In the age of the internet many of us have friends in different states or even countries, some of whom we know fairly well.  Have you ever thought about trading houses with them?  It’s not really a novel  idea and there are companies that will match you up with someone who wants to trade houses in your area.  It works somewhat like an online dating service.  If you saw the movie, “The Holiday” you have a pretty good idea of how it works.

One of the sites, Home Exchange (the one used in the movie) has a membership fee of $9.95 per month that is billed annually.  They also have a 3 month membership for $15.95 per month.    It’s not a bad buy if you decide that you are seriously considering a trade.   Home Exchange also has some great advice on how to be successful at trading houses.   They also publish many of their success stories and I enjoyed reading a few of them.  They really make it seem possible and FUN!

If you aren’t sure that you are ready to spend money on this endeavor, another website Home Exchange Vacation has a free membership option.  Just like Match.com, you can list your house for free and search for others but you can’t contact anyone without purchasing a full membership.   Their full membership is under $30 for a 3 month membership.

Tips for making a Successful Trade

1. Make sure that you are comfortable with the other person.  Talk in email and on the phone before you commit to a trade.  If  you aren’t comfortable with anything, pass on it.
2. Decide in advance how you are going to handle utility bills, cars, pets, etc.
3. Whether you go through a service or not, have a written contract that specifies responsibilities of each party and liabilities.
4. Check with your insurance company especially if you are trading cars to make sure that your insurance covers invited guests and permitted drivers.
5. Make lists of emergency contacts, repair people and local attractions for your guests.
6. Just for the fun of it, leave flowers and a chilled bottle of wine.
7. Have a neighbor or friend check in with your guests the day after their arrival to make sure they are comfortable and don’t have any questions.  It also puts a friendly face with the names on your list.

I think it could be a great way to see the country if not the world.  Home Exchange also mentions that long weekends are their fastest growing segment so you don’t have to go around the world or even for a month.  You can exchange houses with someone right down the road and just get away for a few days.

Have you tried exchanging homes?  How did it work for you?  I’d love to hear some of  your personal experiences.

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I jumped on the internet and did a search for mayonnaise recipes.  The first one I came up with had tons of ingredients and promised a “bright tasting” version.  Bright tasting sounded about right for my slaw so I got out my trusty blender and the other ingredients and went to town.  Now it already was not the most inexpensive undertaking because I was using olive oil instead of regular vegetable oil.  I’m pretty sure you can buy a quart of mayo for less than a cup and a half of olive oil.

The resulting glop was a serious taste disaster.  It didn’t emulsify.  It was oily and olive tasting with a tang that just didn’t sit well with me.  I poured it out in the weeds.  I was two eggs, a cup and a half of olive oil and the other ingredients into this experiment and I will freely admit that it wasn’t the recipe’s fault, it was mine.

I gave up for about 5 minutes and then decided to give it another try.  I did my research and read a few more recipes.  I figured out why my recipe didn’t work.   I stumbled upon another recipe that promised to work AND taste great.  Well, what did I have to lose but another few eggs and some more olive oil.

I have to tell you that making homemade mayo is not for the faint at heart.  It is not the most frugal recipe in the world but the mayo I ended up with is much healthier than the store bought stuff.  If you decide to undertake this endeavor, I will also include these few tips.

Homemade Mayonnaise Tips

• Start with all your ingredients at room temperature.
• Add oil one drop at a time and mix until emulsified
• Do not rush the process – it is better to add oil one drop at a time than to put too much too fast
• Use a lightly flavored oil or a mix of oils – my olive oil decidedly flavored the mayo.

The real trick to this whether you use a whisk or a blender is to add the oil slowly at first.  The egg yolks act as an emulsifier but the yolk and the oil have to be totally mixed before adding another drop.  Add another drop and mix again.  Once you have a tablespoon or two mixed in then you can start drizzling it in but if you go to fast, it will separate and you will have glop.

My first and second tries at making mayonnaise took 5 eggs, 2 1/2 cups of olive oil plus all the other ingredients to yield a single cup of mayo.  It ended up tasting ok but was definitely not cheap.

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It doesn’t seem like that would be a hard goal to reach but with the cost of food (we have blown the grocery budget this month with 3 trips to the store) it is a little more challenging than it seems.  Amelia has me searching through my recipes and not finding many that are both frugal and lo cal.

One of my favorites is Salsa Chicken.  Boneless chicken breasts are marinaded in a salsa marinade and then grilled or broiled.

Salsa Chicken

1/3 cup lime juice
2 tsp minced ginger
2 cloves minced garlic
2 Tb olive oil
2 tsp chili powder
1 cup Salsa
1 1/2 lb boneless skinless chicken breasts

Mix first 5 ingredients in a small pan and bring to a boil.  Stir in Salsa and allow to cool.  Put chicken breasts in a plastic bag and marinade for 2 – 24 hours in the refrigerator.

