NYT is gone too.
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NYT is gone too.
Wow, you are really going!
my public library supports reading in New York times website, or their ap. You get a choice.Quote:
Originally Posted by Tradd
You get a three day pass to read the New York Times. Then it expires. Then you have to renew for another 3 day pass.
I just was going to suggest the same. Our library has the NY Times, the Wall Street Journal, the Marin Independent, the San Francisco Chronicle and numerous magazines. They don't carry WaPo though so I will keep subscribing to that.Quote:
Originally Posted by iris lilies
Oh! I will check that out then, thanks!Quote:
Originally Posted by iris lilies
I also found the leading candidate for my next car. Toyota Corolla Cross hybrid. The base model has AWD and Apple CarPlay and costs the same as a Crosstrek. I looked at a Cross on the lot tonight. Very nice. Amazing amount of cargo room. Definitely not ready to buy now, but helps to have a decision pretty much made.
The downside to this NY Times subscription thru the public library is that I now get 2+ emails from NYT every day. I suppose I can opt out of them. ? But still, a pain.Quote:
Originally Posted by Tradd
Every time my WaPo subscription is about to run out, I cancel it as well and they bring me back in at the $34 (or so) rate. I've done this for the past three years and its worked so far.
I just got a huge discount on my WSJ subscription when I tried to cancel online.Quote:
Originally Posted by SiouzQ.
So I’ve been digging into my local library’s website for digital content services that I might be able to get The Economist. Nothing that I could find, so I just emailed the library to ask. There’s an app called PressReader that I can get The NYT through, but it’s the actual digital newspaper, not stories on an app. I miss the NYT app.
I’m giving Apple News+ a try. $13/month. No Economist or NYT (you get a few articles of each), but I do get the Wall Street Journal and the Times of London. So alternative sources that may work. Tons of magazines and other newspapers, too. Very easy to cancel if I don’t like it.
It’s a news aggregator. Tons of different publications.
What my library said via email about the Economist when I asked.
“Libby lost The Economist to a competing product called PressReader. We have that service too. Unfortunately, PressReader didn't add the magazine to the package we are already paying for. We would have had to pay for The Economist separately, and they asked an exorbitant amount. We decided not to add it at that price. Sorry.
“It's frustrating, but the options for library access to online content are very limited. Providers can charge crazy rates, and libraries have to suck it up and pay it, or say no because there's nowhere else to go.”
NOTE: university libraries have the Economist, but if you are not a student, with a university email, you’re out of luck.
@TybeeQuote:
Originally Posted by Tybee
Did you find any subscriptions to cancel?
Hi--I did, thank you, a streaming subscription for Paramount, I think it was? Still need to do something about a weight loss program that is 59 dollars a month--either use it every day or drop it.
Acquired a new one, for the concierge doctor, so I have to cut back somewhere else.
My favorite YT frugal channel is Frugal Queen in France. I remember her blog from years ago. Anyway, I found she had a video on my question.
https://youtu.be/gSWHb2PHbkM
That house is so aspirational! I love that question, "How does this debt make me feel?"
That is how I feel about my mortgage.
I am definitely the anxious type she describes that cannot split my energy.
Is the weight loss program Noom?Quote:
Originally Posted by Tybee
No, I tried that one and it did not work for me. Also Weight Watchers. Or I did not work for them, maybe. Made me obsessed with thinking about food and I gained on both.
I agree! I watched the whole thing, minus the parts about children and pensions. I agree with Tybee, the question "how does debt make me feel" is key.Quote:
Originally Posted by Tybee
My issue is that the way it makes me feel and the way it makes DH feel are totally different. To try to get him to understand the impact debt is having on our quality of life (particularly mine, because I'm the one working to service it), I went onto Ramsey's free "EverydayDollar" site, where you can construct your budget in a very user-friendly way. I input the money we will be getting in in November, and I prefilled the fixed expenses for him, and I asked him to simply go in and fill in the discretionary expenses, matching the expenditures against the income.
Well, he came in whining that he in't understand it. "Why are things so hard?? What's wrong with paper and pencil??" I told him, of course paper and pencil are fine, but that means you have to constantly adjust manually which is a major pain. "I think we should do this together." he whined.
I specifically wanted him to take the first pass so that he couldn't "blame" me for restricting our spending. So HE could see that the incoming and outgoing aren't lining up. Especially as I am into my 70s, I'm darn lucky that I am still working, even though my income was down 40% this year.
I really want to channel Dave Ramsey right now, when he so cleverly dresses down clueless people. I want to tell DH to put on his big boy pants and grow up.
Anyway, mini-vent over--Tradd, thanks for that video. I'm going to check out other ones, and I'm going to ask DH to watch it. He might feel less threatened by this nice British woman than he would by a no-holds-barred Dave Ramsey.
Frugal Queen wrote that in her early days The Tightwad Gazette and Dave Ramsey were big influences.
oooo! Keep us informed and how much you like your new doctor. I called mine “a direct care physician “because that’s how she advertises her services. I pay a little less than $1000 a year. She expanded her practice and it covers a few towns now. The last few times I’ve been to the doctor office I see the nurse practitioner, but that’s fine with me, I’m not a very sophisticated user of healthcare services.Quote:
Originally Posted by Tybee
The last time I talked to her via email she said she was booked about a week out. That’s not very much in my mind. I can always get into see a nurse practitioner within a day or two.
have you heard of that commercial service that will cancel subscriptions for you? It’s advertised on Podcasts. Whenever I hear them, I think good Lord, do people have so many subscriptions you can’t track them?Quote:
Originally Posted by Tradd
I just canceled a streaming subscription to STARZ yesterday. I had signed up for it two days prior. There’s nothing in that channel that’s worth, watching other than the one production I signed up for.
