Saving Money on Food & Drink
Have you ever just about died of a heart attack at the
checkstand of your local grocery store? It seems like the price of
food and beverages keeps escalating, with no end in sight.
Higher transportation costs (especially fuel) are only one of the
many factors have significantly impacted the price of goods at
your local store. This article will discuss some of the ways you
can cut back your expenses on purchased food and water.
Food Purchased at Markets
You can save hundreds of dollars a year by shopping at the
lower-priced food stores. Higher-end grocery stores may have a
nicer, brighter, more spacious shopping area, but you are
paying for that in the form of higher prices. Some grocery chains
offer a "preferred" customer card, supposedly to give you the
best price over the "non-preferred, non-cardholding" customers.
You would probably be unwise to shop at these stores without
such a card (although it may be necessary when traveling, etc.),
but you would be even more wise to look elsewhere. Sometimes
that "preferred" customer price is higher than the regular price
at the store just down the street. Resist that urge to shop at
the convenience store on your way home; you pay for that
convenience in the form of often significantly higher prices.
Shop with a list! This little bit of planning can also save you
hundreds of dollars annually. How many times have you gone to
the store just for milk (that you forgot to buy earlier in the week
when you were there) and come home with $30 or more worth
of groceries? Grocery stores are purposely designed to keep
you in the store as long as possible; for example, on your way
to the back of the store to get milk (even this is on purpose),
you pass by hundreds of products and colorful displays, not to
mention delicious smells enticing you in their direction. And, oh
what luck! There is a cookie display right next to the milk. Even
the music over the loudspeaker has been specifically chosen
based on market analysis of what age brackets of shoppers
shop at what times of the day (and thus what kind of music they
like). Make out a list and stick to it!
As with all other things, comparison shop. You can save
hundreds of dollars a year by comparing price-per-ounce or
other unit prices on shelf labels. Stock up on those items with
low per-unit costs. Store brands are often just as good or better
than national brands, at sometimes almost half the cost! Try
some; you probably will be pleasantly surprised.
Water
When you go out to eat, don't buy a drink. Ask for water
instead. You probably won't notice the difference (if the food is
good enough) and you will be drinking a healthy alternative to
soda or alcohol.
Keep a water bottle near you at all times. When you start
feeling hungry or thirsty drink some water instead of heading for
the vending machine or that stash of candy bars in your desk.
Many times we feel hungry when we are instead thirsty. Satisfy
the thirst first! You will save money and improve your health.
If you prefer drinking bottled water, look into purchasing a
water purifier or purification system. Over the long run it may be
much cheaper than purchasing bottled water. In addition, a
good filtration system could improve your health, considering all
the microbes and chemicals found in the water coming out of the
tap!
Saving money on food and water doesn't require that you go on
a starvation diet. It just requires a little up-front planning. You
know the saying: If you fail to plan, you plan to fail. Make
planning a habit and watch the savings rack up.
Chemain Evans is a quality control expert for Simple Joe, makers of the popular Income & Expenses PC software which provides a quick and simple way to keep track of your expenses and stay within your budget. Learn more at http://www.simplejoe.com.
Home Coffee Roasters: Enjoy The Sip To The Fullest!
If you happen to be an ardent coffee lover, there could not be a better way to enjoy a mug of coffee than brewing coffee beans on your own. And making coffee out of these self-roasted beans would be a fulfilling experience. I bet! You would love to have and offer others this self brewed coffee.
If you think I am kidding with you, then you need to think again. A good number of home coffee roasters are on the block and are quite easy to operate. You can buy home one such roaster to enjoy the perfect cup of coffee with self brewed and roasted coffee beans. Every morning you can roast beans as per your requirement and enjoy the mug full of coffee with your desired taste. What a fantastic way to greet the day!
Although these roasters offered for home use happen to be a bit pricey, but this cost could be borne for your urge to enjoy perfect cup of coffee every morning. Moreover you get liberty to roast as per your taste. If you are not willing to enjoy a strong cup of coffee you can roast it for comparatively lesser time, you can also do it vice a versa.
But coffee brewing is an art that you will have to learn gradually, otherwise you would end up destroying processed beans that you have bought for roasting.
These home coffee roasters are comparatively small in size and are run by a computerized mechanism. They also possess a display unit to show level of heat given to beans.
After buying one such roaster you are up to a task of choosing right quality beans which you can easily do by paying a visit to a nearby gourmet store. You can buy beans in bulk but the container in which you would store beans must be air tight.
You may get information booklet or brochure with the roaster at the time of buying that would help you in providing only required heating to the beans.
To get more information on coffee, coffee roasters and coffee recipes visit http://www.have-a-coffee.com/
Use your credit cards wisely
Credit cards can be a wonderful convenience but they can also be destroyer of our future if we use them with complete unconcern. You probably think you use credit cards wisely. But the facts suggest otherwise. Credit card companies are very lucrative, and their profits come from costumers’ purses. The principal moment is to understand how not to lose money with credit cards. Using your credit cards sensibly will help you avoid financial problems and help you to build a good credit history.
Credit cards are designed for buying things now and paying later. But don't forget that every time you use your credit card you are borrowing money. Therefore pay your credit card bills on time. This is the single most important thing you can do to improve your credit score. One late fee can really get down your credit rating and increase the rates on your other cards. Do not pay only the minimum of your monthly bill as it may evoke a suspicion on your credit worthiness. If possible, pay off your balance in full each month. If this is not possible, then make as large a payment as you can comfortably afford. If you don’t want special rewards such as hotel rewards, gas rebate etc, if you expect to always pay your monthly bill in full your best choice can be a credit card with no annual fee and longer grace period.
Never transcend the credit limit on your credit card. Ideally keep your balance about 25 % of your credit limit.
If you have a good credit history, you are a valuable to negotiate with your credit company. Call them and ask about and ask about lowering your interest rate. Undoubtedly, they want to keep you as a customer. This is often possible, but never advertised.
Check your statement carefully each month. Do all the charges look correct? Have any required credits been applied? Besides regularly check you credit report to make sure the information is accurate, complete, and up-to-date. Your credit report contains information that determines whether you can get new credit card or a loan and how much you will have to pay to borrow money. If you find errors on your credit report write a letter to the reporting agency. Explain each dispute and request an inquest to resolve the issues.
How do you decide how many credit cards to own? There are reasons to have more credit cards, and reasons to have fewer cards. Here are reasons to own few credit cards:
1. Each time you open a credit card, 20 points are taken off your credit score.
2. It is easier to manage your finance if you use only one or two credit cards. The more credit cards you have, the bigger risk of damaging your credit you carry.
3. If you have more credit cards, you should check more credit statements for errors.
Here are some reasons to use more than one card:
1. The first reason is credit card acceptance. May be American Express Blue credit card satisfies your requirements. But many merchants don't accept this card, so you'll probably want a Visa or MasterCard as well.
2. Different cards offer higher rewards on different types of purchase, for example, some credit cards offer higher rewards on gasoline. So if you have several credit cards you can make the most of rewards you get.
So how many credit cards should you hold? Most experts say there is no magic number. It depends on the amount of effort and time you are going to devote to saving money. Never use more credit cards than you can manage.
Sticking to the rules can help you to avoid the expensive mistakes that most credit card users make.
