Great Websites for Home-Repair & Improvement Help is a post from: LivingFrugalTips.com - Learn about: Living Frugal, Frugal Tips, Saving Money, Saving Money Tips

The recession has forced people to become more resourceful as they manage small home repairs and improvements on their own. The net effect is a huge growth in all things DIY (do-it-yourself). Home Improvements and repairs can add value to your property and doing these yourself can save you money and exponentially increase the value you’ve added to your home.

Start small, do your research or even learn by helping others. My husband’s first project in our first home was building a bird house, next he made a workbench and then built a deck in our backyard with a fish pond. Each cost a fraction of what he would have paid if he hired someone to do these jobs. Since the bird house he’s tiled floors, laid wood floors, painted our house, fixed broken sprinklers, repaired leaky sinks, installed fans, lights, closest organizers and more. He’s become an awesome handyman and made our house a beautiful home in the process.

With time, patience, determination and the help of some wonderful home-repair resources, you too can start making small home improvements and repairs and stop paying others to get the job done.

Home Repair & Improvement Help

HGTV – A meca of all things home improvement and home repair. You’ll get ideas, inspiration and home improvement tips on everything from painting to plumbing to redoing your powder room. There are also great articles such as 30 Tips for Increasing Your Home’s Value.

Do-It-Yourself.com - A great site with tons of DIY guides, videos and even a forum where you can ask and answer questions and interact with other DIYers.

National Association of the Remodeling Industry – Great tips from the home remodeling experts. Get kitchen and bathroom tips and creative ways to make small spaces appear larger.

Department of Energy – Improve your home’s energy with Energy Star. Find ways to make your home more energy efficient and reduce your high energy bills.

Hands-On Training

If you learn best with some hands-on training, then get home repair and improvement help by checking out your local Home Depot or Lowe’s and take advantage of their buying guides and in-store workshops designed to help everyone be a DIYer.

Home Depot – Check out their site for how-to project guides, a list of upcoming in-store workshops or better yet, join their Home Improver Club and receive home improvement newsletters, tips based on weather conditions on where you live, how-to tutorials, tips, and more.

Lowe’s – There are a slew of Buyer’s Guides to help with buying everything from caulk to grills, to lumber, decks, light bulbs, tools, appliances and a ton or other things you may no know anything about.

Hire with Caution

If , however, you find yourself in over your head then by all means, hire someone to do the job for you. But, first make sure that you hire a reliable handyman or contractor. Ask around and get referrals. This is the very best way to insure that you will hire a quality service provider and be satisfied with the job that’s done.

Angie’s List - A very well known source for finding reliable service providers. See how friends and neighbors have rated various providers select based on ratings and reviews.

Federal Trade Commission - When in doubt … check it out. If you are worried about a provider or potential scam, check it out here. There is a great article on things to be aware of when hiring a home contractor — Home Sweet Home Improvement.

Remember to start small, do your research, and learn from others. Once you’ve completed a project, not only do you have a sense of accomplishment, but you’ve added value to your home and you’ve saved money.

Happy home repairing and improving!

7 Ways to Lower Phone Bill is a post from: LivingFrugalTips.com - Learn about: Living Frugal, Frugal Tips, Saving Money, Saving Money Tips

Communications is an increasing part of most household budgets. Between home phones, mobile phones, internet access, and cable TV service, the dollars add up quickly.While it’s hard to imagine doing without, minimizing certainly maximizes  savings.

Calling all super-savers, here are a few easy ways to lower phone bill and save money on phone service:

1.  Drop the Landline

As of this week we are officially among the 20% of U.S. households that have dropped their landline phone service and are now only using wireless. For us, that’s a savings of $39.00 per month for a single line and basic phone service. We did not use our landline for long distance, so the savings could certainly be higher depending on your local rates, plans, and usage.

Dropping land line phone service is an increasing trend with the mobile explosion and mobile online revolution that’s upon us that brings  instant access and constant connectivity.

In addition to saving money, the other big benefit is no phone solicitors. We can get through dinner with out the bothersome sales calls, phone surveys and charities asking for money. There’s also less clutter around the house without all the phones and answering machine taking up space.

2.  Review Your Mobile Service Needs and Adjust Your Plan Accordingly

It’s important to review your current mobile plan and how many minutes you use on a monthly basis to ensure that you have the right plan to meet your needs. You do NOT want to go over on monthly minuets because the fees they smack you with for that are huge. You also don’t want to leave a bunch of unused minutes on the table if you don’t have a rollover plan. Long and short, look at the past 6 – 12 months of minutes used and adjust your plan accordingly.

