October Spending and Savings Report

 Triple coupons came to town this week - most of these items were free or nearly free!

So much for coming back in July, eh?!  For the first few months we were in the house it seemed as though every time we thought we were almost settled, something would happen - plumbing woes, renovation delays, never-ending painting projects - to throw everything back into chaos.  October was the first relatively calm, normal month since we moved, and I have all of its numbers right here at my disposal so I want to post them now, quick, before something breaks or floods!  They'll be followed, eventually, by numbers for all the months when I was MIA.

What We Earned

Between my take-home pay of $1,768.06 and additional earnings of $617.98 (thanks to surveys and online focus groups, trading in old books and selling a bunch of unwanted gift cards) our October income totaled $2,386.04.

What We Spent

This was an unusually "spendy" month thanks to several birthdays (and there are more coming up, argh!), an unexpected home repair and having to take a furry new family addition to the vet for his annual checkup.  Our expenses, which totaled $1,679.81, were as follows:

$809.53 - Mortgage payment
$29.22 - Electric bill
$150.93 - Nelly's health insurance
$14.79 - Auto fuel
$48.05 - Cable and Internet
$50.09 - Gifts
$110.59 - Grocery and household
$3.24 - Hobbies
$27.77 - Natural gas service
$8.07 - Home improvement store
$58.06 - Water bill (paid quarterly, on average we spend only $19 per month on water)
$31.63 - Sewer service
$7.99 - Netflix
$149.52 - 30 lbs. of healthy pet food + vet visit
$160 - Plumber
$9.48 - Newspaper subscription
$10.85 - USPS

What We Saved

We saved a total of $706.23 in October, including my regular monthly retirement account contribution of $416.66.  I'll update this post with an official tally of our year-to-date savings once I've entered the information for the previous months I missed.

Almost Back!

The floor refinishing has finally been completed, just slightly behind schedule, and we're still hosting repair specialists right and left (a plumber, a drain guy, an electrician, an AC guy and an air duct cleaner have come and gone; the electrician will finish his work this week and then hopefully all we have left are visits from a handyman to help with some installation projects and a tree trimmer), but the end is in sight.  So far I've tracked down about 70% of the receipts I'll need to get current on our monthly budget posts, and I expect to find the remaining 30% before the week is through.  In the meantime, some random thoughts on the crazy last few months:

• Our Angie's List subscription has been worth it.  It cost $21 after coupon and has pointed us toward several fantastic technicians we never would have found just by using Google and asking relatives and neighbors for recommendations.  Quite a few of the companies we've used have also offered exclusive Angie's List coupons that have already saved us around $200.

• One of our fears about moving was that we'd encounter sexist repairmen who'd try to rip us off.  What we've found so far, to our great surprise, is that most of these repairmen regard us almost paternally and, perhaps as a goodwill gesture because of our age and status as somewhat beleaguered first-time home-owners, look for ways to charge us less. 

• Even well-planned moves create chaos, and there have been plenty of times since we took possession of the house when we've wanted to spend, spend, spend, whether it's ordering takeout or heading off to Lowe's without comparison shopping or tracking down coupons.  Instead, we suck it up and cook for maximum leftovers and remind ourselves that getting careless in our shopping would start us down a slippery slope.  

• It has taken extra effort since we've been much busier than usual with meetings, chores and setting up accounts with utility companies we never had to interact with as renters, but we've continued taking steps to create more wiggle-room in our budget: Nelly's officially done with Verizon now and has joined me at TracFone, which will save several hundred dollars a year; we also purchased our own cable modem using Amazon gift cards earned at Swagbucks and will save approximately $17 per month, or $204 per year, by returning our digital cable box and cable company-issued modem to the cable company. 

• Freebies really come in handy when you have to spend a few nights away from home!  We had to stay at our old apartment for three nights while the floors were finished, and being able to toss a bunch of free toiletry samples into our overnight bag rather than pack up the contents of our bathroom at the house, saved us both time and stress.

