EDIT: At the time this blog entry was posted I had a Youtube video here. That has been removed but I want the rest of my content to be remain. Nothing hidden no past mistakes ignored. All out in the open.
I've found that I only spend about 30 minutes extra a week clipping coupons and looking through sales ads Unless your job has you working Sunday morning do you have anything else you could be doing with that time to make you money? I saved $195 in one month before costs of the membership and the coupon book which were a yearly fee. Even if I spent 2 hours a week between clipping coupons and going to Costco in addition to only going to a grocery store.. 8 hours month... that's $24/hour. I shop weekly but many families shop twice a month or monthly. $48/hour sounds even better.
If you have the cooking ability, only buy what is a bargain for that week. Buy a couple extra of each item too. Then when you get home plan your menus around what you have. In a coupon shopping trips you will have built up a good sized stockpile of ingredients. Then when you do want to cook a specific recipe you will have that ingredient that you bought 50% off a couple weeks back. That style of shopping as much as the actual coupons themselves have lowered my grocery bill. Though to be honest I am only counting the actual coupon value as bonus towards the Model Portfolio at the end of each month.
I want to expand on the Costco numbers a bit. I had price compared 80+ items and found that Costco on average was 56% cheaper. Now that won't mean that the $800 average grocery bill will turn into $400. Costco doesn't have everything that a family would need. Additionally, is a family going to really go through a gallon of mayonnaise before it expires? Some perhaps but not if you are single or just a couple. There are plenty of things though that won't expire. Will even a single person use 36 rolls of toilet paper in their lifetime? Will you use that gallon of dishwasher detergent eventually? Yeah probably. Since I had to pay for the Costco membership I am taking the difference in price saved from the Costco purchases vs the local grocery store price.
You can free quite a bit more cash flow in your budget then you might think. If you are only able to get a little extra out of your groceries at least its something and can be combined with other cost saving strategies that you might use. It might be the difference between being able to build a portfolio at all.
October Coupon and Savings Results
Coupons: Cost $7.50 (newspaper). Savings: $30.90
Costco: Cost: $50 (1 time yearly membership). Savings: $143.81
Entertainment: Cost: $35 (1 time yearly purchase). Savings: $21
Future month's savings will be rolled into the last weekly deposit of each month.
Here are the sites I talked about...
Entertainment Book. These are targeted to towns and suburbs of large cities. You should be able to buy them at Walgreens and flip through them to see if it would be worth it for you. They list additional coupons on the website not listed in the book for additional savings.
Harbor Freight. Located in 45 states hopefully there is one close to you.
Disclaimer: The investments and trades in my videos and blog entries are not recommendations for others.
I am not a financial planner, financial adviser, accountant, or tax adviser. The financial actions I talk about are for my own portfolio and money and only suited for my own risk tolerance, strategy, and ideas. Copying another person's financial moves can lead to large losses. Each person needs to do their due diligence in researching and planning their own actions in the financial markets
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