Also check if your service provider has made enhancements to the plan you are currently on. For example, we are with Verizon and can call Verizon to Verizon at no charge in terms of minutes used. They now offer a Friends and Family Pick 10 feature where we can call 10 numbers and not use minutes and these can include out-of -network and landline phone numbers.

The important point is that the new features may be available to you without changing your package, but you need to ask about them to activate them.

3.  Consider Pre-Paid Cellular Service for Low Rates and Fixed Costs

This is a great option if you don’t use your cell phone that often or want one just for emergency purposes. Or, if you want your child to have one, but want to seriously limit there usage. While there are a number of providers that offer pre-paid service, I am going to recommend the provider that my father-in-law has used for the past few years. He is the most frugal man I know and does tons of research on everything before committing to anything. As a result, his recommendations are always great!

He uses AirVoice Express and has been very pleased with them for the past two years. He has the 700 minutes per year plan for $70 ($.07 per minute) which more than suits his low usage cell phone needs. They have several other options

4.  Use an Internet Phone Provider

Free is a wonderful thing and Skype offers free Skype-to-Skype calls and video calls via the internet. There is no charge when making calls to all your friends and family members that also have the free Skype service and this includes calls to other countries. You can’t beat that. It’s super easy to get started — basically 5 minutes to download and set up and you are in business. The quality and clarity is really good and the video component is great as you can see who you are talking too.

5.  Bundle It Up

If a landline is a must then check and see if your phone, internet or cable provider offers the option to bundle services for a reduced monthly rate. Companies now offer phone and internet through one provider or you can get a “triple play” and bundle your cable television too. But, never assume that the bundle will be the cheapest way to go. Do your homework and shop around.

6.  Ask About Special Offers

Also make a point to see if your phone provider offers special lower rates for calls made during certain days and time (ie. nights and weekends) as this is another way to lower phone bill.

7.  Shop Around

It’s always important to shop around and compare prices for available providers. This applies to home and cellular service. For example, for home phone service I can use Embarq, Comcast and Vonage in my area. They each offer different rates and package deals for ways to save money.

Please share other ways to lower phone bill and save money on phone service.

How to Clean Clogged Shower Heads is a post from: LivingFrugalTips.com - Learn about: Living Frugal, Frugal Tips, Saving Money, Saving Money Tips

Before you ditch your old, clogged shower heads and spend money on a new one, try this little trick.

We’ve all dealt with this problem before — the shower flow becomes erratic due to a build-up of mineral deposits and we try scrubbing it with all sorts of products — Comet, Lime Away, and Oxy-Clean with no luck.

Compliments of my handy Martha Stewart Homekeeping Handbook, here is a quick and easy solution. Simply pour white vinegar at full strength into a plastic zip-lock baggie. Then place the baggie over the shower head and make sure that it is fully submerged in the vinegar. Fasten the bag tightly with a rubber band, plastic tie strap or a twist tie. Let it soak overnight and then scrub the shower head with an old toothbrush.

It works like a charm and it will save you money.

How to Get a Discount for Bad Service is a post from: LivingFrugalTips.com - Learn about: Living Frugal, Frugal Tips, Saving Money, Saving Money Tips

Have you recently contracted out a service and been less than impressed with the outcome or less than satisfied with a service you are paying  for? If this is the case … ask for a discount!

We recently had to have some repair work done on our house. It amounted to wall texturing and baseboard painting among other things. The person who did the texturing and baseboard painting work was a subcontractor for the company we hired to do the numerous fixes around the place. When all was said and done, the subcontractors work was less than stellar.

My husband  elected to do all of the wall painting himself which afforded him the opportunity to notice just how poor the texturing work was done:

1.  There was no wall texture sprayed behind the toilet tank. He tried to spray around it versus taking it off.
2.  He made a mess. There was wall texture everywhere  – on doors, window treatments,
mirrors, bath tube … – and my husband was left to clean it up.
3.  The wall texture came off the wall in two places as my husband rolled on the paint.
4.  The baseboard paint rubbed off in a few places since only one coat was applied versus the two coats stated in the contract.

After reviewing the itemized list of work that was to be done and comparing it to what was actually done, my husband pointed out his dissatisfaction to the owner of the company and received $186 discount.

In short, don’t put up with shoddy work! Especially during these economic times! One would think that people would be working extra hard to keep their jobs and that quality would be on an upswing … but that’s not necessarily the case.

Always look over things and speak up if you are not happy. And, if you are happy then sing their praise.

How to Have a Successful Yard Sale is a post from: LivingFrugalTips.com - Learn about: Living Frugal, Frugal Tips, Saving Money, Saving Money Tips

Believe it or not, there is a right way and a wrong way to hold a SUCCESSFUL yard sale.

Here is a list of DOs to help you get rid of unneeded items while bringing in a little extra cash.

