Welcome to the 3rd edition of the Finance Fiesta. I’ve always enjoyed proverbs, and since Spanish is one of my favorite languages, our theme for this week’s fiesta is Spanish Money Proverbs. The following proverbs all come from A Polyglot of Foreign Proverbs for anyone who wants to know. Hope you enjoy them.

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Reading is one of the most frugal hobbies in existence, and is something, in my opinion, that everyone should do. Not only is it entertaining, but it can be beneficial and educational in many ways. In fact, reading is (along with watching period films based on classic literature) Madoline’s and my favorite hobby, and when we’re not working we can often be found with a book in front of us, even while eating.

The virtues of reading (even light-hearted, entertaining fiction) are as follows:

• Subconsciously improves your knowledge of language, grammar and writing
• Acquisition of vocabulary through example in context
• Expands your horizons and knowledge of people and the world
• Teaches a sense of perspective and the ability to see more than one side of a situation
• Improves overall reading comprehension skills and better prepare you for life
  • Good reading and writing skills are essential for success in career and business
  • The ability to better read and understand contracts, terms and conditions (such as credit card terms) helps you to be a more conscientious consumer
  • Proper writing and spelling is a necessity if you want to be taken seriously whether it be in letters, on message boards, your own website or blog, etc.

So now that I’ve convinced you of the virtues of reading, here are some tips for reading on a budget (or No-Budget) and sources for affordable reading. While we try to borrow from the library as much as possible, we do sometimes purchase books.

A few reasons we purchase books are:

• Collecting
  Book collecting is just as rewarding a hobby as stamp or coin collecting. Some people collect for fun, and others for profit. We personally love books so much that we would rather keep old and rare books than sell them.
• Reading more than once
  We have favorite books and series that we often read more than once (sometimes once a year) and feel it worthwhile to purchase and collect them.
• Study and reference
  Madoline is currently studying in preparation for graduate school, so we often purchase reference and related materials that will be useful both now and later.
• Home library
  We live in a remote area without much to do and our local library can be rather lacking in some areas, so if there is a book we are sure of liking and re-reading, we sometimes purchase it. Also, if you live a frugal lifestyle and often opt to stay home instead of going out and spending money, it’s sometimes nice to have a handy library to pick from when in need of some entertainment or activity.

You don’t have to purchase new books to fill your collection or library. In fact, we often prefer to purchase used books just because they’re more comfortable to read. When we read a new book, we always feel the need to keep it pristine and hate seeing them get dinged or creased. But with used books, we don’t have that problem, and can read in total comfort (after wiping it over with rubbing alcohol). There are many sources for very affordable books, as low as 10-25 cents per book, which I will share below. I will start with the most preferred (frugal) sources and work my way down.

Continue on for a list of affordable reading resources. (more…)

These days, most companies (including banks and utility companies) have websites and online payment options. Those that don’t often accept payments by phone. If you are still using snail mail to pay your bills each month, you could be saving $60 or more, depending your number of bills, each year by switching to payments by internet or phone. Consider the following example:

Our monthly household bills look something like this: electric, gas, water & sanitation, 2 mortgages, cell phone, home insurance, auto insurance, 2 credit cards - an average of 10 bills per month. The cost of a first-class postage stamp is $0.41 ($0.42 starting May 12, 2008), and the cost of a personal check for us is about $0.07. (Since the companies usually provide the envelopes, we won’t count the cost of an envelope.) So the cost of mailing one bill is $0.48. At 10 bills a month, that amounts to $4.80 a month, and a total savings of $57.60 each year. A larger household with children and more bills could save even more than this.

If the company doesn’t have a website, it usually has a toll-free number you can call to pay by phone. Some companies allow you to set up automatic monthly charges to your credit card or withdrawals from your bank account, which could save you a lot of time.

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