Twenty Something Sense

This is not a gimmick, I promise.  In fact the title is only deceiving in that it is most likely understating your savings potential.  Author of “I Will Teach You To Be Rich,” Ramit Sethi, has come up with an outstanding program geared to save you real dollars not petty nickles and dimes.

The Scrooge Strategy is where Ramit shares his best savings tips that he guarantees will save you money on a weekly basis.  Its a simple subscription service that will allow you to continuously have fresh ideas on how to save big bucks that can be used to save for your future or to put towards that upcoming vacation.

I personally reviewed several of The Scrooge Strategy tips and they are extremely solid.  The tips range from easy to follow strategies on saving to in-depth ideas on how to save hundreds on your auto insurance every year.  These ideas are not one-off savings that will land you an extra $.50, but are instead aimed at truly effecting your finances by saving you hundreds if not thousands of dollars each month.

With that, here is a detailed description about the program and some great examples straight from the source:

The Scrooge Strategy is a subscription service for one savings tip per week. That’s it — it’s very simple. It’s one tip per week that you promise to commit to use and implement. I guarantee that if you join The Scrooge Strategy, you’ll save more than the cost of the program — every month.

There’s literally no risk. If you know me from my blog, you know I focus on the Big Wins — the savings tips that will save you hundreds or thousands of dollars per year. I have no interest in debating how to save money on toothpaste or grains of rice. Those people can get a life.

But I LOVE showing you how to negotiate with banks, or find ways to get custom shirts made for 60% off, or show you how I set up automated savings accounts to plan for my wedding (I’m not even engaged), my down payment, and my vacation this year.

This isn’t just about small savings here or there. Because most people spend such a large amount over 12 months, if you identify the problem areas and change your spending, you can get massive savings over the next 12 months. For example, if you save $40 per month on your cable, that’s $480 per year. If you cut $150 per month off your food bill, that’s $1,800 year. And if you earn $200 more per month (yes, it can be done easily), that’s $2,400 per year. Those tips alone are worth $4,680 per year.

You’ll realize that many of these tips are do-once-save-forever tips: If you can optimize your energy spending, or your cellphone bill, or even save money on your basic cable, you’ll get those savings for the rest of your life.

The Scrooge Strategy is about ultra-specific tips with tactical assistance to make them useful for you. You might have heard the “set up an emergency fund” advice. Nice, but useless. I’ll show you how to do it: How to connect your accounts together, how much to save, how to set up an automatic transfer each month, and how to set milestones in your calendar so you know when to stop saving for your emergency fund.

That level of specificity is the difference between taking action and doing nothing. For example, when I wrote about negotiating car insurance, here’s what I included:

I made it easy for you.

Here are the phone numbers of the big insurers:

Geico: 1-800-861-8380
AAA: (866) 539-8033
Allstate: 866 704 9900
Progressive: 1-800-776-4737
State Farm: Sorry, despite getting good ratings in the comments below, THEY OFFER NO PHONE NUMBER. Anyway, you can get to their auto insurance site here.
21st Century Insurance: Don’t use this worthless insurance company. I used to use them, but they sent me multiple envelopes in the mail EVERY SINGLE WEEK until I finally canceled them. The rates were great, but the hassle wasn’t worth it.

Be an expert caller by asking these questions
With each call, you should say, “AAA (or whoever) is offering to insure me for $XXX less” (silence). See what they do. (Note: Getting lower rates using this technique is much harder to do with car insurance companies than banks, so don’t expect very much from this.)

How much would I save if I insure my car and house with you?

What about renewal discounts? How long have I been a member with you? What can you offer me as a discount for long-term membership?

Can I save money by pre-paying my entire year up front?

Let’s check my car. I know other firms offer discounts for features like anti-lock breaks. What about you?

What kind of low-mileage discounts do you offer?

If I enrolled in a defensive-driving course, what kind of discount would you offer? Oh, really? Which courses qualify?

What about discounts for my employer? (Tell them the specific name of your employer?)

Some insurance companies offer discounts for low-risk occupations (engineers). What kind of competitive rates do you offer?

Am I paying for roadside assistance? What other additional “benefits” am I paying for? (If you already pay for AAA, you don’t need roadside assistance through your car insurance. Also, check your credit card: They may offer roadside assistance (but call them and ask how much it really costs if you have to use it — some of their offers for “roadside assistance” really mean “we will assist you by calling someone for you and then charging you out the ass”).

Can you walk me through the deductible changes I could make to save money? (Deductibles are what you pay before your insurance policy kicks in. By requesting higher deductibles, you can lower your costs substantially. For example, increasing your deductible from $200 to $500 could reduce your collision and comprehensive coverage cost by 15 to 30 percent. Going to a $1,000 deductible can save you more than 40%. Before choosing a higher deductible, be sure you have enough money set aside to pay it if you have a claim. More details

AAA, Costco, credit cards, large employers, associations (AARP, teachers’ union): Many of these offer discounts on car insurance. Log onto their website and browse to “perks.”

After reading those tips, one reader left me this comment: “I would have never have gotten off my butt and made this call if you hadn’t removed the barrier and provided the phone numbers for us. THANK YOU. Total Savings: $360/year by this tip alone.” Don’t just take my word for it. Let’s see how much other people saved with my tips.

For more information or to sign-up, go to The Scrroge Strategy webiste.