1.  Don’t do this on your own! Get several neighbors to hold a yard sale on the same Saturday. Yes, now you have competition, but the increased traffic will more than make up for it. you can then promote it as a multi-family yard sale or as a community yard sale.

2.  Place a yard sale announcement in your favorite local paper on the Wednesday, Thursday, Friday and Saturday of the week you’re holding it (my paper charges $17 total for all for days and you can split the cost with the neighbors.
3.  Place signs at strategic places that are closest to the main intersection and then place other signs that lead them to your home. It is best to put these up on Friday morning before the event. If you put them out sooner, you run the risk of losing them.
4.  Also make sure your signs are large and legible. Put a day not a date on the sign so you can use them again. You can buy them at Lowes and Home Depot or you can make your own with bright colored poster board. Again, purchasing or making the signs can be a group effort with neighbors with respect to cost and placement.
5.  Place your best items closest to the street and spread your things out nicely so it looks like you have a ton of stuff.
6.  It also helps to organize your items into “departments” — sporting goods, clothes, household appliances, tools, etc.
7.  Price everything in one way or another. You can use individual price stickers or make small signs such as “Everything in the box $1″. Some people aren’t hagglers and feel uncomfortable asking. There are not many of these folks. Most people tried to get you down and make a “Will you take …” type offer. If their offer is too low you can state a counter offer and tell them what you will take. Remember, it’s a yard sale so price accordingly.
8.  If you have new, unused items that may still have tags on or be in the original packaging you can price these higher and make note on the sign that they are new.
9.  Another idea if you are having a pre-holiday yard sale, you can package up some ready made gifts.f I had a bunch of unused perfume that I had collected over the years. I put them in holiday gift bags with tissue, made a little hang-tag with the fragrance name and sold them as gift sets. When the men walked by I promoted them as Christmas gifts for their wives and girlfriends and mentioned that they didn’t even have to wrap them. They sold like hotcakes.
10.  If you make crafts you can sell them too. There’s nothing that says it all has to be used stuff.

Cheers to a successful yard sale.

Happy Dickering!

Save Money with Satellite TV is a post from: LivingFrugalTips.com - Learn about: Living Frugal, Frugal Tips, Saving Money, Saving Money Tips

If calling your cable company and asking for a discount didn’t work to help save on utilities, you can always try satellite TV. As I mentioned in yesterdays post, our cable company gave us a $20.00 monthly discount for six months for staying on board as a customer instead of canceling our service and going to satellite TV. So, for now we still have cable, but in 6 months when our bill goes back up we will likely make the move to satellite TV.

If you are unsure if cable TV or satellite TV is for you, here’s a handy side-by-side cable vs. satellite comparison chart to help you make the right decision.

My husbands did a lot of research into satellite so that he could get educated on the various providers and price shop the service. In doing so he learned that there is a lot that goes into picking the right satellite company. After doing internet research and asking numerous neighbors who have DirectTV and who had Dish Network, it became obvious that DirectTV would be our choice – here’s why:

• With satellite dishes, customer service is key. If you are getting bad reception, you need a trained expert to correct the problem. DirectTV has the best customer service response team by far. Dish Network will try to talk you through correcting the problem yourself. Good Luck!

• You will pay approximately $5 a month more for DirectTV, but knowing someone will be there ASAP to correct any problems, in my view is worth it. — Just a note: you will have service interruptions during heavy storms; all satellite systems do. If your dish gets knocked around during a storm, you most likely will need adjustments.

Here’s a quick comparison chart of Dish Network versus Direct TV. You’ll note that they seem very similar with Dish Network winning with the lower price. But beware … you need to talk to people and do your homework. All our neighbors said DirectTV was far better and worth the few extra dollars.

All in all, satellite is cheaper than cable TV and in some cases you may even get more channels, a free DVR box and free installation. Always check for special offers and call and ask for them if you can’t find any.

How to Reduce Your Cable Bill is a post from: LivingFrugalTips.com - Learn about: Living Frugal, Frugal Tips, Saving Money, Saving Money Tips

In the past, cable television companies have been unwilling to give discounts to people who have been subscribers with them for years. Not the case anymore!

My husband recently got feed up with my huge cable bill and did some research on DishTV and DirectTV. He called the cable company to inform them that he was a loyal subscriber for 5 years but the cost of doing business with them was much greater than changing over to satellite. He explained that he was thinking of canceling our service and asked if they had any loyal customer discounts since they are always running great deals to attract new subscribers. The customer service representative put him on hold to talk to his supervisor. When he returned, he informed him that they would take $20 a month off the bill for the next 6 months if he stayed with them.

