Beating Broke

Personal Finance from the Broke Perspective

Search Results for: budget

8 Free and Cheap Things to Help You Save Money on Your Wedding

By Leave a Comment

They say nothing is free, but I know from living on a broke budget that there are many free things in this world if you just take the time to find them. Thankfully, this even applies to weddings and  it’s easier than ever to plan a wedding on a budget. These are some of the best ways to cut corners and get something for free to help you save big money on your wedding day.

Electronic Invites

It might sound crazy, but wedding e-vites are starting to trend. With a growing awareness of the impact of paper on the environment and people who simply want to save buck, they provide the perfect solution. It’s important to follow-up with your friends and family though just to be certain their invite didn’t end up in their junk email folder.

Wedding Websites

Tell everyone about your story in a fun and creative way. Free wedding websites help you connect all of the most important information to your guests. When you create a wedding website, you get to choose the theme, add images, put in the event time and location, and so much more. The designs are chic, stylish, and help you communicate everything you need in a free and modern way.

Free-ish Officiant

Don’t want to fork out money for someone to officiate the wedding? Did you know you can get ordained online for free or cheap? Some states require an ordained wedding officiant to handle the ceremony. But the cool thing is that there are ways to become official for good or just for the day. Choose someone you love and respect to get the credentials if they don’t have them already. It’s likely they’d be honored to participate in your day in such an important way.

Pot-Luck Style Dinner

It might be a terrible idea, but what a fun way to include everyone in the wedding. Some people love pot-luck style family gatherings so for them, this could be a great way to save cash on the big day. It’s important to note that if you do this, you risk people being offended or frustrated that you’re not providing a meal. So maybe you provide the main dish, and they bring all the delicious sides.

Church or Community Center

Some churches rent out their event halls for low cost or a donation to the ministry. The same goes for local community centers. They provide affordable alternatives to hotels and other large wedding venues. These types of locations are perfect for smaller gatherings.

Get Married at a Park

If you don’t care about fancy decorations, a wedding ceremony at a local park could be the perfect solution. Some of them allow weddings as long as it’s standing only. Additionally, in Colorado, you can get married in the Garden of the Gods for free. You just need to make a reservation in advance and follow their rules. Look at your local parks and see if any of them offer something similar.

Borrow your wedding gown

What if instead of paying $5-$10K on a dress you’ll wear only once, you simply borrowed from a family member or friend? Since most people will never wear theirs again, they might be excited to see their wedding clothes get a second act. Be prepared to offer to pay for cleaning services and understand that you may not be able to make any alterations if you don’t love something about the dress.

Free online wedding planners

There are countless companies who offer wedding checklists to help you plan a fantastic wedding. Once you get it done, you can put in the details and check it off the list. These are helpful because if you hired a wedding planner, you could expect to pay up to 20% of the total cost of your wedding on them.

What not to get for free

While free is good, it’s also important to think through the parts of your wedding day that probably should go to a professional. While you may think that random camera phone photos of the day will suffice, hiring a professional photographer and/or videographer is something you should definitely plan in the budget. Unless you have a friend, who is a pro and will do it for free, it’s best to hire it out.

One way to save however, is to only hire them for the most important parts. If you get them for at least the ceremony and formal photos, you’ll have some key memories captured professionally. You can let your buddies take endless camera phone pictures of the reception and dancing and upload those for you later.

Do These 6 Things To Save Energy

By Leave a Comment

Saving energy is both important and beneficial for a number of reasons. Of course, shutting off the lights when you leave the room or adjusting the temperature when you’re not home will save you money and keep your energy cost low.

But there’s so much more that you can do. Energy is likely being lost through cracks in the walls, the windows, worn-out weatherstripping, poorly designed doors, uninsulated ceilings, and walls. The energy that you’re paying for is literally going out the door.

You can do six major things that will improve your home’s energy-efficiency and save you money. You’ll find that most of these methods are things that you can do yourself without shelling out thousands of dollars for a new energy-efficient HVAC system or having solar power energy installed. Although these would be beneficial to your energy savings, they are not always in the budget.

1: Replace your light bulbs

Technology is pretty amazing. You can use between 25 – 80% less electricity by changing your light bulbs to energy-efficient alternatives such as Halogen incandescent bulbs, compact fluorescent lights (CFLs), and light-emitting diode bulbs (LEDs). The downside to these light bulbs is they are an expensive alternative; however, you’ll actually be saving money in the long run.

2: Install a smart thermostat

Keeping your temperature just 10 to 15 degrees cooler while you’re at work will help to save you between 5-15% every year according to energy.gov.

Smart thermostats allow you complete control over your thermostat. You can program the temperature for when you’re at work or sleeping so that you’re not keeping the house too cool or too hot when it’s not necessary.  An additional benefit of a smart thermostat is that you can program it to tell you when to air filter needs to be replaced.

