Do you want to build wealth and have financial independence? Well, do you?
Then every day, with every financial decision you make, remind yourself that there are 2 main methods to achieving that goal.
It is a simple concept: Make more (revenue) and spend less (costs). The more money you accumulate, the more you have to invest, which increases your wealth and helps you get rich.
We learned a long time ago, that with some effort, we could save 50% of our meager incomes in order to save money for a down payment on an investment property or to add to our investment accounts.
You may ask, what does that have to do with this great bread machine?
As regular readers of this blog know, I LOVE bargains and believe you can get pretty much everything at reduced prices if you search for them.
The less you spend- the more you have to save and invest!
Long ago, I discovered the gold mine of estate sales and garage sales! I have been amazed at what people have sold and the fantastic stuff I have been able to buy for a song.
Recently, I spotted this brand new, never used Williams-Sonoma bread machine at a garage sale.
The woman running the sale said her husband had given it to her as a Christmas gift several years ago and she had never used it! She no longer had the box or the instruction book, and that’s why she had it priced at $10!
I asked her if she would take $5 and she happily said Yes! This terrific Williams-Sonoma item probably sells for $100 or more!
After I paid her, I asked her “If you didn’t want it, why didn’t you take it back, get the money and buy something else?” She said, “Oh I didn’t want to hurt his feelings.”
I said “The money he spent belonged to both of you–doesn’t that seem nuts to basically throw away $100?” She said “Yeah, I guess so.”
So, thanks to her and her husband I now have a brand new bread machine! There are bargains like this everywhere!
At another yard sale, all books were priced at 50¢ and I found this terrific Bread Machine book!
So now for the cost of one loaf of gourmet bread--I have a terrific machine that will make me countless loaves of fresh bread!
The money I save will be invested in appreciating assets that will build wealth!
If you could pick up a prescription and get a $25 gift card for FREE at the same time, would you be interested? Would you like drugstores to be fighting for your business and giving you more FREE $25 cards? That’s what happened to me and I’ll tell you how you can do this too!
Recently I saw a sign in the window of a local Rite Aid drugstore that said you could get a FREE $25 gift card for any transferred prescription. The pharmacist told me I just needed to give them the prescription number and location of the pharmacy that had my prescription–and they would handle the rest.
I gave them my info and later picked up my prescription and got my FREE $25 Rite AidGift card! That gives me FREE MONEY, so I can invest that money instead!
Actually, you can transfer up to 4 prescriptions and receive a total of $100 worth of FREE Gift Cards! What a deal!
A week later, out of the blue, I received a $25 check from Walgreens in the mail that I could redeem if I transferred a prescription to them! I believe that was in response to my transferring a prescription away from their store.
Being a person that always loves FREE MONEY, I did just that! I now have $50 worth of FREE gift cards I can use to buy anything I want. The cards do have some restrictions. You cannot use the gift cards to pay for prescriptions or co-pays, stamps, tobacco, and other items.
But–anything else in the store you need including cosmetics, household supplies, even food you get for FREE!
I took the $50 I would have spent on these drugstore items and I invested it in the Vanguard S&P 500 Index Fund–to make myself MORE MONEY!
Use this calculator to see how that $50 will grow over time and how it will help you build wealth! Every little bit helps!
Recently, I discovered fabulous printable grocery coupons at Kraftfoods.com to take with me when I went shopping for food at my favorite store, Wal mart!
Included were terrific coupons for Cool Whip, Philadelphia Cream Cheese, Ritz and Triscuit Crackers and more! Those were the things I love and wanted to get anyway!
While I was on the Kraft website, I came across this terrificFlag Cake recipe! It was so impressive looking, yet sounded super easy, so I decided to make it for our Memorial Day picnic!
Many of the ingredients in this patriotic cake were items I got with the coupons.
Most of these Kraft coupons gave me $1 off the price of the item and combined with the low prices at Wal-Mart, I was able to get them for practically nothing! That’s just the way I like it!
Last night we decided to take advantage of the FREE Birthday Entree that my husband had received in his e-mail from Moe’s!
If you sign up at Moe’s, they will send you a coupon around the time of your birthday and you get an entree absolutely FREE! Love that!
I have found the Moe’s Kid’s Size entrees are plenty for me & really not much smaller than the regular sized entrees. Plus–they are only $ 3.29 and you get a combo with a small drink and cookie! That brought the entire cost of our meal to $3.55 plus $1 we put in the tip jar! That’s only $4.55 for 2 people to eat dinner! What a deal!
This week we will be going to redeem our FREE coupon at Qdoba Mexican Grill for my husband’s Birthday Entree! They will send you a coupon for a Free meal if you sign up on their website!