Our cable company is Comcast, but based on the level of competition between cable companies and satellite providers, I am betting all cable companies will give you a discount to reduce your cable bill if you ask for one. He told his dad about the discount the next day and he called and asked for a discount too. He stated that that he was trying to reduce his monthly bills and needed to reduce his cable bill. After an on hold wait, the service representative came back on the phone and gave him a $15.00 discount for 6 months. His was slightly less because his monthly bill was less than ours.

It goes to show … you don’t get if you don’t ask. That’s $180.00 saved!

Don’t be afraid to ask … all they can say is NO … and then you can explore other options.

Ways to Reduce Electric Bill and Help the Planet is a post from: LivingFrugalTips.com - Learn about: Living Frugal, Frugal Tips, Saving Money, Saving Money Tips

These are some very interesting Eco Facts that offer ways to reduce electric bill, save money … as well as help the planet. They are really very simple things to do that can have an enormous impact. Please read and pass along as these facts are too important to keep to yourself.

1. Use CFL Light Bulbs (Compact Fluorescent Light bulbs) — these are the new corkscrew bulbs, but now GE has CFL light bulbs that look just like the regular light bulbs. If all 200 millions of us here in the little USofA just replaced ONE 60-watt regular bulb with a CFL light bulb, it would be the equivalent of removing 9 million cars off the road for one year!
2. Changing just one standard bulb to a CFL light bulb can save you up to $44.00 in energy costs over the life of the bulb.
3. Shut Down Your Computer. If you power down your computer every night, the saving’s is estimated at over $40.00 per computer/work station in one year.
4. Another Eco Fact – did you know that even when OFF, your electronics still use power when plugged in. So, if you want to save money … unplug! Who knew.

Other interesting facts to help save the planet:

• Don’t Pollute.  A tin can that enters the ocean is still decomposing after 50 years!
• A plastic bottle in the ocean is still decomposing after 450 years!
• A Glass bottle that enters the ocean is still decomposing after 1,000,000 years! That’s just crazy. I collect sea glass, but not at that price.

Changing just a little can save a lot.

9 Ways to Save Water is a post from: LivingFrugalTips.com - Learn about: Living Frugal, Frugal Tips, Saving Money, Saving Money Tips

It is so easy to save money here and there by making very small changes to your daily life. Here are a few ways to save water … and you save money and help the plant and the same time!

1.  Scrape your plates – If you scrape your plate scraps into the trash first versus rinsing in the sink and then using a disposal you use far less water. Since I’m on septic and don’t have a garbage disposal it’s a given for me.

2.  Use the shorter dishwasher cycle – A good scrape in the trash will also allow you to use a shorter dishwasher cycle (my dishwasher has an EcoCycle) that uses up to 20 fewer gallons of water per dishwasher load. Not only do you save water, but you can save you up to $40 a year.

3.  Only run when full – Run your dishwasher and washing machine only with a full load. This could cut down on a load or two a week and save you up to 1,000 gallons of water a month. I can creatively pack that dishwasher to maximize what it holds and only run it once or twice a week!

4.  Wash clothes in cold water - Cold water washes use 90% less power that hot water washes! With less power being used, that also means that less carbon emissions are being released into the atmosphere too. A double plus. My mother-in-law has been doing this since washing began and has the cleanest laundry around (never using the warm or hot water cycles). She also line dries her clothes. Added plus there … more money saved and they smell so fresh!

5.  Don’t let it run – This is an obvious one, but worth repeating. When brushing teeth or washing dishes don’t let the water keep running. Turn it on and off when needed and fill the sink a bit to rinse or wash dishes.

6.  Use drought tolerant plants – These are my absolute favorite type of plants — “full sun, drought tolerant”  These are also hard to kill! My husband has the green thumb in our family… but not me!

7.  Get a rain barrel – We’ve got one and they are great. We use it to water any potted plants, herbs, and anything else that are not drought tolerant and require a bit more water than Mother Nature can provide.

8.  Low flow baby! – Switching out your toilet and shower head to water-efficient versions can save you big time.

9.  Water your lawn sensibly – If you must water, do it wisely. Only water on your designated day. Water over night or very early in the morning for maximum absorption and minimum evaporation. It just kills me when I see these stupid people watering their lawn in the middle of the afternoon and heat of the day. Also, don’t water on windy days … as it blows away to your neighbors lawn versus landing on your grass. Duh! Oh, and one more pet peeve … if you set your sprinklers on a timer make sure it works right. My neighbors are notorious for watering their lawn for the entire day because there sprinkler doesn’t shut off right. My husband has told them countless times and he ends up going to the outside valve and cutting it off. Bad.

We’ll that’s just a start. I could certainly keep passing along my pearls of EcoChic wisdom, but I’d rather get out and enjoy this beautiful day.

Please share your earth-friendly tips.

Peace to the planet!