Let’s start out by seeing if we can all agree on the following:
1) Tickets to Disney World are not exactly cheap.
2) The more days that you add to your ticket, the more you’ll pay (total cost, that is)
3) There are only so many park hours to see what your family wants to see (per day).
4) The more time that you spend waiting in line for each attraction the fewer attractions that you will be able to visit each day.
Assuming that we can all agree on the four points (above), let’s take a look at some ways get more for each dollar that you spend for Disney World tickets.
e. Write High Demand” next to each attraction that you identified (above). These are the attractions that are most likely to have long lines.
6) Ok, now that reality is starting to set in, now is a good time to map out attractions that are close to each other. Take a look at the Disney World maps page http://disneyworld.disney.go.com/maps/
7) Now figure out where and when you are going to eat at the park. Of course fast food options will not only save you money, but they will save you precious time as well.
While on vacation
1) Plan to try to arrive at the park gate at least 20 minutes before they open.
2) If you have an internet capable mobile phone, check the wait time for each attraction using this web site http://m.disneyworld.go.com/ to get an idea of which of the attractions within each park are “High Demand”, “Moderate” and high demand.
3) Be flexible and ready to reprioritize which attractions to visit.
4) Make use of Disney FASTPASSwhich allows guests to make ‘reservations’ for a popular ride to avoid
waiting in long lines.
If you’re a down hill maniac (ski or snowboarder you might want to consider purchasing a season pass (if you plan on skiing at least 20 times at the same location during a season).
Buying books of lift tickets early in the season (before you hit the resort) may save you 50%?
Check out the ski packages being offered by the resorts where you plan to ski or snow board. If you plan on renting equipment, taking lessons and/or staying at their lodge, it might be cheaper to purchase a package deal. Just like at Disney World, multi-day tickets can save you money if you plan ahead.
Always inquire ahead of time to see if the resort offers discount tickets for seniors, students and/or kids.
Checkout the continuously updated ski and snowboarding deals on http://www.Snowbomb.com discount coupons.
Keep an eye out for lift ticket discounts at gas stations (e.g. Shell)
It is not uncommon to find lift ticket discount deals at participating Mc Donald’s restaurants.
Grocery and drug stores can also be great sources of cheap lift tickets.
Give the resorts in the area that you want to visit a call ahead of time and ask them if they are offering any ski or snow boarding deals online and/or through business or restaurant establishments.
Ask your fellow snow craving friends as well as local sporting goods stores if they know of any good deals.
As with most of the savings tips we provide on our web site, you should several of the ideas that we list to ensure that you are receiving the rock bottom lowest price on your ski vacation.
>> To find more FREE and Cheap Stuff check out categories to the right of your page or just use our search box at the upper part of the screen.
Every month brings new opportunities for saving money. In March these are the items that you want to look for to be priced to sell. Patience and timing are two powerful tools for ensuring that you get the best deal on your purchases.
Your daily trip to the coffee shop could be costing you around $4 per day. Over 12 months, this could easily add up to $1500 out of your pocket. Compare that to the cost of brewing your Java at home which amounts to only a few cents per day and decide for yourself.
Here are a few simple steps that you can take to duplicate the quality that you’ve been pay big bucks for.
Get a screw on water filter from target or walmart and only use filtered water when making your coffee.
Pick up quality coffee from Target, Walmart or even Costco. Freshly grinding your coffee beans at home will somewhat improve the flavor of the coffee. So, consider this step if you have the time and patience.
Pour the coffee into a well insulated stainless steel (inside and out) commuter mug to keep it warm and your ready to hit the road with one less stop to make on the way to work.
To take advantage of more of our secret money saving tips, be sure to explore the categories listed on the right hand side of the page or use our friendly search box located in the upper right hand side of this screen.
Thinking back over the years, it’s really hard to believe how much food prices have increased at grocery stores over the years.According to my relatives that lived through the great depression, food prices were affordable to most people of modest means. Well, I’m not sure the same thing can be said these days.Since food is becoming a larger part of the American family budget, we thought that we would throw out a few of our favorite ways to save at your local grocery store. So, here is the game plan that we came up with.
Shop with a detailed list of only what you need to purchase.
Larger sized packaging marked as “value buy” may not actually being saving you any money. In fact, it may end up costing you more per unit.
Keep a running list of prices that you prices that you spot at different stores and either try to map out a sensible route and schedule or see if some of the stores closer to you will price match (e.g. Wal Mart)
Always verify at the register that you received the posted sale (or club card) price. Double check your receipt before you leave the store.
