Getting Finances Done

I’m constantly on the look out for products that will make life easier and save money. The following list of products not only makes life easier and can save you money, but they can also help the environment. I remember seeing a Wal-Mart video that mentions if everyone bought and used one energy-saving light bulb, there would be a huge reduction in energy use. One small change if made by enough people can make a huge difference.

1. Motion Activated Wall switch. I’m a big fan of motion activated sensors. I use them anyplace that we use light in short bursts and then forget to turn them off; in our garage; in our pantry; in our walk-in closet. I’ve been tempted to put them in the bathroom but it’s harder to gauge how long to set the shut-off timer. I’m so used to walking into these places and just having the lights turn on automatically that when I go to someone else’s house I think there’s something wrong when the light doesn’t turn on. You can set the lights to go on anywhere from a few seconds to several hours, depending on the switch. I don’t necessarily have a favorite brand. As far as I know, they all perform about the same. If anyone’s had a particularly good or bad experience with a brand or model, please leave your thoughts in the comments.

• Cooper Wiring Devices motion sensor wall switch - This is the one I use.
• Here are some other brands of motion sensor wall switches.
• There is also a version made by First Alert you can plug directly into a light bulb socket that would be great for a garage or basement.

2. Motion Activated Electrical Outlet. I’ve never used one of these but, as you know, I’m a big fan of motion sensors. I would use this for lamps, fans, heaters, radios, or even power strips connected to electronics.

• SensorPlug Motion Sensor Outlet by Andev

3. Motion-activated flood lights. Yes, another motion-activated product. We use these around the outside of our house; one on each side and two sets in the back. Not only are they great for conserving energy, they are also incredibly effective for burglary prevention. You couldn’t break into our house on any side without being in the spotlight.

• Here are several versions of outdoor motion sensor lights and floodlights.

4. Kill A Watt energy tracker. This device shows you how much energy other electronic devices use in kilowatt-hours. It can also monitor voltage, line frequency and power factors. I’m a little nervous getting one of these because I would spend too much time testing all our appliances. But that’s a good thing, right? By finding energy-guzzling appliances you can be more aware to use them conservatively or turn them off when not in use. A couple of common energy leaks are leaving electronics plugged in even when they’re not in use and leaving your computer turned on at night.

• Here is the “Kill A Watt” brand monitor.
• Here are monitors from several brands.

5. Renu-it battery charger. I go through a lot of batteries. My three-year-old boy loves trucks that make noises and take 4 C batteries. Add to that my extensive use of portable electronics and I go through batteries like crazy - AAs, AAAs, and Cs, you name it. I’ve used rechargeable batteries before but the cost of them is high and they wear out over time. The other problem is that batteries tend to disappear around my house and I don’t want expensive rechargeable batteries walking off.

Enter the Renu-it battery charger. It charges regular alkaline, titanium, and rechargeable batteries safely. It has built-in mechanisms to prevent overcharging, overheating, and short-circuits. I’ve never used this product but I love the idea. This is definitely on my shopping list.

• Sylvania Renu-it battery recharger.

6. Valve cap pressure indicators. Not all the products on this list are for electronic devices. These clever units replace the existing valve caps on your car tires and constantly show the tire’s pressure making it easy to know when to add a little air. According to the EPA, you can improve your car’s gas mileage by more than 3 percent simply by keeping its tires inflated to the proper pressure. In addition, keeping tires inflated properly can extend the life of your tires so you’re saving money in more than one way. Keeping your tires properly inflated is also safer since under-inflated tires are less responsive, particularly in the rain and snow. One word of warning: a few Amazon reviews indicated that some defective valve caps may cause the tires to leak slowly.

• Analog Tire Pressure Valve Caps.
• Electronic tire pressure valve caps that blink when your tires are low.

7. MagLite LED bulb-replacement kits. It’s now common knowledge that LED lights use a small portion of the energy of regular incandescent lights and last way longer. LED lights are increasingly common in flashlights, electronics, and are even available as replacements for household light bulbs. These clever kits allow you to replace the bulb in a Maglite flashlight with an LED or luxeon light bulb. Most people I know have a number of old Maglites lying around. Now they can be updated and brought into the 21st century at about half the price of a new Maglite.

• Conversion kit for AA Mini Maglites.
• Conversion kit for C and D cell Maglites.
• Conversion kit for 3C and 3D Maglites

8. Energy-saving light bulbs (LED or florescent). According to one Fast Company article compact fluorescent light bulbs emit the same light as classic incandescents but use 75% or 80% less electricity. Florescent bulbs are now commonly sold at major retailers. Another benefit is that the bulbs are supposed to last much longer, even for several years. Over the lifetime of the bulb you will easily save more money than you paid for the bulb.

We use florescent bulbs in several places in our house. I must admit I don’t like the light they produce as much as incandescent bulbs, but the right color lamp shade can remedy that for the most part. Less common (and much more expensive) are LED household light bulbs. There are currently LED bulbs available on the market but they are still too high priced for most consumers. I’m anxious to see what kind of light LED bulbs produce in a household light.

• Here are a variety of fluorescent blubs including regular sized bulbs and floodlights.
• Here are a couple of LED lights including a small version and a floodlight version. They didn’t get very good reviews and are quite expensive. It looks like LED technology isn’t quite ready to invade household lighting.
• This is an excellent Fast Company article outlining the benefits of CFL bulbs and how Wal-Mart has led a campaign to get consumers to start converting to CFLs. Well worth a read.