Anyone have any other suggestions for great deals, freebies of any kind or FREE meals? Please share them with us!
Would it surprise you to know that you can buy coupons on eBay that can greatly reduce the cost of buying groceries? Recently, a grocery store in our town offered triple coupons for a week! They would triple the value of any coupon up to 99 cents! What a deal!
The technique I have used to capitalize on this offer makes the process super easy! I signed up for the e-mail version of the weekly specials to be sent to me on the first day of the new week. I then check what they are offering as super deals that week, paying particular attention to the Buy One Get One Free offers. I went to eBay and in the Search Field, I type in the names of the products that are on special to see if there are coupons available.
Recently, I was able to find 10 peanut butter coupons for 40 cents off each, for total cost of $ 1.49 plus 42 cents postage. That’s a grand total of $1.91 for 10 coupons! That’s a $ 1.20 reduction for each jar of peanut butter! I order the coupons from the eBay seller on the first day of the store sale, so they can be mailed to me right away so I get them in plenty of time while the sale is still in progress.
I took these to the store, where my final cost, after all the deductions, came to 30 cents per jar of peanut butter! Combined with all the other coupons I had for other products, I was able to save 50% on my grocery bill!
That’s like someone handing me $25.00 cash that I didn’t have to work for! I will take it!
I accomplished this task in 10 minutes drinking coffee at the kitchen table and you can too! It couldn’t be easier!
Dr. Mehmet Oz, the bestselling author and health expert on “The Oprah Winfrey Show” came to North Carolina recently to raise money and awareness for a local health clinic.
According to the Charlotte Observer Dr. Oz said ” The reason we cost 50 percent more to care for than Europeans is because we’re 50 percent sicker. We need to walk more, eat high-fiber, high-protein breakfasts, get more vitamin D and omega-3 and trim our waists, he said, rattling off dozens more health tips.”
2/3 of Americans are either overweight or obese and it is getting worse! “Forty percent of our kids will be diabetics if we don’t do something about this!” Dr. Oz said. Forty percent!
The line that struck me was this one: “Are you willing to admit that your life is so out of control that you can’t carve out 20 minutes a day for a workout?”
People that take care of their bodies have much lower health care costs and take less medicine– so they have more money!
A woman recently told me her doctor scolded her at her latest checkup and said “If you don’t want to have to pay for expensive blood pressure medicine, cholesterol pills and diabetes treatments, and possibly end up in an expensive nursing home, then stop treating your body like a garbage can!”
There are many parallels between taking care of our physical health and taking care of our financial health. It is actually very simple. Eat less and exercise more. Spend less and save more.
When you love yourself enough to treat your body well, you also will treat yourself well financially and believe that you are worthy of being financially secure.
Start today and do a little something in both these areas to make some progress. Go for a little walk, choose not to buy one small item and save that money.
Look what eliminating one gourmet muffin or latte can save you and what it will add towards a fabulous future.
The other day, my 23 year old daughter called me to ask the name of the bagel shop where I get fabulous sun dried tomato bagels because she wanted some of them. I gave her the name of the local bakery and told her they have bins off to the side marked “Last Night’s Bagels” and they are half price.
In my typical frugal fashion I said “Get them out of that bin and ask if they’ll give you 2 packages for $ 2.49” ! She said Ok–I will try. She was amazed! They gave her 12 bagels for $ 2.49– Just for asking!
I discovered this bargain several months ago, when I was in the bagel shop and spotted this bin. I decided to give it a try and buy a package of 6 bagels for $2.49. I had become reluctant to pay the outrageous higher price of $ 1.29 for ONE “fresh” bagel, so I thought– Hey, how BAD can they be?
When I got to the cash register that first time, the lady took one look at me, dressed in my garage sale appropriate clothes after a long morning of scouring yard sales and she said–You know what? Right now they are 2 Packages for $ 2.49! I got the message! She thought I was POOR– so she was going to help me out and give me extra bagels for FREE!
I said Well alrighty then and grabbed another sleeve of 6 yummy bagels! I got 12 bagels for a grand total cost of $ 2.49! That’s 21 cents per bagel!
That saved me over $ 12 for 12 bagels! That’s $ 12 free money–that I didn’t have to earn by working!
We lightly toasted the bagels and they made fabulous sandwiches! They were great! There was NOTHING wrong with them! Now every time I go to the bagel shop–I ask them –Could I have 2 packages of day old bagels for $ 2.49? They ALWAYS say YES!
Try it next time you have a taste for bagels!
Be generous and get a whole bunch of the bagels and donate them to the food pantry so other people can enjoy them too!
