I discovered a blog called Poorer Than You that has a list of 15 places to get free books online, including paperbacks, audio books and textbooks. Could this be better than the library?
I have not heard of most of these sites, like BooksShouldBeFree.com, which has audio copies of Pride & Prejudice, Ulysses, and other classics. Project Gutenberg has more than 28,000 free books in their catalog and links to another 70,000 free books. Students give away textbooks they no longer need and receive books in return on TextbookRevolt.com.
Read the entire post here.
If you enjoy reading Bargainbabe.com, sign up for my free emails! That way you can read about the new deals I find via email, which for some readers is easier than visiting the blog.
I have a weekday list for readers who want to know about EVERY bargain and a weekly list for readers who want a selection of deals.
Join the thousands of readers already subscribing! I do not share or sell emails and you can unsubscribe at any time. Thanks!
~Julia
aka Bargain Babe
Liz Pullam, a widely-read personal finance columnist and author compiled a list of her 100 favorite Web sites to save money. Sadly, Bargainbabe.com is not mentioned, but many of the sites I have shared with you are on her list. Enjoy!
My ridiculously over-taxed sister always has time to share a great idea for Bargainbabe.com, which makes me very grateful for her. Here is one of her recent gems:
“Here’s an idea – how to get a pet on the cheap through adoption agencies. Sometimes they will even agree to pay the vet bills (as our rat adoption agency did.)”
First of all, fab idea sis. Second of all, rats have vet bills?! And there are agencies that tend to their adoption??? Ha! Not that I have anything against rats. I had many rat-pets growing up, including one that built a home-away-from-home in our upright piano. But that’s another story.
To find out if adopting a pet through an agency is a good deal (and a good deed) I emailed Betsy Rosenfeld, author of The Complete Singles Guide to Being a Dog Owner. Here’s what she said:
I wouldn’t say rescuing from an agency is a cheap way to get a pet, but rather it’s a safer, more predictable and budget-friendly way to get a pet because reputable agencies take responsibility for the pets they adopt out. They have paid for the shots, spay neuter and medical problems the dog came with and many rescuers will help you through the sometimes expensive process of integrating your dog into your new home. Moreover many rescues will know a dog’s behaviors so they can help you avoid common, sometimes expensive problems.
So, even if the adoption fee from an agency is more than you would pay at the shelter, it’s a safer bet.
Then when you compare rescuing a dog to buying a dog, yes of course it’s a savings. However realize that the trade-off is that rescuers will ask questions and ask for home checks. They want to make sure the dog is going to a good home where whatever brought them into rescue in the first place won’t happen again.
It’s also important to know that when you buy a dog from a breeder or god forbid a pet store or online (which you should never do because they are most likely puppy mill dogs) even after you’ve already spent all that money there is no guarantee that dog will be healthy either. Breeders and particularly pet stores and online dog stores are notorious for walking away from unwell dogs, and leaving new dog owners to care for their sick puppies.
Per your sister’s situation, many rescues will subsidize a new dog owner who may be a dedicated dog owner, but who couldn’t otherwise afford a dog’s prescription or even a procedure. Rescues can pay hundreds of dollars a month to board their dogs until they find homes. It would be better to find a loving owner and help with a 40 dollar a month prescription than let the dog waste away in a boarding facility.
So yes rescuing a dog from an agency and remember many have purebreds as well – I just rescued a very sought after Labrador from a rescue – is both a cost conscious and good-karma way of bringing home a dog.
Hi folks,
I’m working on a few posts about ways to vacation this summer on a low budget. I’m interested in hearing stories and getting tips about how you are taking a vacation for less. Got staycation plans? Going to blow a wad despite the recession? What are your plans for downtime this summer?
Thanks for your input!
Julia
aka Bargain babe
Get a small scooop of ice cream for 31-cents between 5 and 10 p.m. Wednesday, April 29, 2009 at participating Baskin Robbins stores. The deal is part of a charity fundraiser for
Starbucks is an ever popular topic for bargain hunters, even if the recession has hurt the green giant’s popularity. Here are all of the Starbucks discounts and coupons I know about.
- Register your Starbucks gift card online and you can get up to 2 hours of free WiFi every day at their coffeeshops, plus refills and other perks.
- If you are a big fan, consider buying a $25 Gold Card that gets you perks like 10% off most items. A certain Bargain Hunter says “you need to spend $250 a year at Starbucks, which is $4.80 a week” to get your money back.
- Befriend a barista and ask them if any specials are coming up. Never hurts to be friendly!
- Select chains sell $1 cups of instant coffee.
- Starbucks recently introduced a few $4 breakfasts that include a drink.
- Many Costco’s sell 5 $20 Starbucks gift cards for $80, a 25% discount.
- A few times I have gotten a “free upgrade” to a decaf Americano when ordering decaf in the afternoon, when many shops stop brewing decaf. Being a caffeine lightweight has benefits!
- Many Web sites sell gift cards at a discount, including ABCGiftCards.com (10% off), GiftCardsAgain.com (10% off), or GiftCards4Less.com (auction site).
- Sign up for Starbucks email list, which occasionally includes notices about drink giveaways, free shipping codes, and other perks.
What Starbucks deals am I missing?
Thanks, Jonathan!
Ever listen to Loveline on KROQ? Remember the show’s original host, Poorman? Well Poorman has a new radio show now, called Luv Chat. And I’m going to be on it tonight! I hope I’m not a total disaster. The two hour Internet radio show is from 8 p.m. to 10 p.m. PST. You can listen through your computer by visiting LuvChat.com. You will need Adobe Acrobat for it to work.
