The high price of gasoline has led travel industry analysts to coin a new term – the “staycation.” They believe lots of folks will vacation close to home this summer, opting for near-by, low-cost attractions.
Matt’s View
What are your summer vacation plans? Have they been impacted by high gas prices? Drop me a line
and let me know.
We’re renting a house on Lake Michigan for a week with extended family this summer, just as we did last year. It’s less expensive than a hotel (it would be anyway, but it’s especially affordable since my mother- and father-in-law are generously paying for much of the rental), the hour’s drive doesn’t burn up too much gasoline, and the kids have plenty of space to play.
Do you pay your credit card balances in full every month? Have you been using credit cards for more of your purchases, like groceries, figuring you’re ahead of the game because of the rebates, miles, or other perks? According to researchers quoted in a Washington Post article, you’re overspending. Professors from MIT, Harvard, and Britain’s Warwick University all have found that no matter how people use their credit cards, paying with plastic instead of cash makes people spend more.
Matt’s View
There have been numerous similar studies over the years, all coming to the same conclusion. Still, I have mixed feelings about such research. On the one hand, I readily accept that there are many occasions when paying with plastic would encourage people to spend more than if paying with cash, like buying a restaurant meal. However, I do not agree with those who say no one should use a credit card. Just because someone gets into a car accident doesn’t mean everyone should stop driving.
One problem credit cards create is that it’s easy to lose track of how much has been spent. When the bill arrives, the total due comes as a shock. That even used to happen to me, and I teach about this stuff! But that’s because I was recording and categorizing my credit card spending after the bill arrived. Now I download credit card expenses into my budget (we use Quicken, but this can be done through a lot of tools, including Money, Mint.com, Geezeo.com, etc.), enabling me to check how much we’ve spent in various categories, including spending on credit cards, before the credit card statement arrives. If you don’t use an electronic budget tool, just write down credit card expenditures in your check registry or a separate registry.
The rules of the road for credit cards are to use them to buy only what you planned in advance to buy, record your credit card expenditures as you go, and pay your balances in full every month.
There’s been a big push to get people to replace traditional light bulbs with compact fluorescent light bulbs (CFL). As a result, sales have skyrocketed—from about 17,000 bulbs in 2000 to 380 million last year. However, there’s been less focus on teaching people how to properly dispose of such bulbs. As was pointed out in a recent Associated Press article, that’s an important consideration since CFLs contain small amounts of mercury.
Matt’s View
To find a CFL recycler near you try the EPA’s recycling site locator
. Also, Swedish retailer Ikea collects used CFLs at its 34 U.S. stores.
Among all the coupon queens and kings out there, Crissy Thompson is true royalty. The Gainesville, GA woman sometimes spends as little as $10 per week to feed her family of five. To really understand her methods you may have to read the full transcript
of the TV news report about her, but here are a few of her money-saving moves. At the most basic level, she clips coupons and tries to match them with advertised sales on the same items, thereby maximizing her discount. Another approach involves buy-one-get-one-free offers. With such a promotion on cereal costing $3.79 per box, Crissy demonstrated how to save even more. She had two three-dollar-off coupons, one for each box. And the store allowed her to use both, thereby generating a more than $2.00 credit on her tab. According to the story about her, it’s a common misconception that “one coupon per purchase” means one per transaction, but it really means “one coupon per item.”
Matt’s View
Thompson acknowledges that her methods take time—about an hour of prep time before heading to the store, and up to four hours of actual shopping that involves stops at multiple stores. However, since food is one of the highest-cost items on a typical family’s budget, the savings generated can make it time well spent.
