Beating Broke

3 Ways to Record Your Stuff for Personal Property Insurance

July 8, 2011 By Shane Ede 3 Comments

So, you’ve got auto insurance for your car, health insurance for your health, flood insurance for your property, and home insurance for your house. Everything’s covered! Yay! Whoa there. Not quite. These days, it seems like you’ve got to insure everything if you want it covered in case of loss. There’s pet insurance. Celebrities are insuring their body parts. And, while you probably don’t need to insure those killer legs, you probably want to check to make sure you have some sort of personal property insurance (or personal belongings insurance).

Despite what you may think, your home insurance doesn’t necessarily cover your personal properties. They might have some small rider that will pay out a small amount to replace certain essentials like clothes and such, but if you’re ever in need of it, you’ll quickly find that it will fall far short of replacing much of the personal property that you owned. Some of the things will have caps on them for value. Got a killer gaming computer? Not covered to it’s full value. Many people are choosing to add a personal property policy to their list of insurance policies.

Part of getting a personal property policy is being able to identify the item, it’s value, and prove both. Here are three ways you can use to record the property that you own, and do it easily.

Spreadsheet — Create a spreadsheet for each room and list the items you are insuring from that room. Be sure to record any serial numbers and model numbers that you can. A short description can also be helpful.
Take Pictures — Combined with a simple spreadsheet, take pictures of the items that you own in each room. This can help identify the items, and act as proof of serial and model numbers as well as condition.
Contents Video — Take a camcorder (or any device that records decent quality video) and walk through each room of your house, recording each item that you’ll be insuring. Again, be sure to record serial numbers and model numbers. You can use the ability to record voice to add in descriptions as you go.

Properly recording and keeping track of your property can make purchasing your personal property insurance a much easier task and make sure that you’re insured for the proper amounts and items so that you don’t find yourself trying to replace expensive items that you though your home insurance would cover.

photo credit: 111 Emergency

7 Frugal Date Suggestions

June 22, 2011 By MelissaB 7 Comments

Whether you are dating or married, one of the best ways to maintain closeness in your relationship is to have a date night. However, with the high cost of entertainment, dating can put a serious kink in your budget, but it does not have to. Here are some frugal date suggestions that will kindle your relationship and protect your wallet.

-Cook together. Dates don’t always have to entail a dinner and a movie. Consider making a meal together. My husband and I both love to cook and eat, so during our courtship we frequently cooked together. We tried new recipes and varied what we prepared. Sometimes we would make an economical stir-fry, while other times we bought crab legs from the grocery store and treated ourselves. We bought the crab legs on sale for $9.99; still much cheaper than a night out on the town, and we could talk while we cooked.

-Go to a free concert. If you live in a metropolitan area or near a college town, there is no shortage of free events. Take advantage of them and plan your date around the event. We attend blues festivals and food festivals as well as concerts in the park. They provide several hours of enjoyable entertainment for free.

-Rent a movie. Rent a movie or two from Redbox or the local library. Redbox only charges $1 per movie, and the local library may offer them for free or for a nominal fee for $1 or $2.

-Star gaze together. If you live in a rural area, take advantage of the darkness and put out a blanket on the ground and gaze at the stars together. My husband and I bought a constellation map and spent hours trying to identify all of the constellations. It’s also fun to watch shooting stars.

-Hike together. If you live somewhere with trails or hiking paths, take a hike together. It is free, and you can’t compete with the beautiful scenery.

-Have a picnic. In this modern society where we are trained to go, go, go, it seems simple to pack a meal and have a picnic somewhere, but you will appreciate the time to talk and just focus on one another. My husband and I frequently went to a local waterfall in the evenings and just talked. It was so refreshing to hear the water in the background, and the scenery was amazing.

-Grab a bite to eat during happy hour. Many restaurants offer ½ off appetizers between the hours of 3 and 5 and after 9 p.m. Plan to dine out during that time and enjoy some half-price appetizers. (This is fun to do sometimes; I went to grad school with a guy who would only take his dates out for half price appetizers. I am still amazed that he found girls to go out with him.)

If you go the traditional route of dinner and a movie for a date, you could spend upwards of $50 for two people for just a few hours of entertainment. Instead, try some of these frugal date suggestions or alternate expensive dates with more frugal dates. After all, the point of dating is to have fun and enjoy one anothers company, not spend as much money as you can. Enjoy!

photo credit: ai.dan

What if Everyone Was a Frugaler?

June 15, 2011 By Shane Ede 16 Comments

What if everyone in the world was as frugal as the most frugal? Inspired by conversation on the Early Retirement Extreme forums about the ethics of the Early Retirement Extreme lifestyle. So, the beginning of that linked conversation (if you haven’t read it) is based on the premise that if everyone did as Jacob does and lived the ERE lifestyle, would the world collapse? And, if so, doesn’t that indicate that the ERE lifestyle is not socially responsible (ethical)? Which, got me to thinking. What if everyone was as frugal as most of the frugalers we know? What if frugal was normal?

I’m not talking about the people who hand wash their Mercedes, either. When it really comes down to it, the ERE lifestyle is pretty similar to the frugaler lifestyle. Each has their extremists. So, what if everyone was frugal?

Would we all make our own shampoo? Would we all have a sustainability garden? Would we all coupon? Would coupons still exist?

It’s an interesting question. Many of the things we all see and do each day exist because a much larger section of the population use them far more regularly than we do. Disneyworld, for instance, probably wouldn’t exist if it’s only customer base were frugalers. What about those Mercedes cars? Probably not in the U.S. But, if you think about it, there wouldn’t be very many used cars available for purchase, since we’d all be busy driving them until the wheels fall off. What would that do to the auto industry? If all the people who buy a new car every year, or even every five years, stopped doing so? You thought they needed a bailout a couple of years ago! They’d really need one then.

We might see more local farms growing a larger variety of goods because more people are shopping at farmers markets and taking advantage of the Co-Op farms. We might see less McMansions and more smaller houses with big yards and gardens. We might see some pretty drastic changes in the pricing of some things. Without all the willy-nilly spenders out there paying whatever the manufacturer asks for the product, you might see more reasonable pricing to get people to purchase a product. We would likely see a return to a more craftsman foundation, much like the early retirement extreme lifestyle. People might be interested in making things themselves if the market dynamic shifted that drastically towards the frugal side of things.

How do you see the world changing if everyone was as frugal as the most frugal?

photo credit: kenteegardin