Weekend saving results

Newest savings results:

A carefully planned trip to the grocery store resulted in savings of $52.73. We also both took our lunches on Monday for another $12. Finally, much to his chargrin, but my oldest son did get his haircut at home saving us $18. No worries, we have been doing that for awhile so the end result was a good one.

So from the weekend, I was able to transfer over another $82.73

GRAND TOTAL: $165.97

I do have to say that it's pretty shocking how quickly it's adding up. Just two weeks in. Wow.

Extra savings on Old Navy Groupon using cash back shopping

Old Navy is offering a nationwide Groupon today where you can get $20 of merchandise for $10. Ah yes, my go to place for pants that my kids will inevitably blow through the knees of...

But here is what I did to save even more. I started off by going to MrRebates which is one of my favorite cash back shopping sites. Today they have a special deal where they are offering 8 percent cash back on Groupons purchased through their link.

End result? In addition to getting $20 for only $10 at Groupon you will also earn 8 percent cash back on the $10 you spend (another 80 cents). 

GRAND TOTAL: $10.80

OVERALL SAVINGS SINCE STARTING: $83.24

In case you want to take advantage of this, too, here's the step by step process.

1. If you haven't signed up for Groupon yet, you will want to do that first.

2. Head over to MrRebates. Sign up is free and takes about 15 seconds.

3. Then once you are signed up, click on the left hand search box and type in "Groupon."

4. A link to Groupon will show up. Click through that link and you will earn 8 percent cash back on your purchases.

End result? In addition to getting $20 for only $10 at Groupon you will also earn 8 percent cash back on the $10 you spend (another 80 cents).

BOGO, Crowd Cut and Cash Back Savings Results

So I’m coming up on a week of this new savings experiment. Over the past few days, there have been some good savings wins.

Buy Two Get One Free

This week Ulta is offering a deal on certain products where you can buy two and get one free. My hair product is one of the things included. I did a quick cross checking on price and found it was a good deal. In addition, they had a coupon in their circular for 20 percent off any one product, and, I bought in Iowa while we were visiting family, saving a bit on sales tax, too.

Results:

-$14.00 (free product)

-$2.80 (20 percent off one)

- $.43 in tax I would have spent if I’d bought them at home

Total saved: $17.23         

Crowd Cut

Our local swimming pool was offering a deal where you could get five passes to the water park along with treats for $11. Now normally we skip the treats when we’re there, but passes for our family are usually $17. I bought two of the packages (and will consider the treats an added bonus).

Total saved: $12.00

Additional Tax Savings

Seems a silly thing, but as I mentioned earlier, we happened to be traveling over the weekend, by car, to a state with lower sales taxes than ours. So I stocked up on some things that were on sale at Target while I was there.

Tax savings: $1.68

Cash Back Savings

I had been needing some new go-to weekend casual summer dresses and the ones I had my eye on at Target were on sale last week.So I ordered four of them in four colors. I took advantage of the sale price and also ordered them online through cash back shopping site MrRebates which was offering 4 percent cash back.

Sale savings:       -$8.70

MrRebates Cash Back:   -$2.05

Total Savings:    $10.75


GRAND TOTAL: $41.66

OVERALL SAVINGS SINCE STARTING: $72.44

*Disclosure.

May 23, 2011 Results

Yesterday I began the saving my savings project. I started it off by heading to the bank and opening up a second savings account linked to my regular accounts. Each day I will transfer money over that we have effectively saved.

One of the areas that we haven't done well lately is in eating out over lunches. So both of us packed our own lunches and for that I credited $12. In addition, I got my newspaper bill for the next six months. We had been getting both Saturday and Sunday but never seemed to look at the Saturday paper. I wanted to keep my Sunday subscription for the coupons. I called and asked them if we could opt out of Saturday. Doing that saved $13.78.

Finally, I closed out the day selling one of my kid's old fall coats on Craigslist for $5.

Total transferred over to savings: $30.78

Getting Started

It all started when I found our dream house. You know the one. It had everything we wanted. The neighborhood. The size. The bedrooms. The layout. The lot. Everything.

And it also had a price tag that was easily $100,000 more than we could afford.

But it got me thinking about an idea.

I am pretty good about saving money. I clip coupons, nothing extreme, but I clip them. I send in money for refunds. I use cash back shopping sites.

So I am already saving money. But what if instead of saving money we actually saved money?

What if every time I went to the store and the receipt showed how much I had saved...what if I then put the amount into savings?

What if every time I brought a lunch to work I paid myself back what I would have spent?

What if I didn't just "save" money, but what if I actually saved it?

I'm not kidding myself. I won't magically find $100,000. This dream house will have to pass.

But I am going to try this little financial experiment all the same.

I will kick it off by opening a savings account today just for this purpose. Then I will document the journey, strategies, and things I learn on this blog.

Let's see where it goes...