Consider getting take out from the grocery store deli instead of a pricey restaurant. This simple tip could save you both cash and time.
Create and stick to a weekly family meal plan. Make sure to take a good look at the fridge as well as your kitchen cabinets before making you list for the week.
Keep a “to buy” list on a piece of paper in an easy to find place in your kitchen and update it frequently as you start consuming food items.
Plan out your tips to various store in a way that will minimize your time and mileage on your vehicle.
Make sure to check the per unit price on items (vs. just the shelf price).
Always ask for rain checks when a store is out of an item on sale.
Disney theme Parks can be really expensive since discounts are few and far between.
However we’ve come up with a few tips that can help you save some money on your trip.
Plan to visit Disney theme Parks on off peak dates. You will save both time and money. The parks are less crowded and hotel prices and are cheaper during off peak times (avoid holidays, spring break and the summer months).
Plan to arrive early and leave late so that you can get in as many exhibits as possible.
Food is expensive in the parks and since you are permitted to bring your own food and drinks inside, you may want a pack a backpack ahead of time with sandwiches snacks and a few bottles of water. We’ve been told that Disney will provide guest with a cup of ice and water free of charge whenever you ask for it at one of the fast food restaurants counters (but you may want to verify this before your trip). The cheapest food option in the parks are probably the fruit carts located around the park. Not only will the fruit cost you less than fast food it’s healthier too.
If you plan to stay several days at Disney World you might save money by booking a Disney vacation package where you stay at one of the resort hotels located within the park. Resort guests also enjoy extended park hours. On the flip side, your dining choices will be limited to the pricey dining establishments that Disney provides. These options can be expensive and could tally up to a sizeable portion of your total vacation costs. One way to get around this is to purchase a Disney meal plan. But be sure you use care when selecting the plan so that you use all of the benefits that you paid for (since unused meal services will not be refunded to you).
Written on February 2nd, 2010 by l2cadminno shouts
Similar to the shocking cost of your popcorn at your local movie theater, the price tags on college text books also come as an unwelcome added expense to college students (and their parents).
OK, it may be more convenient to snag your text books from the on the college book store, but like the popcorn, you’ll end up paying dearly for it. Instead check out these simple alternative options.
Cross the street – Closely located off-campus book stores stay in business by beating the prices being charged on campus.
Plan ahead and surf the savings – Try to obtain your upcoming course requirements and surf the web to find lower prices. Check out Bestbookbuys.com . It’s a great eMarketPlace site that allows people to do one stop shopping through tons of different stores. . Note: It is always easier if you have the ISBN number handy for searching. Make sure to pay attention to the price as well as the additional shipping charges and shop total price, not just list price.
Go digital and save – Look around for cheaper digital versions of text books (e.g. ebooks, PDF’s, kindle books from amazon.com, etc)
Free is a good price – Check with the college and/or public libraries to see if you can check out the books you’ll need.
Previously owned – Check out the prices of used or earlier editions of the textbook.
Written on October 20th, 2009 by l2cadminno shouts
Learn secrets to how to finding the best PC printers for a lower overall cost. LeapToCheap.com will walk you through several important considerations to think about before you shell out your hard earned money.
Written on October 12th, 2009 by l2cadminno shouts
Today’s Fly and Dive Economy. Where will the next random walk take us?
Let us first take a moment to reflect on the recent journey that our stock market has taken (over the last 5 years).
Click HERE to view a chart of the S & P 500 for the last 5 years.
The phrase that keeps rattling around in my brain is a phrase that a Finance Professor once shared with the class.
“The market shall take a random walk”. I try to keep that in the back of my mind whenever I make financial
decisions.
As a typical middle class family, we probably have some of the concerns that your family does. So, here is the short list of what we’ve been pondering lately.
I have a 401K or a 403B retirement account at work, but what if I know little or nothing about the stock market. Whom shall I trust?
Our opinion is that nobody is going to watch our money like we will. So we started spending time studying what we could on our own. We found tons of free tools on the internet to help us figure out what to do. One of the web sites that started with was finance.yahoo.com. As we began to educate ourselves, we tried to stick to web sites that weren’t trying to sell us financial products or services.
We also took time to seek out a flat fee certified financial planner. We typically visit a planner once a year to review our investments and only pay him or her a flat per visit fee. Fair warning, it’s not going to
easy to find a good financial planner that is will to go this route. In our experience most of financial planners we spoke with preferred to be paid a commission on the funds they recommend or be paid a percentage of the value of the portfolio. After quite a bit of searching, we financially located the
planner that we had been looking for.