3: Insulate your home

A poorly insulated home plays a major role in retaining energy in your home. Insulation is designed to keep heat out during the summer and keep heat in during the winter.  You should consider insulation installation in your attic, walls, floors, basement, and crawlspace. These are the main areas where proper insulation will be beneficial.

Consider having a home energy auditor come to inspect your home to locate the areas that need additional insulation.

4: Weatherize your home

You’ll need to visually inspect both the inside and outside of your home to look for areas where air could be getting into your home. You’d be surprised how much air is lost through vents, windows, and doors because of worn-out weatherstripping, cracks, and gaps. Even small cracks or openings can cause lots of energy to be lost and make it harder to control the temperature to a comfortable level.

Replacing weather stripping, sealing, and filling the gaps around windows, doors, plumbing, and ducts will improve your energy savings. You’ll want to check the attic and light fixtures as well.

5: Unplug things that you’re not using

Leaving those small kitchen appliances plugged in is actually costing you money. There is still energy going through these appliances as well as your computer and chargers. So when you’re done using your computer, toaster oven, blender, and coffee machine, you should get into the habit of unplugging them.

For some appliances like your refrigerator, washing machine, or dryer it isn’t practical to unplug them between uses so don’t get that much plug paranoia. Instead find ways to make these machines work better, or fewer hours. For example you could sun dry your delicate clothes to run your dryer less or use tricks like a dryer ball in order to get your clothes moisture free quicker which means less run time on the machine!

6: Tune Up Your HVAC System

Regular maintenance of your HVAC system will not only help you to keep the cost of repairs low and prolong the life of your unit, but it will ensure that your heating and cooling are running efficiently. Keeping it at peak performance helps you to continue to save on your energy bill.

We all want to save money, and these are just some of the simple do-it-yourself ways to reduce the amount of energy that your home is losing. We tend to believe that the only way to improve our home’s energy efficiency is by purchasing all new energy-efficient appliances, windows, and doors. Oftentimes it’s the little things that you can do that make the most significant differences.

Saving money on your energy bills can often make the difference between which bills you can pay off this month and which ones you cannot. Learning how to budget your bills to keep costs down is essential.

Tips on choosing the right contractor to renovate your home in Australia

By Leave a Comment

When your house starts feeling dated and sort of drab, you don’t need to look for another place to live. You want a good contractor to renovate your home – top to bottom. A good professional can create miracles and the only problem is how to find the right one. Here’s all you need to know about choosing the right contractor.

  • Make a plan

Maybe top to bottom is not really necessary, maybe it’s just the kitchen and dining area. You need to decide what is the extent of the renovations your house needs. Write down all the work you’d like done so you’ll know exactly what to tell the contractor.

  • Make a list of contractors in your area

The first thing you’ll want to do is google the home contractors in your area. Check out their websites, look at ratings and customer google reviews and write down the ones that seem OK to you. Check out their Before/After galleries.

Also, it’s always good to ask around, talk with friends, family or neighbors and see if they can recommend somebody they’ve worked with and add them to your list.

  • Ask for quotes

Contact all the contractors on your list. Explain the kind of work you have in mind and ask for an estimate. Don’t be surprised if their estimates fall in the same range, but be wary of those who go over the top or make a really low offer. You can also ask for a time estimate since such projects typically turn your life upside down. You don’t want to live on a construction site for the next six months!

  • Interview the selected contractors

Next step is to ask to meet the contractors on your shortlist. Have them come by the house and talk to them about your requirements. Listen carefully to their solutions. You want somebody who sounds competent and comes up with easy solutions. Something that sounds overly complicated will probably end up costing a lot and might turn out quite unnecessary.

  • Ask for references

Besides checking their online reviews, ask to talk to former clients. See if they were satisfied and ask if the work was delivered within the agreed time frame. Most important ask if the contractor stayed within the initial budget or did they keep making demands for more money.

  • Ask for a criminal background check

If these people are going to be in your house for a long time, they’ll also have access to your valuables. It’s always smart to ask for a background check. Ask the business owners if they run background checks on their employees. You don’t have to be ashamed to ask such a thing. These guys will be in your house and around your kids for weeks if not months. You don’t want dangerous people in your house.

If they cannot provide police checks for their employees, suggest using an online character check agency that sends you back the results in a couple of days. It won’t inconvenience them in any way since everything is done online, applying for a background check only takes a few minutes and you can do it over the phone even. It’s easy and it gives you peace of mind. These days, criminal record checks are relatively easy to obtain. In states like New South Wales, you can apply online. It is also important to note that police checks do come with a small cost involved and even in places like NSW (e.g. Sydney) whilst you can get a police check in NSW online, you cannot get a police check online in NSW for free which is a common misconception when people request police character checks. There is no such thing as a free check as you will see from the official website link given here. They normally cost around $48 AUD or so so keep the cost in mind.

Now that you’ve made up your mind, make sure to read the contract carefully, including the fine print. The devil is in the details, you know that. Good luck with your project!