Grill or broil chicken breasts, turning once and basting with some marinade when you turn them until done.  Make sure that chicken is done all the way through.

I use frozen bags of chicken tenderloins.  These cost approximately $7 for 5 lbs so this is a very economical main dish.  Salsa is a staple in our house so I always have a jar open in the refrigerator.

The recipe makes 6 servings at 225 calories per serving.

Do you have any frugal lo cal recipes to share?  I will pass them along to Amelia as well.   If you have one online, I will include it in an upcoming frugal lo cal recipe post so shoot me a link.

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Is the new bill a good thing?  I have no idea.  How can you form an opinion on a bill that is over 2000 pages long?  How can you form an opinion on something that has so much mis-information floating around that it is impossible to tell fact from fiction?

My mother and I have this discussion every time we talk.  She is against health care reform.   The reasons that she cites are the exact ones that are supposedly debunked in the Top Five Lies About Obama’s Health Care Reform.  This Newsweek article explains the top 5 objections to the Health Care Reform bill.   If you believe that the bill will offer free coverage to illegal immigrants or cut benefits to the elderly, you should read this article.

On the flip side, CNN Money has an article on The 5 Key Freedoms You Will Lose.  They write that you will eventually lose the right to choose your own coverage or to choose your own doctor.   These are important choices that everyone should be able to make.

So which side is right?  Is Health Care Reform inherently evil or the best thing since sliced bread?  I don’t think that the average American can possibly make an informed decision on that.  The debate is presented by lawyers and politicians who are paid to read the 2000 page bill that has been written in legalese and then interpret it in the way that is most beneficial to their side.   I could sit down and read the bill and know as little when I finished as when I started.

What are the needs of people like me who cannot afford to pay the high costs of health insurance?     I have found various estimates on the average cost of health insurance that range from $4000 per year to $7000 per year.  This ranges from 40% of my income to 70% of my annual income.  It’s not much of a choice.  When I last checked into insurance, the monthly cost was approximately $300 per month and I am a healthy woman in her 50s.  I don’t have any pre existing conditions.  I don’t have diabetes, I have never had cancer, my heart is in great condition and while I am slightly overweight, my cholesteral is within normal limits.  I have never had high blood pressure.   My total health care costs over the last 5 years equal less than $500 and that includes doctors visits and prescriptions.

While I still view health insurance as a necessary evil, I can’t afford to pay more monthly for insurance than I would for a year of expenses.  I would like to have a basic plan for major medical that would cover my hospital bills in the event of an emergency.   I honestly don’t care if I can pick my own doctor or hospital.   I don’t expect Cadillac service on a Yugo budget but I would be happy with some affordable options for hospitalization coverage.

I realize that this article has had more questions than answers.  I think that is the general state of the health care debate now.  I seriously doubt that anyone including the Congress has a clue about the impact of the WHOLE bill.   And I think that because of the complexity of the situation, we should stop and quit trying to rush the solution.  The health care system needs reform but I believe we should be approaching it in smaller,  less complex steps instead of sweeping reform that is bound to fail.

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My biggest problem with coupons is that they are very rarely for the things that I buy on a regular basis.  We buy very little prepared or convenience foods which are usually the coupons I find.   I make biscuits for a few pennies with flour and baking soda.   A large percentage of our vegetables are from our garden.  If I want a pizza, I use homemade tomato sauce, garden vegetables and fresh cheese.

There are very few coupons for fresh meat or vegetables.  I’m sure that they are out there but I just haven’t been able to find them, at least, not often enough to make it worth the time I have to spend searching.  When I did take my coupons with me, I saved money on the food that I bought but it wasn’t food that I would normally have purchased.  So while I saved money, it was money that I normally wouldn’t have spent.

My third problem with coupons is that I don’t go shopping often enough to really spend so much time planning it. While we plan out our meals and make a grocery list,  we purchase things when they are on sale and we shop at specific stores for specific items.   One of the small local grocery stores has 5 lbs of sausage for $5, 5 lbs of bacon for $5 and 5 ls of Bologna for $5  so when we are in that town, we will stop by to stock up on those items.  We stash it in the freezer and it generally last us for a couple months.

Another store, about 25 miles in the opposite direction, has excellent buys on great quality meats.  When we are in that town, we stop and purchase as much meat as we can afford.  They run weekly sales so we might end up with 10 pounds of chicken or 4 to 5 Chuck roasts.  It may not be the most practical way to shop but it does keep our grocery costs for the two of us under $200 per month.

