How to Lower Your Bills
August 25, 2011One of the great things about your 401(k) is that it allows you to put away a small amount of money each month and end up saving quite a bit of money over time. The “fixed” expenses I’ll write about in this post work the same way, except in reverse. While they individually aren’t as big an expense in most people’s budgets as the housing and transportation costs discussed earlier, these relatively small costs can still add up to a lot of lost savings each month:
TV. I wouldn’t watch cable tv even if it were absolutely free. I can say that because it’s true. My apartment building has free cable tv and I have yet to watch a single show on it. In this case, it’s less a matter of money and more a matter of time. The two shows I do watch regularly, the Apprentice and the Office, I watch online on NBC’s web site. In addition to not costing me anything, I can watch them when it’s most convenient for me and skip most of the commercials. There’s also a ton of other shows for free on sites like Hulu.com, or you can use a small antennae to get HDTV over the air if you want to watch live sports. I see very little reason to pay for cable or satellite tv.
My cost: $0
Internet. If there’s one place not to cut corners, I would say this is it. If you’re going to rely on your Internet connection to watch your favorite tv shows, you’re going to want to make sure you can do so smoothly. It’s better to pay a little more for a faster speed than to find yourself reordering cable tv. On the other hand, don’t pay for more speed than you need. I suggest trying a lower speed to see if you notice the difference.
My cost: $16.33 per month (after dividing by 3 people)
Phone. Assuming you have a cell phone, two things are likely true. The first is that you don’t need a landline phone. The second is that you’re paying too much for your cell phone. I travel a lot for work and I’ve yet to be in a place where my Virgin Mobile prepaid phone doesn’t have reception. Virgin Mobile is owned by Sprint and uses their network, but you pay a lot less. The plans are $35 for 300 min, $45 for 1200 min, and $55 for unlimited minutes, all with unlimited texting and data. That’s pretty tough to beat. The only catch is that their phones are a little behind the curve. Their leading phone is the Motorola Triumph, which is a 1Ghz Android smartphone with a 4.1 inch screen that would have been on par with the latest and greatest phones last year. But is a slightly faster processor and network speed really worth paying an extra $50-60 more per month on one of the contract networks?
My cost: $25 per month (since I locked in the lower price before it went up)
(If you really need the newest cell phone technology and talk a lot on the phone, consider T-Mobile’s prepaid plan of $50 per month for unlimited minutes, texting, and data. The first 100 MB of data are at 4G speeds on America’s largest 4G network and they have many of the latest phones. The main downside is that the phones are more expensive without a contract, but you can pay for the phone over time and still save more in lower monthly payments over the long run.)
Power. The main ways I keep my gas and electric bill down are by living in an apartment in San Diego, where I don’t need to use much heat or air conditioning, using compact fluorescent light bulbs, and splitting the bill three ways with my two roommates. I’m sure there are things I could do to be more energy efficient (see Greg’s post on this topic), but saving the few bucks just honestly isn’t worth the hassle to me.
My cost: an average of $36 per month (after dividing between 3 people)
Gym membership. See if you can get a workout that’s as good, or even better with your own set of weights, or an in-home “boot camp” like Tony Horton’s popular Power90 and P90x programs. Just stay away from those expensive machines sold on late night infomercials. You probably won’t use them past the first few days and free weights, resistance bands, and body weight exercises tend to actually be more effective while costing you a lot less money.
My cost: $60 one-time cost for the Power90 program, then $0 per month
Netflix subscription. At one time, Netflix was a great way to save money on movies. But with their recent rate increase and lower priced competition from Redbox and even Blockbuster, that may no longer be the case, unless you watch a lot of movies every month. Instead, check out your local library for older movies and Redbox for new releases for only $0.99.
My cost: $0 for library DVDs and about $10 per month on movie rentals
Magazine and newspaper subscriptions. If you’re not reading it regularly, cancel it. If you are, see if you can read the articles online. I regularly read a lot of newspaper and magazine articles and I’ve yet to find the need to subscribe to one.
My cost: $0
My total: $87 per month
I’m sure there are countless other ways to save on these and other monthly bills. If you have any, please share them in the comments below.