pay for things you do. Be more focused about where you money is going so that you can then spend your money on things you really want.

Save on Cash!

Electric usage

Check around your house for things you have plugged in but you are not using. A great example is underneath your TV set. Do you still use your VHS recorder?

Around 10% of your energy is actually used at night, just powering devices that are not actually switched on. So switch it off at the wall! Get a habit of switching things off at the wall when you lock your house at night.

Energy saving light bulbs can now be bought for only a £1 in some shops which are always a good buy. These bulbs do last longer and use as much as 80% less electricity. The 20watt bulbs are as bright as 100watts.

When calculating a typical home’s energy usage, you will find that you have about 3 devices that use more energy than the rest of the house put together. Phone chargers, lighting etc use tiny amounts of energy when compared to a tumble drier or a water immersion heater. If you have gas heating, then don’t use the immersion.  If it’s a dry day, don’t use your tumble drier!

Consider buying PV solar panels for your roof. Spending £2000 can reduce your bill by £500 a year. If your bill is already quite low, then could be quite a saving for you.  If you’re living in a caravan then it’s quite easy to only be using solar panels as your only power source by hooking it up to a battery.

Gas usage

A lot of people don’t know how to use a thermostat correctly. When its a cold in the day, you should set the temperature to around 22°c then leave it. When the house is hot, the heating will then turn itself off. At night, turn it down to 16°c, that way, if it gets really cold, your heating will come back on.

If you have dials on your radiators, they shouldn’t be all turned to the maximum or turned to the minimum, as a rule of the thumb put them about two thirds the way up, but turn down the rooms which are not in use, you will get more heat pumped in the rooms which are.

If your radiators are too hot to even touch, then you need to turn down your boiler slightly. as over heating your water to a very high temperature is just a waste of energy. If your radiators are cold at the top but hot at the bottom then you need to bleed the out the air from the top of your radiators. Some systems need to be done regularly.

New efficient boilers are available today which save you money on your gas, however they can be expensive to buy. If you need to replace your boiler, don’t buy the cheapest, shop around and find one that saves you on gas.

Land line phone

Some of the cheap extras you can add to your phone bill like £2 a month for free local calls actually work out to be expensive. Local calls are the cheapest calls you can make, so it can actually take quite a number of local calls before you have spent £2. So calculate if extra bundles actually will save you money before signing up to them.

Mobile phone

The amount of people I know who don’t make full use of the monthly plan of their mobile phone. If you’re not using up all text or minutes every month. Just ring your phone provider, Usually dialling 150 will get you a free call straight to your network. Say to them you have lost your job, and need to reduce your monthly bill or you have to cancel the contract! You will be amazed at how much money you can save without reducing how much you use your phone.

TV

Do you use sky? Do you actually watch the specific sky channels? If not, then get freeview TV. 90% of the channels can be found on freeview, but for free! All new TVs now have freeview built in. All you have to do is connect your aerial to it to get freeview.

Hot water

Is your hot water too hot? Steaming hot water is usually not even necessary. Hot water should be at around 60°c, any hotter is a waste of energy. It takes lots more energy to get the water to higher temperatures. Most homes have a thermal stat fitted to the side of the hot water tank. Just turn this down. If its too cold for a bath, then you have gone too far!

Have you got the extra insulation around your hot water tank? This is actually one of the easiest and quickest ways of saving money. Just spend £10 at your local supermarket for tank insulation. Its so easy to fit, and will save you £50 every year.

Also consider solar hot water panels. The panels are designed to absorb the sun light as to heat your water. They can actually bring water to boiling point on hot day, but they usually used to raise the temperature in your tank and a gas boiler is still required to do the rest.

Heating

Heat can enter and escape out through house windows.  If you live in a cold climate, or in a cold season, you should try to let as much light as possible in to the rooms, during the day, while keeping all window being closed.  Sun’s light comes with IR heat; so the more light you have in the house, the more heat you are getting radiated in to the home.  So keep your windows close, and the curtains wide open.  If you have blinds, make sure they are turned as to get the maximum light through them, don’t pull them to the side of the window as this encourages conventions which leak heat back outside.

As soon as the sun has gone over the horizon, make sure all windows, blinds, curtains and doors are closed as to slow down the heat you’ve captured from escaping to the outside.

Loft insulation

Supermarkets have started selling loft insulation at good prices. So nows the time to buy. Your home looses a great deal of heat through the roof. Keep the heat in and it will reduce your heating costs. If your living in rented accommodation, you can often get this done for free.

Driving

Always keep an eye on the fuel prices, and use those 5p off vouchers available from Tesco and Sainsbury’s. When you see cheap fuel, fill your tank! You can also reduce your fuel costs by 15% just by keeping your car clean and the tyres at their correct pressure.  When driving up to traffic lights or a junction, start slowing down earlier, you can quickly save up to miles on fuel using this method.

Eating

Eating and drinking out is 5 times more expensive than eating at home. What you save on drinking down the pub in a year can easily buy your family a holiday abroad. Give up smoking, and you could have three holidays a year!

Gym membership

Average gym membership is around £400 a year, and most of these members are not actually going to the gym. Are you one of these silly people?

Weekly shopping

When you are buying food, look at the cost per meal. There is so much choice. Lots of food which actually cost next to nothing when you consider the amount of meals it can replace. Always, always buy bread. Bread is so cheap. A lunch only costs about 10p!.

Insurance

If you’re paying insurance of any kind, then you need to think about if you are likely to get any benefit, say over 10 years? Most insurances are not worth their money. Most commonly credit card insurance, as they often don’t even pay up when you need it. If you don’t actually know what the benefits and the conditions of the insurance your paying for, then you don’t actually know why you are given them your money.

Car insurance

Once you have car insurance, they will automatically try to insure you the next year at a high price. Car insurance will almost physically fight to keep a customer. I dont like changing insurance companies, so I email them the cheapest quote I could find on the net, and ask them to beat it – Even when their system wont let them, they will still find a way to beat your quote just to keep you!

Buy a car

Car purchase

Buying a brand new car when you’re on a budget is not worth it, as in most cases the car will instantly loose between £1000 to £3000 of its value before you drive it out of the showroom. However buying an old car will lead to high maintenance costs, as parts will fail towards the end of a cars life. So, arguably the most valuable time to buy a car is when its between 1 and 3 years old. New cars don’t even need to be MOT for its first years of its life, and often most the car parts are still guaranteed.

Banks

Overdrawn? Why are you keep on paying those fees? Just give your bank a ring. They really don’t care how or why you’re overdrawn, they don’t bite. Just say to them, what can you do to help me get out of debt, and they will!

Credit Cards

If you own a credit card, then the only way you will actually benefit from it is if you always pay the whole balance every month. If your not, then everything you purchase will cost you more than the price you actually paid for it.

Mind set

When you get paid, and have new cash in the bank, don’t spend it! Pretend you haven’t even got paid yet! When you are really desperate, once you have eaten every bit of food from the kitchen, your car is nearly out of fuel, and you have a red bill that you must pay; only then do you withdraw the cash. Keep this up for a few months, and you will soon find yourself with lots of money in the bank. A warning, do keep paying your TV license, car insurance and MOT etc, as fines and criminal record is worse than being in debt.

Cash in your pocket

By using all the above savings tips you will now have lots of extra cash in your pocket! Having extra cash in your pocket also helps you save even more money, because now you have cash at the ready when you come across that bargain item.