Do you know of any other energy-saving or money-saving products? Leave them in the comments below!

Several months ago I wrote a post detailing how to put your online shopping on steroids by using RSS feeds to find great deals. Not long after writing the article, my sister heard about it and decided to try using the RSS technique to buy a Yamaha DisKlavier piano.

The piano she had in mind retails for about $10,000 and she had seen used, older models for as low as $6,000. She was hoping to find one at an even lower price of $5,000.

She had been spending 2-4 hours a week searching extensively from October to March and had found nothing. She was willing to travel within a 12 hours radius to pick up the piano if she found a good deal so she was even actively searching classified ads and on Craigslist in other major cities - but still no success.

Once she read my article, she had her husband set up an RSS search feed on CraigsList.com for the piano. Literally within 2 days she found an available piano about 12 hours away for the ridiculously low price of $2,500. It seemed to good to be true but they drove there anyway. It turned out to be a piano in excellent condition that had only been played once! They literally walked away with an $8,000 piano (that’s the going used price) for $3,500.

Shopping using RSS feeds really is a revelation. I’m surprised I haven’t seen the topic catching on more. I’m surprised by how much the general population doesn’t know about RSS feeds yet. Particularly when they can make such a huge difference in productivity. If you haven’t been introduced to RSS feeds yet, particularly for use in shopping online, check out the two posts below.

Shopping using RSS feeds
RSS shopping website guide

In part four of the Financial Peace University I’ll cover week 9 titled “Buyer Beware.”

Week 9 Buyer Beware

Dave Ramsey talks about how marketing affects behavior and subsequently debt levels. Some of the information about how companies use marketing to entice consumers is interesting but I somewhat question the usefulness on a practical level. Simply knowing the tactics companies are using doesn’t mean you’ll be immune to their effect.

Beware of marketing tactics

Here are some examples Dave uses:

• The number of daily marketing impressions the average person is exposed to has increased from 500 in 1971 to over 4,000 today. I believe it. In today’s multimedia culture, particularly with the internet, we are exposed almost constantly.
• More than half the GDP consists of consumption spending.
• Dave outlines the ways we’re sold to, including
1. Personal selling - Sales materials are increasingly customized and personal. By using database technologies, companies often have much information on potential buyers and are able to target individual needs.
2. Financing - Many businesses provide lines of credit or other forms of financing. In fact, some businesses make more money from financing than they do on actual consumer goods sales. I shouldn’t even need to mention that it’s a mistake to buy consumer goods with borrowed money.
3. Repetition - This one is self explanatory. This one is self explanatory.
4. Product positioning - Ever noticed the ice cold drinks displayed prominently in the store on a blistering hot day? Large companies are very savvy and do extensive research to determine the best way to position products in a store.

Again, I found this information useful but not incredibly useful or practical. There are many ways companies market that Dave left out. In fact, I currently run the marketing for a multi-million dollar internet company and am very familiar with many additional sophisticated marketing techniques. For example, a techniques called means-end laddering identifies the high-level personal benefits and values of consumers and emotionally ties the products features to them. Statistical clustering allows marketers to profile certain market segments in great detail and can effectively predict how certain segments will react to products. Conjoint analysis allows marketers to predict how much more a consumer will pay for a product given a tweak in the features of the product (e.g. gel vs. paste consistency in toothpaste).

Although marketers use these techniques, they are not necessarily bad. While they can be used for evil purposes, for the most part they can actually benefit the consumer. Using such tools, companies can create products that more fully meet consumer preferences. As a result, the consumer’s quality of living increases over time.

How to save on big purchases

On the more practical side, Dave gives a few very good tips for spending less, particularly on large purchases.

1. Wait over night before making a large purchase (being defined as $300 to $1,000 depending on how much money you make). Many of the large, multi-hundred dollar purchases people make are surprisingly impulse purchases. This happens particularly when people receive large lump sums of money such as a bonus. They go on a shopping spree and before they know it have spent the money on things they may not care that much about. The simple act of waiting overnight to make the purchase will deter most frivolous impulse purchases. Once the excitement of the moment has worn off, your brain actually thinks about it and realizes you’d rather spend the money elsewhere or even save it.
2. Understand the difference between needs and wants. You don’t need the wide screen 60″ LCD TV. You might really, really, really want it, but you don’t need it. Your needs are food, shelter, clothing, and transportation.
3. Never buy anything you don’t understand. If the sales person can’t explain it in terms you understand, don’t buy it. Buying things you don’t understand inevitably will cause you to buy something that doesn’t really fit your needs.
4. Consider the opportunity costs (what else could you do with the money). Opportunity cost is an economic term defined as the most valuable foregone alternative. Put in layman’s terms, what else could you do with your money? For example, if you spend $1,000 on the TV, what will you not be able to buy with that $1,000? Maybe there’s something else on your list of wants that you’d rather have even more. I frequently experience regret from buying several smaller items and realizing later that I could have saved that money to buy a bigger item that I want significantly more than the smaller ones.
5. Seek the counsel of your spouse. As painful as it may be, two minds are better, or at least more reasonable, than one. Unless you are spending personal money, you should consult your spouse on all major purchases anyway. A spouse can offer a different perspective and can often bring to your attention other uses for the funds or other alternatives that may meet your needs at a lower cost.