A good friend of mine has invited me to come out to visit him (east Coast to Montana). I haven't flown since 2012. What is a good place to get a good deal on flights these days?

I have quite a few ancient VHS tapes, some from the 80s (and yes, they still have clear video) that I would love to digitize to computer video files.

A public library about a 20-minute drive from me has an option for this, but I would wind up stuck there, spending hours there doing the conversions.

Instead, I was thinking of buying a cheap (<$20) VHS to digital converter and do it myself at home, a little at a time, at my leisure and while doing other things. However, I don't know if the quality is going to be good enough--it doesn't have to pristine, just not awful--or if the hassle of using the software is going to make it not worth it.

My two old VCRs have just coaxial out for video and left/right RCA jacks out for audio.

I have seen on /r/DataHoarder some suggestions about this process but for me those discussions get bogged down in a large amount of details, often there is a push for the highest data capture quality (and therefore $$$), and I'd rather just test the r/frugal waters here first.

I just want this to be fairly simple (I am fairly technically capable but I don't want to dedicate a lot of time learning the intricacies of video digitizing), quick, and inexpensive (doesn't have to be <$20, but not much more than that) with reasonable though not necessarily awesome video quality. If that's not possible, I'll use the library I guess.

Is it possible?

What is a normal grocery budget for a family of 3 and what is a frugal budget?

I'm new to being frugal, but my family absolutely needs to make a change here. In the past, I didn't pay attention to cost (bad habit I picked up from my parents) and would spend roughly $2000+ per month for 2 adults just at the grocery store.

What kinds of foods do y'all buy when buying frugal? Advice appreciated!

Was wondering if anyone has recommendations on where to get some cheap folding or tailgate chairs. Just need something for people to be able to sit outside in the backyard with for a party.

I’ve used the Academy ones which are nice at 6 bucks but they often break. Was wondering if there’s a brand that has better quality for a similar price maybe? Or even those metal chairs would work.

Thanks!

Recently had a change to my medical needs and part of that is adjusting my eating patterns to smaller meals more frequently throughout the day. I can obviously meal prep and portion it into smaller amounts than before, but I don’t want to be eating the same thing 5 times a day. Any recommendations or advice?

Please no suggestions of nuts, peanuts, or beans. Allergies are dumb af.

When I was in college in the early 1990s and then in my 20s until I was 27, I never had my own bedroom. I shared with 1 to 3 other people. I got my first own bedroom when I was 27, and then in my early 30s when I was in grad school I shared a bedroom with a flatmate and our other flatmate slept in the living room.

But here and on some of the other personal finance subreddits, people are saying they can't afford a studio alone and they reject suggestions to share bedrooms for a year to save money.

Do many people feel like it's not safe to live that way anymore? Did craigslist murders ruin the apartment share for young people today?

I’m def a lower middle class american, and here’s how I save money on things that make me feel good and take care of animals!

-I get my haircuts at a Hair Cuttery for 25 dollars. I always research ahead of time and look at reviews to find the best hair stylist!

-If you need cheaper, find a salon school, and look at their instagram! Typically they have students work posted, and you can request a student whose work is standout to get a $10-$15 haircut. In my state students can’t take tips of any kind and are very adamant on it, so that saves a bit of money:)

-If you want to feel pampered for cheap, get a basic facial or massage at salon school. I wouldn’t get any treatments that could have damaging effects, hospital bills are expensive!

-When shopping for animals, I would call several shelters in your county and see if they waive adoption fees for ____(insert identifier here) I’ve seen military, senior, student be waived or in some cases all are!

-Some shelters offer a month or two of free pet insurance! Call ahead and see if yours does!

-Finally, the humane society typically offers insane discounts on pet supplies. I got all my cat stuff for $40(cat tower, week of food, kennel, travel bag, litter box and scoop, toys, and treats:)

Good luck!

So my puppy peed on the couch, like all over the couch, and took out 2 cushions last week. This week, he threw up on the last 2 cushions, so now im left with a couch frame and no cushions. Does anyone know where i can buy some cushion but not a whole couch? Or are there just some reasonably priced large square pillows?

