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Free books from the government

Monday, June 2nd, 2008

J.D. over at getrichslowly.org just posted an interesting article about the Federal Citizen Information Center. Remember those commercials on TV that tell you to order information by writing to Pueblo, Colorado? Well, I never paid much attention to those commercials, but J.D.’s post makes me think that maybe I should be paying a little more attention.

There are cheap/free books on pretty much every subject that you can think of. Some booklets cost $1.00, but most, if not all are available free in PDF form. There are booklets on buying a car, investing, planning for retirement, small business and many, many more. J.D. specifically recommends the 2008 Consumer Action Handbook which is “a 174-page guide to becoming a savvy consumer”.

I plan to take some time over the next couple of days to see what they have to offer. If I see anything particularly interesting, I’ll let you know. Post in the comments if you see find anything useful.

If you like, or can at least stand to read what I write, make sure you add my RSS Feed to your list so you don’t miss a single post. If you have no idea what I’m talking about, read this.

Saving Money To Invest

Friday, May 30th, 2008

I don’t want this website to be about deals and freebies, but occasionally if I discover a great way to save money, I may still pass it along. After all, the more money you save, the more you have to invest.

Recently, I added quite a few blogs to my RSS reader related to saving money. This includes being frugal, getting free samples, clipping coupons, taking advantage of promotions, etc. Some of the sites that I now read daily, include Frugal Dad, Money Saving Mom, and More Than Enough.

I want to point out one specific thing that I have been taking advantage of recently. If you have 30 minutes each week, you can get a pretty good deal, each and every week. Generally, you can get many of the things that you buy anyway for free or almost free if you pay attention. For example, I doubt if I will ever pay for toothpaste, deodorant, or soap again. I’m talking about deals at CVS. I’ve heard that you can do similar things at Walgreens, but one stop is enough for me. I can generally walk away with about $20 worth of stuff with no money out of my pocket. Sometimes you can get items free and also bring along a coupon to get a little extra money to apply to another product that you might need.

One of the blogs, I mentioned (Money Saving Mom), has a great primer on how to work the CVS machine. Check it out here. If you have any questions, be sure to comment and I will answer as best as possible.

Also, here is a tip. Since we’re talking about getting things essentially free, you can imagine that sometimes the stores run out of these products quickly. I hate taking the time to plan a shopping trip specifically to pick up a few items and then show up to find them out of stock. Generally I wake up at about 7 AM on Sunday mornings when the family is still in bed. I get the paper off of the driveway, check the ads, clip coupons and then head to CVS when they open at 8 AM. Since I’m generally one of the first customers in the door, I rarely have a problem finding the deals I’m looking for.

If you like, or can at least stand to read what I write, make sure you add my RSS Feed to your list so you don’t miss a single post. If you have no idea what I’m talking about, read this.