23 Nov 08 Having Mint Helps
I’ve just finished reading Louis Gray’s post about how Mint.com is bringing home to him in no uncertain terms how much the value of his investments is sliding right now.
There are no safe havens in which to put your money any more, he writes. It’s the same on the jobs front too. There are fewer and fewer jobs that can be considered safe any longer. Large corporations and small businesses alike are laying people off, and for the self-employed in many cases it’s getting harder to find work, or at least good enough paying work.
Yes, Mint.com can be frightening reading when you consider Louis’ scenario above. However, all Mint.com is doing is presenting your financial data to you in a way that’s easier to understand at a glance. Pie Charts and graphs abound, and it’s true, that a picture is worth a thousand words. I particularly find the pie charts useful for seeing just where that much money went this month. I often find myself drilling down to click on a category to see just how we did spend that much on a particular category, and it’s surprising how much you can actually save once you’re truly more aware of how much you’re spending on it.
A couple of bucks here and there, doesn’t feel like you’re spending much, but of course it adds up. Most of us can do the math. If, for example you buy 2 lattes five days a week at $3.49 a time, that’s $34.90 a week. No points there for being able to do such a simple calculation. However we rarely think of something like that in those terms, but more like oh, it’s only a few bucks a day, and then trot out an excuse to ourselves (always the hardest person in the world to convince to change, and the easiest one to make believable excuses to).
Look at that pie chart, and you can see how that chunk adds up in a month ($139.60), and in a year (based on 50 weeks – $1745). That information was there all the time, in your bank statements (assuming you use a card to pay), but when it’s presented in a clear graphical form to you, it has much more impact.
Using Mint.com is saving me money, alas not on coffee, as I almost always brew my own each morning!
Tags: bank statements, bringing home, charts and graphs, chunk, excuse, fewer jobs, glance, investments, large corporations, math, mint, much money, pie chart, pie charts, safe havens, small businesses, uncertain terms
08 Feb 08 How To Save $700 A Year
As I’ve mentioned before I’m a gadget geek, but only if I find the gadget both useful, and value for money. I’ve already written about this gadget in my tech blog over at http://ian.may.name but it’s just such a cool gadget and saves so much money, that I had to mention it in here for the benifit of a wider audience. You see, if I find some cool money saving thing I want to share it with everyone!
I’m talking about the Magic Jack.
The advertising makes it look too good to be true, but for once, my theory goes right out of the window!
You plug this gadget into the USB port on your windows PC, and plug the phone into the other end, and make as many phone calls as you wish. That’s it. Free. Well almost.
You go to their web site, and order one. They don’t even charge your card for 30 days, and if you don’t like it and send it back within that time, any calls you’ve made with it are free anyway.
It costs $39.99 plus about $6 shipping.
When it arrives you have to register it at the web site, and get yourself a phone number. Now, at the moment every US code isn’t covered, but they do say they are adding more all the time, and will allow one number change free of charge when your area code becomes available.
I’ve got Grand Central set up, with is a Google-run phone routing service, and you can get almost any code with them. They’re a free service, and you can add all your phone numbers into Grand Central and let it take care of the routing. To that end you can choose any area code you like on your Magic Jack.
Once you’ve registered your Magic Jack you can use it right away to make telephone calls. It comes with free voicemail, call forwarding, and 911 service. You can plug it in anywhere. You can also use it with a headset plugged into your computer, so if you wish you can take it to the office with you and use it there, either with a phone, or with a headset.
For your $39.99 you get one years unlimited calls to anywhere in the US and Canada. You can also add money to your account and make really inexpensive international calls. For example, you can call England land lines for around 2 cents a minute.
We’ve got one installed now at home, and plugged the cordless base station into it, so it works with all the phones around the house.
We’ve also replaced our fax line with My Fax at $10 a month so saved a packet (excuse the pun).
Here’s the math.
Vonage was costing us around $76 a month for a voice line, a fax line, a Virtual UK number, and a 800 number.
We seldom used the 800 number. Most folks have some kind of bulk long distance calling these days anyway. We bought a SkypeIn UK number for $24 for a year.
We signed up for the MyFax service for ten bucks a month. It works with your email, so less ink and paper too! $120 a year.
Magic Jack costs $19.99 a year for the phone service.
That’s a new current yearly total of $163.99
Vonage was costing $76.25 a month, and that works out at $915 a year.
Doing the math: 915 -163.99 = a saving of $751.01 a year or just over $62 a month!
Tags: 911, area code, audience, benifit, blog, call forwarding, canada, cool gadget, gadget geek, google, magic jack, much money, phone number, phone numbers, routing service, shipping, telephone calls, usb port, windows pc