My usual grocery store has a floral department with beautiful cut flowers which I often buy for myself or for giving. You may not be aware that if there is someone working in the department,you can ask them to remove the plastic from the flowers you have chosen and replace it with colored tissue paper. Anytime I am buying flowers as a gift, I do this and they are happy to oblige usually tying it with a ribbon and sometimes adding a little greenery or a card. For 1/4-1/3 the price you would pay at a florist, you can have a beautiful bouquet for any gift giving occasion which looks so much nicer than a plastic wrapped grocery store bunch of flowers. No guarantee that your grocery store has employees who will do this, but it doesn’t hurt to ask! On the same subject , I personally much prefer to receive flowers in person from the sender rather than have them delivered by some random stranger who I am then expected to tip. Much more personal that way!

I shop at three (3) different stores ... Publix, Aldi, and Wallyworld. The other day I was standing in line with a few items (that totaled $60 and filled just two small shopping bags) waiting behind a woman checking out with a fair amount of groceries. Her final tab was ... $300. Later, I asked the checkout person how often she sees $300 (or more) grocery bills like that. Her answer was "All the time. It is very common."

So, doing some simple math, this woman's grocery bill (assuming that she shops only once per week and adds nothing else to the total is between $1,200 and $1,500 per month. This amount (used to) equal mortgage payment. So, how are you handling this insanity?

Hi Folks!

With TurboTax limiting how many efiles can be done, installs require registered email account, etc. I've been looking at H&R Block software since then but had to bite the bullet on purchasing TT Premier for each person that has K1's.

I've been using TurboTax Premier as i believe this is better for K1's but feel free to correct me if TT Deluxe can work with K1's

Taxes I work on is mine, family, or friends:

• W2
• Schedule K1
• 1099-INT
• 1099-R
• 1099-DIV

Has anyone had any experience with H&R Block software and what have you used? Deluxe or Premium?

Thanks for your time and help!

Hi friends actively need health insurance for my wellbeing and one that actively helps with medications and so on. I love in Oregon and assuming I make less than 20,700 dollars a year I gross income I get full coverage with insurance that I need. I believe I should not longer require this after 2 years or so however. At any rate I need to survive off of 1732 dollars gross income per month which assuming 20 percent is taxed roughly 1380 dollars a month or less. For simplicity I’ll aim for 1300 dollars a month.

I should be able to do college as well doing this, as my current part time job has good tips and makes between 18 and 21 dollads an hour consistently, so I’d need to work 20-26 hours a week for it which gives me time to do college as well.

The average price for a studio apartment is 950 dollars a month here, but I intend to roomate during this period (which based on roomie.com is an average of 750 a month for shared two bedroom apartment).

My car payment is 150 a month for loan, and 30 dollars a month for gas refill even while actively working, due to very high fuel efficiency.) and my job being a 10 minute drive down highway from city.

How can I survive off of the remaining money for food and other stuff?

I try to live a relatively frugal lifestyle and I try to avoid unnecessary big expenses. However, I’m now faced with a dilemma;

Lately someone has been targeting my car. And I found out it was one of the neighbors who apparently is angry with me and will definitely be more angry once he knows I’ve got evidence to report him to the police.

So we feel less safe in our own street now, and I’m considering to invest in increasing security with an alarm, cameras and a dashcam for our car. But all together this will be an investment of easily 2.000 euros i estimate. All because of one crazy guy.

I’m a bit conflicted for that reason. I do want to feel safe. But I also feel like I shouldn’t be forced to spend such money because of one person.

You guys have any views on this to consider?

I used to swear by a specific brand of golden (and now white) bar of antibacterial soap. That stuff used to last ages, not it seems like it rinses away so quickly! Anyone got any tips to make soap last longer? Switch to bodywash? Im all ears to any and all suggestions. Thank you 🙏

Assuming it's in season. For instance bananas. I've spent a lot more than I'd like on frozen lately. Unfrozen is pretty cheap but don't last. Is it cheaper to just cut them up and freeze them myself?