We’re going to talk about saving money, relationships and where those two topics collide. Please call into the show at 714-786-6832 if you have a love/money question.
I wrote a fabulous post about why we overspend and rack up monstrous credit card debt for a blog called Man V Debt. Read my post here.
If that’s not enough to get you to click on the link, I’ll tease you with this. In the post I reveal what food I have ZERO ability to say no to. Hmmm…is it chocolate? Carnitas tacos? Pancakes made from scratch??? Find the answer here.
I recently discovered a new personal finance blog called Man V Debt. The author is a guy named Baker who, along with his wife, is waging a personal war on debt. One of his first steps was getting rid of all his credit cards. GASP?! I guess you can tell which side of the war I am on. Here is a guest post from him.
There are two extremes when introducing the concept between using cash (or debit) and using credit. In the one corner, you have those crazy people (a.k.a. me) who live completely without credit cards altogether. Not only do they cut-up their credit cards, but they tend to go as far as canceling the accounts. In the other corner, you have the credit card “gamers.” They are constantly juggling specialty credit cards, in-store charge cards, and 0% balance transfers. They are mixing and matching specific purchases with specific credit lines in order to maximize cash-back, airline miles, or gift cards to the mall. The average person, however, finds themselves wandering somewhere between these two extremes.
Before we get into the details of why my wife and I have actually embraced one of the extremes, let’s review some of the basics:
Benefits of Cash
- Increased Emotional Attachment – You’ve probably heard the different studies about how the average person spends more when using credit cards. Some say 8%-10%, but I’ve heard others claim as high as 12%-18%. At the end of the day, I couldn’t care less about some university study. What matters most is how it affects me. As I’ll explain later, using cash/debit triggers different reactions in my brain that I know help curve my impulse spending.
- Tangible Budgeting – There’s nothing like looking into an envelope marked “FOOD,” which holds exactly $82 and seeing the cashier ring up $90.74 in groceries. That’s the kind of in-your-face budgeting that credit cards are great at detaching you from. Sure, we are only talking about $8 in this example. But if you are like me, you love hunting for a deal, utilizing coupons, and would surely bend over to pick up a quarter in the parking lot. What’s the point of budgeting if not to save that $8 from vanishing.
- Simpler Financial Accounts – Although cash often times takes more effort to track effectively… (more…)
Time Magazine had a brief history of credit cards that I’ve turned into a TRUE or FALSE quiz.
1. In the 1920s gas stations, department stores and hotels offered the first charge cards to drivers who did not want to zip back to the bank for cash.
2. Credit cards became popular in the 1950s post-war boom.
3. The first widely used credit card was a Diners Club card made out of cardboard.
4. In the 1960s credit cards were mailed to 5 million Chicagoans, including toddlers, felons, and dogs.
5. The American Express platinum card, which debuted in 1984, was the first premium charge card.
6. Lenders collected more than $18 billion in credit card penalties and fees in 2007.
7. In 2008 half of U.S. college students had four or more credit cards.
8. Outstanding credit card debt reached a record $951 billion in 2008.
To get the answers keeping reading. (more…)
You’ve probably heard that our elected officials are trying to give regular folks like you and me more rights when it comes to credit cards. As it stands, we don’t have many rights (short video).
For a timeline of news stories about the CC bill of rights, click here. The latest is that the House is scheduled to pass the bill this week.
Here is a summary of the Credit Cardholders Bill of Rights. One important change is that credit companies won’t be able to raise the interest rates on existing balances.
No, I’m not joining the military. But I did get accepted into a super cool program at the University of Southern California for news entrepreneurs! It’s a one-week training camp for journalists who want to learn business skills.
Even got a shout out from LA Observed, the top blog for SoCal media and news, about being selected.
The program is in mid-May and I’ve already been given a homework assignment. These folks mean to work us hard!
The average American household that uses credit cards carries a $10,679 balance, which, in the grand scheme of things, is not much debt. The problem is that credit cards have such high interest rates, making a few thousand dollars in debt nearly insurmountable.
Like many bad spending habits, small scale purchases – a new gadget, a few drinks out, a pair of jeans – get us into big trouble.
Let’s take three different looks at this seemingly little problem.
1. Percent markup. If you stopped using your credit and started only paying down the balance, making minimum payments of 3 percent or $25 a month (whichever is more) on a balance of $10,679 at a 15 percent interest rate will take 188 months.
That translates into 15.6 years and extra payments of $7,284. So in the end, $10,679 worth of instant gratification costs you $17,963, or 68 percent more than the original cost. Next time you are oggling a fantastic consumer good that will absolutely complete you ask yourself if you are willing to pay 68 percent more. Makes it easier to say no, right?
Got a slightly different interest rate or balance? Calculate the big picture cost of your minimum payment.
2. Lost buying power. Ironically, the $7,284 you are giving to credit card companies to get the good things in life – STAT! – is money you could have spent on the good things in life…later.
That $7,284 in interest could buy over 15 years:
- One very fancy dinner every three months (at $140 per dinner)
- 145 pairs of new shoes (at $50 per pair)
- 18 months of groceries (at $400 per month)
- Approximately ten percent of your yearly IRA contribution
- 87,408 miles of driving in a car that gets 30 mpg at $2.50 per gallon
3. Dreams deferred. Paying extra interest also detracts from the real American dream – retirement. A couple in their mid-30s that invests the $7,284 in even yearly payments ($485 over 15 years), could earn an extra $9,676 towards retirement in a Roth IRA account. That assumes 10 percent returns over 15 years, which historically is not unreasonable.
Thanks, Dad and Hubby!
Loading ...