I have two permanent streaming subscriptions, Prime and Netflix. Those are huge and provide tons of content. Those, plus an occasional dip into HBO Max or one of the British subscriptions works for me.
As for text subscriptions, I subscribe to National Review and I think I’m going to start up a subscription to the Free Press.
at the moment I have a subscription to the St. Louis Post-Dispatch that is free and will kick in a cost in about a month, but I’m not sure I’m gonna go with it. Still, I will say this for the STL PD: they apparently are not covering national news much at all and I think that’s where they should be, concentrating on regional news.
we also subscribe to our town’s weekly newspaper.
IL, if you were in a financial tight spot, would you be willing to get rid of all or most of the subscriptions to free up money? I was talking to a few friends at church yesterday about this. One guy said he would love to just slash this stuff, but the whining of the wife and kids would be relentless.Quote:
Originally Posted by iris lilies
I cancelled Apple News+. It was really nice, but I think I’ll just go back to getting my local news from the radio and everything else from BBC Radio or their website.
Of course. I didn’t START any of these subscriptions, with the exception of the local newspaper, until I had a couple million in the bank.Quote:
Originally Posted by Tradd
I can be black belt frugal when necessary.
I laugh about our cable-less life for decades. We never wired our former house for cable TV service because we did not use it, but I always worried about that for selling it. But by the time we sold it, cable tv service was outdated, there was no need for it.
we do have cable TV service in Hermann though, because the surrounding hills block any broadcast waves coming in. I do not watch it, but DH does.
Will do. Mine is what you called yours--she is also a "direct primary care physician." She does some procedures free such as knee injections. It is a hundred dollars a month. I have to call and make an appointment to discuss the results of all these tests I've had this year.Quote:
Originally Posted by iris lilies
Not to continue the hijack of Tradd's thread, but to folow-up on this earlier post, DH and I had a 2 hour budget meeting last night!! And we didn't have any fights. We did use the EveryDollar Dave Ramsey free budget program, because it's a lot more user-friendly than my YNAB program. We went through every category discussing it, and his takeaway was exactly what I hoped for--that we are spending beyond our means.Quote:
Originally Posted by catherine
I thanked him and hugged him and while I know there will be a fairly steep learning curve if we manage to continue collaborating on this, it's all good! We'll have a much better chance of digging ourselves out of the hole and working towards a reasonable retirement, financially-speaking.
And actually this does tie back to the OP because today I am going to work on getting rid of some subscriptions.
oh thank you for the report--just this morning I have been working on November in the Everydollar app and was thinking I would ask my husband to help me with my budgeting--I am just budgeting my money on there, not his income and not what he pays for4--but maybe he will get an idea of just how far money does not go these days--like I am paying 24% of my income on medical stuff.
I like the feature that gives you those percentages of what categories you are spending in.
I would NOT consider your posts a hijack of my thread! It’s good to hear from people in similar situations.Quote:
Originally Posted by catherine
Frugal Queen has another video on budgeting while you’re paying down debt. I write everything out yesterday, including things like car/renters insurance that aren’t paid monthly. I was sort of astonished at just how few things I have to pay. I did NOT include diving as that comes out of what is left over and for the next six months, the only diving expense would be gas to get there and air fills. Maybe once a month.
Payday today. Threw about another $1K at the debt. The amount is very low 5 figures.
I forgot to add:
Christmas is taken care of. $30 spent on a gift for my teenaged goddaughter. I’ll throw in a nice blank journal from my stash (she writes a lot). Christmas cards/stamps already done. They were budgeted for months ago. I am spending T’giving and a Christmas with goddaughter’s extended family. I will spend maybe $25 for each holiday on food I bring with me.
Wow, that's great planning Tradd. And congratulations so much on another 1k at the debt!!!!
Thank you! I want it done! I’ve sort of come down on the side of throwing as much as I can at the debt and not adding more to savings for the time being.Quote:
Originally Posted by Tybee
I decided WTH not to type this out.
This is my monthly bare bones budget:
$1000 rent
$50 electric (budget plan)
$50 house gas (budget plan)
$250 car gas
$300 groceries/household
$50 hair cut/brow wax
$97 internet
$55 mobile phone
$100 church donation
$130 massage (for sciatica)
$12 Apple Music
Annual
$1000 car insurance
$150 renters insurance
$200 diving insurance
$151 car registration
$300 gifts/Christmas
$50 oil change (every 5K miles)
My 2018 Escape is paid off. Internet is kind of high. Need to get into the Xfinity store to see what I can do about reducing cost. My complex only allows Xfinity for broadband internet. Mobile is the base cost for Xfinity Mobile as I only have one line (it’s just me). Anything for car (such as tires) is cash flowed. Same with diving. All the pricey diving stuff I’ve done the last couple of years has been paid for with cash.
$800/month into 401K.
So inspiring to see simple living in practice! I think you are doing great, Tradd! I can't see how you can do much reducing your basic expenses, and you're knocking off your debt really well, with enough money to save into your 401k and fund your diving passion!
Forgot the $12/month Apple Music!Quote:
Originally Posted by catherine
That's a great budget, Tradd. You are not wasting money, that is for sure! I am super impressed with your rent since I have an idea about where you are and what things cost from my years in the area.
I’ve been in the same place 15 years. It started at $800 in 2008 and just went to $1K last month. Landlord said it will stay at $1K for at least two years.Quote:
Originally Posted by Tybee
You provide the landlord with a stable, clean tenant who is not hard on the place. That is worth something to him.Quote:
Originally Posted by Tradd
Yep!Quote:
Originally Posted by iris lilies
Looks good, Tradd. Great to see you adding to both 401k and paying down the debt.
I’ll up 401K contribution once debt is paid off. I really should have it done sometime by the middle of next year. No trips for me, aside from going to FL at Christmas next year.