Hi all!

So I recently changed gyms to 24hour Fitness around 4 months ago now because I wanted a gym… get this, that was open 24/7.

And I did just that. The location I go to was a 24/7 gym up until two days ago. They changed their hours to open 24hrs (Tue-Thur), Mon 5am-12am, Friday 12am-9pm, Sat+Sun 5am-9pm.

I paid for the full year at the start because it was cheaper and it wouldn’t conflict with my alternating schedule. Because it was open 24/7. And I typically work out from 10:30pm-12:30+am. Which are the times affected the most with their new schedule. I can only workout 3 days with this new change of theirs.

This gym is by no means the closest to me, and lacks a good bit of equipment. But they were the only gym around open 24/7.

Would I be able to get a refund for this? What are the routes I can take?

With food prices in Canada soaring, I can’t really afford..anything rofl. I have severe texture issues(please don’t mock me) so I’ve never liked bean. But I need to get more protein in my diet so…thing is I’m deep in a depression slump as well so I’d prefer something easy to make as well.

Can you guys share cheap but easy to make bean/legume recipes that you think I might enjoy?

I've had some eye issues and I'm realizing that making the font larger on my desktop computer's monitor is just much more comfortable for me--but at the cost of screen real estate.

For many years, I've been using a 19" monitor (which I still think of as "big" after years using a 14" laptop monitor) but it occurred to me that maybe I should get a quite large one so I can have a more comfortable visual experience. I don't know if this is a good assumption.

I had a quick look on Google shopping but am not sure what I should know about buying a bigger monitor. I don't really need it to be much wider, I don't think? Mostly just taller. I don't know how much bigger or what it "should" cost, or resolutions issues, or... I'm coming into this cold.

What do you think? Is buying a larger monitor worth it in terms of visual comfort? I use my computer many hours every day.

And if so, what's a frugal way to go about this?

I got my partner a Victorinox knife for Christmas looking to get them a sharpener now.

I don’t want to ruin the knife, but I want something affordable that works.

Thank you

Hello, I need help moving from a studio size apartment from Los Angeles to a studio apartment in San Francisco to attend school. Everything would be packed just cannot carry heavy boxes or furniture due to disability. I’d love to hear your recs, costs, tips, stories to be as financially efficient as possible? Even U-Haul/self recs would be appreciated. Thank you

I walk a lot for work and have been wanting to invest in a good pair of shoes. I was thinking of the Brooks Ghost 15s as I’ve seen a lot of good things about them. It’s important that they’re comfortable and durable as I obviously want to get as much wear out of them as possible. Does anyone have experience with these shoes? Or any other recommendations for comfortable, durable walking shoes that will give the most bang for your buck?

My wife and I don't meet the definition of "frugal".

We eat out frequently, we don't care about saving a nickel (gas / a pound of meat).

We are retired, our home and cars are paid off (no debts, except taxes and the like) our retirement income covers all the bills easily (heat, internet, car insurance, etc).

I think we lived (are living) a proper / non-greedy life. We are mostly happy.

I also know that life/things could go sideways ($$$) tomorrow.

In my old feeble mind, frugal just means life is a long journey, don't be stupid or greedy.

I live in a small studio rental (~500sq ft) and I cannot cool down my bedroom alcove. My apartment has hot water pipes / radiators on the ceiling that heat my apartment. They have insulation on parts of them but I still feel it warm up. My radiators have been turned off. I have a small window AC unit outside the bed alcove but no matter what I try (pointing it’s vents toward my bed, putting a fan in front of ac to push air into the bed) it is noticeably warmer in the bed area and I can’t seem to get circulation in there. I can’t move my AC unit to my bed area because it is a different type of window and would not fit. I wake up every night because I’m so warm, and I walk outside the arch of my alcove and notice instantly it’s much cooler. My blackout curtains in the bed area are almost always shut so it’s not an issue with sun. How can I easily cool this area down?

I live in a dry climate if that is relevant.