What’s going to happen next in the stock market and what can I do to protect myself and my family?
We try to stay away from any financial expert that claims to know what’s going to happen in the next few months (or years). It’s that random walk thing that will never be out guessed. So, we try to plan as if we don’t know either.
We figure that it all comes down to a few basic considerations:
How much risk are we really willing to take?
How many years do we have until retirement (assuming that anyone will be able to afford retirement)?
Do we have our money spread around in enough different types of solid investments to protect us from an all or nothing financial scenario?
How often should we monitor the performance of our investments?
Should we set an exit strategy (how much of a market drop in a specified period of time are we willing to stomach before we liquidate our investment)?
If we liquidate, how much of an opportunity loss are we willing to endure because we’re unable to figure out when the right time to get back in is?
If we liquidate, are we willing to pay capital gains on our taxable accounts?
Can we count on the federal government to get us out of this mess?
We figure that the best the government can do is to delay what is going to happen.
We believe that fundamental life principals never change. Here are a few that we could identify:
Greed and a myopic view of money will always end badly (for people, the market, countries and the world).
If we (people, companies, governments, etc) keep spending more money than we have or can afford, this too will lead us into a crushing realization of what’s really important in life.
If we care more about money than we do about others, we’ve already failed.
The problem with buying more stuff than we need is that non of that stuff ends up give us the long lasting happiness that most people are looking for.
One simple idea to help your child to put money into a healthy perspective is to:
Ask your kids to close one eye and hold a quarter a few inches in front of their eye.
Now ask them what they can see out of that eye.
Next ask them to hold the quarter as far away from their opened eye as possible (still holding it level with the single open eye).
Next, ask them what they could see when the quarter was close (the typical answer is just the quarter).
Now ask them what they could see when the quarter was held farther away from their eye (the typical response is that they can see both the quarter and all the other things in front of them).
So, as you guessed, this object lesson is intended to communicate that if all you pursue in life is accumulating money and wealth, that will block out everything else in your life. However, if you keep money in a proper perspective, you will enjoy a more balanced life.
Here are some great ways to teach you kids about money
When your kids are young, consider setting up a weekly allowance for them. There are several considerations that you may want to think out before offering the allowance. For example:
Do you want the allowance to just be automatic, no strings attached?
Do you want to the allowance to be tied to work that they do around the house?
Are you willing to consider paying your kids a little extra when they choose the save some of their allowance (paying interest on savings)? Likewise, are you willing to charge them a little extra money when they ask for an advance on their allowance?
Do you want to encourage (or require) your kids to set aside some money to share (with those less fortunate than them)?
Ask your kids where they think money comes from.
Ask your kids if they think it is a good idea to save money (and why)?
Sit down with them and try out this “what if “calculator to show your kids how fast money grows when invested (the lesson of compounding).
The follow is an interview with a six year old child regarding their views about money. You may be surprised by the responses. Try asking similar questions to your children and you may be surprised as well:
(Q) What is money?
It’s tender. A dollar and coins.
(Q) What do you do with money?
Spend it save or share it.
(Q) What happens when you only have a little bit of money?
You could end up with no money if you keep spending.
(Q) What can happen when you have way more money than you need?
You can get greedy or rich.
(Q) How do people get money?
They work at work. If you’re like a kid you can have an allowance.
(Q)What’s an allowance?
Money that you can either save or spend.
(Q) Can you be happy with just a little money?
Well, kinda, well if you save or spend?
(Q) What do you do with the money you share?
At church we have like this little bank. We put money it and give it to people that need it.
Many people don’t realize how much money they can save by using coupons from the newspaper, web, direct mail, etc. Here are some of the ideas that we tried out recently.
Ask yourself if the product associated with the coupon is something that you really need. Sifting out the coupons that don’t make sense for you and your family is a good way to control spending.
Start a coupon trading club with your friends and co-workers. This is a win win strategy that may allow you to double dip on the savings.
Sort your coupons by:
Expiration date (earliest to latest expiration date)
By major categories (e.g. food, dinning, clothing, crafts, entertainment, travel)
Check store ads and clearance racks to see if you can combine a sale with your coupons.
Try keeping the coupons with you whenever you leave the house. So, if for example, you or your family decides to dine out, you can consider the coupon savings opportunities before deciding where to dine.
If the store is out of stock of the item(s) that match up with your coupons, ask the store manager if you can get a rain check on the coupon.