Budget Updates Coming in June

Well, we bought a house!  We went house-hunting in April (after watching online listings for the last year), made an offer, negotiated, went through several rounds of inspections, and now we're in the process of moving in.  It's been done in pieces, as we're doing most of it ourselves - we only paid to have the heaviest furniture moved by professionals - and it has largely been done in sweltering 100 degree temperatures, which hasn't been a lot of fun.

Other than putting the kitchen, bedroom and bathroom in order, we have no immediate plans to unpack: no point in doing that when there's flooring to be refinished and walls to be painted, which will require empty rooms.  It'll take a few weeks to get all of that done, at which point I'll be able to rummage through our receipts (unless I stumble upon them in the interim) and provide thorough budget updates.  As far as I can remember, we've managed to stay within budget: there's just been the usual grocery shopping and the occasional trip to Target or Lowe's for trivial things like shed locks and drop cloths, often covered by gift card.

What we spend on repairs and renovations will be examined in future posts, along with our attempts to creatively utilize Swagbucks, survey sites, coupons and sales to minimize the cost of replacing everything from interior doors (a priority) to the refrigerator (for the moment, at least, not a priority).

Spending Tracker: The Last Two Weeks of April

Some Target odds and ends.

In the first two weeks of April, as you might recall, we bought a lot of groceries that, thanks to a surplus of gift cards, hardly cost us anything out of pocket.  We also spent more than usual on gas (though we still came in under budget for the month) as we went house-hunting, and eventually we did find a house that we liked quite a bit, which will be the subject of a future post.  So the last two weeks of April were slightly hectic for us, which is probably reflected in our shopping.

We visited only one grocery store in the second half of the month, where we spent $5.18 on produce that was entirely covered by gift card, and made two trips to Target, mostly to gather prices on things we'll need to acquire if we move.  On the first trip we spent $15.79 on groceries and a $6 shirt; on the second we spent $23.61 on groceries, a garden hose and a couple of miscellaneous items.  Our best deals, pictured above, were $0.16 boxes of whole grain pasta, $0.99 body wash and $0.39 dog treats.  Both trips were paid for by gift cards we earned by doing surveys.

We also tracked prices on everything from painting supplies to welcome mats at Lowe's and Kohl's, and while at Lowe's I picked up a little plastic piece to repair a closet organizer.  The total was $3.07, which was covered by a gift card earned at MyView, and afterwards we stopped by Petco to pick up some free cat food using a coupon offered to Petco Pals rewards club members. 

Finally, we spent $21 on a year-long subscription to Angie's List, which aided in our research of home inspectors and should continue to prove valuable if we indeed buy a house. 

Total spent the last two weeks of April: $21
Total spent this year: $493.46

March Freebie Roundup

A little bit of everything made its way into March's freebies.

February was officially out-freebied last month! February's collection, as you might recall, fit easily in one photo, but capturing March's haul in a single frame took a bit of work.  Here's what we scored and how we did it:

• Two boxes of Kraft Macaroni & Cheese, courtesy of the "Macsurance" promotion they ran earlier this year on Facebook.  The rules allowed three boxes to be claimed per household, but the coupons went so quickly that we counted ourselves lucky to have even snagged one.
• Two boxes of Pop Secret popcorn, used with the last of the free product coupons we earned from the Disney Rewards program throughout 2011.  (Note: We earned these points without buying Disney products, using all-purpose codes Disney Rewards issues every month.)  Pop Secret is no longer available as a prize there but has returned periodically in the past, so we continue to amass points in the hope that it will pop up again later this year.
• One package of Kraft Fresh Take, which we bought using a free product coupon offered through the Kraft First Taste website.  I've been a member for over a year and was never invited to take part in previous free product promotions, so being selected for this one was exciting. 
• Three bottles of Up & Up ibuprofen, purchased at Target using a $1 coupon that was offered on Target's website.  The 24-ct. bottles of their store brand ibuprofen are regularly priced at $0.97, making them free after coupon. (The hard part is finding the bottles in stock.)
• Two Tide Pods laundry detergent samples.  Tide ran a free sample promo twice in the span of a week or so and we tried it both times and both times it came through.  You can't always count on that happening with freebies, so it's always a nice surprise when it works.
• Quaker Oatmeal Squares cereal sample, requested via Facebook.  They run a similar offer every month or two, so keep an eye on their Facebook page if you'd like to try this cereal for free.
• A Keebler Jumbo Fudge bar, another offer that has already popped up two or three times this year, once through Keebler and once through an affiliated website.  
• One Purex UltraPack laundry detergent sample and one Purex liquid laundry detergent sample, both requested through the Purex website during a limited-time offer.
• Beneful Baked Delights dog treats, requested through their website, and this was a neat, unusually generous one because they shipped two bags in one box, each a different flavor.  
• One can each of Purina Pro Plan dog food and Hill's Science Diet cat food, picked up for free at Petco using coupons offered to Petco Pals rewards members.  It's free to join and many of the coupons can be printed right from your computer. 
• Two Simple-brand facial wash products, one full-size and one sample-size.  The full-size was offered to qualifying SheSpeaks members, the sample was offered through the CVS website.
• One package of Always panty-liners and one package of Carefree panty-liners, both free at Target after using $1 manufacturer's coupons.
• Maybelline Baby Lips lip balm, regularly priced $2.99 at Target, or free after stacking a $2 manufacturer's coupon with a $1 Target coupon.
• CoverGirl LashBlast mascara, won through a Facebook promotion.
• Up & Up dental floss, regularly priced at $0.97, was free after using a $1 Target coupon.
• Free Always and Tampax samples are offered with great frequency, sometimes through Facebook, sometimes through the manufacturer's site and sometimes through other P&G promotions.  I don't remember the origins of the samples we received in March.
• Mucinex sinus medication and Garnier shampoo and conditioner samples were requested via Facebook.
• Prilosec, Crest toothpaste and whitening strips, Scope mouthwash, Dawn dish-washing soap, Downy Unstoppables and Pampers samples came via Procter & Gamble promotions.  (The Pampers will go to a neighbor.)
• Gevalia coffee sample, requested via Facebook and, once this picture was taken, passed along to my father.

Not pictured: A small sample jar of Valspar paint that came with two complimentary tiny rollers.

Phew, that's a lot of free stuff!  Sometimes, I must admit, I don't like waiting around on a Facebook page, hitting "refresh" and hoping the application doesn't crash or the connection doesn't time out just so we can get a tiny bottle of mouthwash or a packet of laundry detergent.  It sounds silly, since it's an activity I personally choose to take part in, but it can still get a little exhausting.

There's a snowball effect though, once you've done it long enough that you've built a stockpile of, say, allergy pill samples or lip balm or lotion.  Suddenly, if your household is as small as ours, there are a number of items you probably won't have to buy for at least a year or two (or maybe longer, if similar offers continually surface).  And samples often come with coupons that, if used during the right sale, can yield even more free, or nearly free, products.  So, for the time being, I'll keep hitting "refresh" - and keep taking pictures of the results, because it helps me see that we really are getting something for our efforts.

Stream a Movie for Free at Amazon

If you have a Twitter account, you can claim a $3 Amazon Instant Video credit by clicking here and allowing their Twitter application.  Newer releases generally cost $3.99 to stream, so you might consider looking for a free Redbox code instead if you're interested in, say, The Iron Lady or The Descendants, but older releases are frequently priced anywhere from $0.99 to $2.99, so who knows what you might find in your price range.  Expires May 1st at 11:59 p.m. PST.

Another Free $2 MP3 Credit at Amazon

You can collect your free $2 MP3 store credit at Amazon by entering the code MOMROCKS and clicking the "apply" button.  This offer expires at 11:59 p.m. PST on April 22, 2012.  Last time around, Nelly and I used our credits to buy songs off the same album, and we'll do so again this evening.  By May or June, whenever Amazon holds their next MP3 store promotion, we'll have downloaded an entire album free of charge.  Not too shabby!