EDIT: My current AC unit was provided and is drilled into the window. I’m not keen on buying a different unit for the different window on the bed area due to $ and security in a ground level apartment (I’m not sure my apartment would be happy with new holes on the window trim because of me drilling stoppers for safety)

For the past several years, I've done a Reverse Budget, but circumstances have meant that I've needed to tighten up on how I spend, so I decided to marry it to the Kakeibo Method to track spending and find additional savings. (If you google, you will find many guides and videos that go in depth into Kakeibo and some sites include free printables.)

If you've struggled with other budget methods because they are too strict, inflexible, overwhelming, or the software has a learning curve, Kakeibo might be the right fit for you.

What I like about the Kakeibo method is:

• It's super frugal to get started and maintain. All you need is paper and pen. (You probably have a notebook hanging around, and if you don't, they are cheap.)
• It holds you accountable by making you log expenses as they happen (or no later than end of day), by making you reconcile spending each week, and by reflecting on lessons learned at the end of the month.
• It makes you come to grips with your income and how much money you have "free" after your fixed expenses. (And to determine those fixed expenses, you will be examining your CC and bank statements closely, because you will be listing those expenses out to start each month.)
• It has some aspects similar to reverse budget in the sense that once you've allocated money for your monthly fixed expenses, you are free to spend your weekly "allowance" however you see fit.
• It is simple! There are 4 broad spending categories, and no trying to forecast variable expenses. So you're not overwhelmed with "giving every dollar a job", or feeling bad if something goes over the money allocated to an "envelope", (or for failing to realize you needed an envelope to begin with).
• It considers cultural (leisure and pleasure) spending a legit category, and not just a "want". Going to the movies/museum/concert or buying a book? Culture. The non-work convention (vacation) I had last month? Culture.
• It's flexible and adaptable to your needs and lifestyle. For example, to marry it to Reverse Budget, I consider my "pay your self first" savings one of my fixed expenses. If the 4 categories are too broad for you, create as many as you need for granularity.

I've also figured out a work-around for 4 week months vs 5 week months. I don't track my spending via calendar weeks. I divide each month in to 5 "weeks" of 6 days, with some months having a final week of 7 days. (Did I mention it is flexible.)

Does it work? Well, last month, a month where I had a week where I went way over the allowance because of my vacation (as I knew I would -- I just made a note that it was a vacation week); because of the way it slowed down my spending and made me think? I still ended up with +$476 to sweep to savings at the end of the month.

​

I am a single person with two cats moving into a one bedroom apartment halfway across the country. Does it make more sense to only take the “necessities” and cats on the road, then immediately go out to find a new bed/frame/boxspring, desk, kitchen table/chairs, couch, tv stand, cat trees and hope I can find all of those things in the same day, OR spend $1400 on a U-Haul before gas. All my stuff is pretty well used and I don’t really care either way. Just not sure which would be most cost effective.

eta I’m 26 and all my stuff is used, 100% would be getting used again in the new place. Spending $1k on a couch with my salary is obscene lol. The last time I did this I was just moving across town but I FB marketplaced/craiglist almost everything and set it up to be picked up the day I was moving. Popped it all in the UHaul and spend less than $500. I would certainly be able to get most things for less than the cost of transporting all my stuff, but as others have mentioned, it would be least disorienting for the cats to bring my stuff. But my stuff is literally so not expensive, all in less than $1k

Edit 2 my vehicle can NOT tow anything (in the words of my gearhead stepdad when I asked if my car could: “fuck no”)

Edit 3 I am NOT GETTING RID OF MY CATS, sorry if this was somehow confusing???

Edit 4 I’m not only asking from a frugality perspective but from those of you that have done this before. Clearly in the comments people have VERY different experiences both from a cost perspective and personal labor. By my estimates, the cost of Uhaul dragging everything: probably 2k between cost of the uhaul and gas. The cost of buying all “new” stuff on FB marketplace (I imagine doing what I did the last time I moved where I rented a truck and picked up everything in one day): less than 1k.

Edit 5: Penske is more expensive even before I get what’s needed to tow my car. I also don’t live in a major city currently so the moving companies won’t really work.

