Coupons

In a day and time where families are trying to really stretch a dollar, coupons are becoming more and more important.  That being said, I ran across this great website Hip2Save a while back and have been able to really save a lot of money since using it.   They have done a great job aggregating coupons from multiple major stores and presenting them to their audience. You can grab the coupons from Hip2Save both on their site, their Facebook page, and I am pulling some of their coupons and placed them on my site.

So where do you find your coupons?  And more importantly, how much are you saving each week?

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Why pay full price, when there are so many websites now that are offering discounts on products and services that can be used for your local areas.  We get daily emails with local offers:

We have purchased several of these discounted items, such as House Cleanings, Oil Changes from Jiffy Lube, and several local restaurants. We have been able to save a lot of money by doing this. For our oil changes, we were able to save about $45, for the house cleaning we saved about $55 and for the restaurants, we have saved at least $100. When every dollar counts, keeping an eye out for good deals can really come in handy.

Take advantage of local offers whenever possible, because it not only saves you money, but it also helps local businesses.

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As many people start the 2012, New Years Resolutions are being made and most will be stopped by March, as mine have in years past. I hope that by publishing my resolutions, I can keep track of them easier and focus on them more. So here goes:

1) Spend more time with my boys
2) Save more money – both for the boys College but for the family & I am hoping that by cutting down on eating out, using more coupons and the boys switching from formula to milk in a few months, that this will be an achievable goal.
3) Exercise more – I would like to start doing 2 – 3 days a week of cardio, which should be doable since there is a 1 mile walking path at work.
4) Pay down debt – Pay down at least 3 credit cards and finish paying off 1 college loan for my wife.

So, as we start the new year, let’s hope that I am able to do better this year than in previous with my 2012 New Years Resolutions.

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Being the father of twins and being the one that looks at the checkbook on a daily basis, the added expense of twins took a toll on us financially. But we have taken some steps to help us save money each week:

1) Coupons – We actually subscribed to two weekend only newspapers for our area. The cost of these two papers were $60 for the year for the two papers. In the first month, between the two newspapers, we were able to use enough coupons to pay for the entire year. Our average weekly savings is about $35 a week at the grocery store.
2) Discount sites – We signed up for Living Social, Groupon, and local coupon websites and they too have been helpful. Whether purchasing oil changes, gift cards to consignment shops, etc, every little helps.
3) Loyalty Programs – For somethings we are not brand loyal, but then for somethings ,we are. One thing that we did was to immediately signup for Gerber and Pampers Rewards programs. We get coupons on a regular basis, which help with our weekly purchases of formula and diapers.
4) Friends, Family, Co-Workers – All of the above help us by bringing us coupons on a weekly basis. I’m not a fan of it takes a village philosophy, but with twins, it takes those closest to you to help.

We on average spend $50 a week on formula and another $10 – $20 on solid food for the twins, so every little bit helps.

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