When you look at TV, radio and print ads, there are several little understood marketing tricks that are used to get people to pay more than they need to. Here are just a few of the popular tricks:
Advertising products as FREE or at ridiculously low priced and making good money by:
Charging jacked up Shipping and Handling (or Processing) charges to customers.
Offering a return policy with required jacked up return shipping and handling charges.
The old “Priced as Low As” trick:
When you think hard about this, it becomes crystal clear what they are really saying. We translate it as something like “We may sell you item(s) no cheaper than this price”. Hey, what does that really mean anyway? Most folks don’t think to hard about it and assume that they are selling stuff at fantastic prices. As you can image, this is often not the case. Maybe we should ask them to advertise using this phrase “Priced as HIGH as…”. Hmm, that probably would not sell as good.
The old, if it’s sold at auction, it must be cheaper trick:
In reality auctions can bring out the competitive nature in people. Some people need to win at any cost. Since most auctions have a fixed minimum price set before the auction start, the seller is protected and may make more profit in less time using this approach.
So, you really need to do your homework before putting that bid out there on ebay. Make sure you know what the item is really worth before you bid.
The “If we call it a Factory Outlet store, people will assume that the prices are less than the mall” trick:
In reality, you may actually pay less at the mall if you catch a good sale. Also, don’t be surprised if you end up paying the same prices than you can find at the mall.
When you think about it, it is brilliant to setup factory outlet stores (that have less overhead cost than being in expensive mall space) and pricing them at the same or higher prices. Also, many outlet shops are closer to upscale residential neighborhoods. Someone really thought this one out.
Of course you may be able to find lower prices at the outlet stores at times. Our point is, don’t assume that outlet store prices are cheaper before doing your homework first.
These days if you work at it you can actually eat for substantially less that you thought. We have identified several ideas to help you get started.
Coupons can be a great way to save on food at restaurants. However, it is important that know which ones are really a good deal. Here are some tips.
Do the math first – Calculate your saving ahead of time. For example, if the coupon is a buy one sandwich get one free deal when you purchase one fountain drink, make sure to check the price of the required fountain drink. Add the regular price of the sandwich and the fountain drink price. Next, subtract the price of the regular price of two sandwiches and there is your saving. Some establishments have been cleverly raising prices and marketing coupons.
The fine print – Make sure to check the expiration date and other requirements to redeem the coupon.
Saving $ off of what? – Some establishments will jack up their prices and then offer awesome discounts off inflated prices.
Money saving strategies for dinning out for less
Fast Food
Stick to the real deal -Lately they have been offering great deals (e.g. value meals). Remember, that the restaurants are probably barely breaking even on their cheap deals. So, they hope to make money on the higher priced extras like fries, soda and deserts. Lately McDonalds figured out that they can make a decent profit by selling fancy coffees similar to what the expensive coffee chains offer, but for less.
Home base for saving – Save big by skipping the fries and snagging the soda at home.
Double up on that 99 cent burger, sandwich, baked potatoe (wendy), salad, etc and make a meal out that. Skip the fries and soda and your eating cheap.
Sit down restaurants
Predictable prices – Stick with restaurants that have standard pricing any time of the day (as opposed to place that jack up their prices for dinner). One example is Chili’s bar and grill.
Two meals for the price of one - Many restaurant serve larger portions that people could (or should) eat in one sitting. Instead, eat half and take the doggie bag home or to work and enjoy another meal.
Adults eating childish - Some people suggest that you order off the lower priced kids menu to save money. I might try that on a to go order, but I don’t think I would have the guts to order that kind of meal when dinning in the restaurant.
Being fair - If you choose to eat inside a sit down restaurant, don’t skip the tip. Waiters work hard and they should be treated fairly. If you’re not into tipping, order take out instead.
Take out at the buffet
Several restaurants will allow you to do take out from the buffet.
Typically, the rule is that you can take out what you can fit in their take out container (typically a decent size).
The price for this may not seem cheap, but don’t be surprised if you get at least two meals out that take out container if you packed it up to capacity
This allows you save on those expensive beverages by getting them at home or out the reasonably priced vending machine at the office.
Also, since a waiter is not involved, there is no need to tip.
Time is Money at Disney World
10 Quick Tips to finding Cheap Lift Tickets
Every month brings new opportunities for saving money. In March these are the items that you want to look for to be priced to sell. Patience and timing are two powerful tools for ensuring that you get the best deal on your purchases.
Some food for thought…….
Similar to the shocking cost of your popcorn at your local movie theater, the price tags on college text books also come as an unwelcome added expense to college students (and their parents).
Keeping money in perspective.
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