Edit 6 WOW so so so many responses. I think I’m going to go for hauling all of my stuff via truck with me because it just makes the most sense for my circumstances. I am however now terrified that someone will steal all of my things in the truck while I’m in the hotel… I REALLY like the idea of the uhaul pods things but unfortunately I have a tight window (looking to move before the end of the month and kind of need all my stuff in the meantime; shipping takes 9 days) in my case it would be $2800 to do that; uhaul price is $1350 or so since I have to tow my car, +$300 at least for gas, + truck insurance, and I would still have the same cost of me and my dad’s car getting out there, then having to hopefully time my arrival with the Ubox’s (and again go 9 days without any of my stuff… not sure what my cats and I would do in the meantime). Probably all in still less than $2800 for the pods alone, not to mention then the cost of 2 cars with gas and one night in a hotel. Maybe it evens out, but even still isnt worth being out my stuff for over a week. Looking into it further though and discussing with my dad tomorrow.

Last (?) edit; none of this would be possible without having focused on frugality for so long, I would never have been able to cough up any amount of money like this to move. Yay, and also boo that the only way for me to move forward in my career without dying in the one major city in the state I live in currently is to move halfway around the country. But let’s be clear, this was prob not the right place to pose this question lol big moves and spending 5k+ all in all is not frugal whatsoever

Was going to invest in a freezer and look at buying 1/4 cow. If anyone had any experience could you help me out with some questions.

How big a freezer should I have? Was thinking I would buy a 10 cu ft freezer for this. Along with my fridge freeze which is fairly small.

What price should I look for? Seem to see 5-7$ a pound hanging weight does that sound fair? Looking at grass fed longhorn ( idk how much a difference that makes) 1/3 ground 1/3 steak 1/3 roast. I expect 100-130 pounds of beef.

I spend a lot on food and was hoping this might cut the cost back a bit rather than buying individual steaks and ground beef. Let me know how off base my research might be.

Have been looking to replace our Japanese rice cooker and have delayed due to cost ($100+). Happened upon this classic Comet Rice cooker at a thrift shop. Had no clue what it was, but figured it our. $4 makes perfect Rice. I did an online search and thenonly thing I found was it came out in 1955(?). Otherwise I only found ebay listing for $38+ for this classy cooker.

Actually sat down and worked out the cost of these smoothies I've been using to bulk out between meals, probably the most clean calories and protein money can buy?

If you're the one paying bills and expecting people to pay you back, just get for their venmoes and request them on the app. Idk if you guys have discovered this, but the venmo search feature has also gotten much better recently in finding people who may be in your mutual networks when you search their full names. I often find myself in situations where I am underpaid (if I had a dollar for the number of times people 'forgot' to account for tip and tax..stuff adds up) or forgotten to be paid and just hate chasing people to pay me. I know it's simple advice, but I have found that requesting people is way more reliable than dropping your venmo id in a groupchat or expecting people to find you and pay you correctly for their share. Plus it feels nice to just say "We can figure it out later" instead of having people scrambling in that moment.

Hi,

Does anyone know of an app/website/service that details deals or discounts that you are eligible for given you have a subscription to something else?

For example: O2 Priority offer free Greggs breakfast at weekends Studentbeans offers 10% off Asos Apple offer 3 months free Apple Music when you buy a new phone

It would be great if you could look up these offers in reverse. For example: “How do I get offers for Apple Music?”

• Buy a new iPhone -> 3 months free
• Buy a new iPad -> 3 months free
• Buy a new Mac -> 3 months free
• Start a contract with EE -> 6 months free
• Valid Unidays account -> 50% off + free Apple TV
• and many more…

I know that services like O2 Priority, Studentbeans, Groupon exist, but these all show the offers you are eligible for because you have them, not all possible offers if you had some other service. I’m describing a service that informs you on how to be eligible for a discount for a thing you want.

I guess I’m trying to describe a similar idea to justwatch.com but for products/services instead of films and tv.

Any examples would be greatly appreciated. Thanks!