I am writing this for the people like me who have found very little benefit from clipping coupons.  I have often felt a little guilty for not doing a better job of it but I have finally decided that it just isn’t for me.  We all have to use the savings methods that work the best for our own situation and trying to make someone else’s method just may not work for us.  So if you save tons of money with coupons, I applaud you but I will stick to what works for me.

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1. Calk the exterior of your home.  Chances are that if you walk around the outside of your home and look, you will find old, cracked or missing calk.  These gaps around doors, windows and corners, let cold air in and warm air out.  Calking these areas is easy and inexpensive and will save you $$ on your bill.
2. If you haven’t already switched to compact fluorescent lights, try them.  Not only do they last longer but they burn a fraction of the electricity.  They are making different styles now so you don’t have to have the spiral ones in your ceiling fans or decorative lighting.
3. Weather stripping – check the weather stripping around doors and windows.  Make sure that when your door is shut there isn’t cold air leaking in under and around them.  You can buy weather stripping and door sweeps at your local hardware store and they will help stop those cold drafts.
4. Check for Drafts.  You can use a stick of incense to check for drafts.  Simply light it and move it slowly around your walls.  (Avoid drapes and curtains) When the smoke swirls and blows, you have found a draft.  These are often found around water pipes and places where pipes or wires come from the outside.  These are generally under cabinets, in closets, etc.  You can insulate around them or use calking to stop leaks.
5. Change your Filter.  Your furnace is probably doing double time right now.  In order for it to run the most efficiently, the filters need to allow air to move through them.  Check your filter every 30 days at a minimum but during heavy usage, you might need to change it more often.
6. Don’t Heat It.  If you aren’t using it, don’t heat it.  Turn off heat or shut off vents in unused parts of the house.  We have one bedroom that we don’t use.  We keep the vent closed in that room and the door closed so that we don’t need to heat that room.
7. Insulate electric outlets and switches.  If you hold your hand up against an electric socket on an exterior wall, you will often notice a drastic difference in temperature.  You can buy foam insulating gaskets for these.  You simply take off the cover, install the gasket and screw the cover back on.  (Don’t Stuff these Full Of Insulation.  This is a fire hazard. )
8. Use Solar -  Open the drapes or blinds on your south and west facing windows during the day.  The sun will help warm your home during the day.  Close these during the evening and night to help insulate the window.
9. Turn it Down –  Turn your thermostat down during the winter.  Turn it up in the summer.  Our thermostat stays at 72 all winter.  The only time we really feel cool is when we are sitting around watching TV in the evening.  You can put on a sweater or get up and sweep the floor.  Both will warm you up.
10. Turn It Off and Unplug It – Make it a habit to turn off and then unplug small appliances.  If you add up all the small appliances in your house and combine the usage when they are in stand by mode, you will find that they use a surprisingly large amount of electricity.

Do you have any additional cheap and easy ways to save energy?  How are you keeping warm in the arctic blast?

This post has been included in the Carnival of Personal Finance.   Stop by and check out the other great posts at Darwin’s Finance.

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Cash

I was reading an article at Fire Finance about the number of people who live without a bank account.  Fire Finance was stunned to find that 17 million Americans have no bank accounts.   I was not so surprised.  Having worked in various situations with low income people, it is common among them not to have a bank account.

With 13 to 17 percent of the population living at or below the Federal Poverty guidelines, it’s not surprising that few of them have checking or savings accounts.  They generally have income once a month or no regular income at all.  They cash their checks at the closest available place and what cash doesn’t go to pay the monthly living expenses, they keep the little remaining cash close at hand.

Life on A Cash Basis

While I am not one of the 17 million Americans without a bank account, we do live life on primarily a cash basis.  We have a checking account and a savings account.  Our checking account is used solely for paying monthly bills.  We do not use it for shopping at the grocery store or for gas or daily incidentals.  Our savings account is online and it is used solely for an emergency fund.  It is linked to the bank account for easy transfers in and out of checking.  We ordinarily keep a $5 balance in the checking account.

I know that we are not the norm for Americans because we pay for most things with cash,  good old American greenbacks!  We don’t use credit cards as a matter of fact, neither of us even own a credit card.  We also do not routinely use our debit card.  We do own one of those but generally, it is only used to check the balance if necessary when the bank is closed.

Like most Americans that Fire Finance classifies as underbanked, we don’t have a great deal of income.  We generally are living off of less than a thousand dollars a month.  While this is well below the poverty level, it doesn’t feel like we are ‘poor’.   I can’t think of a many things that we want that we don’t have.   I can’t actually think of many things that I had when I was earning over sixty thousand per year that I don’t have now except for bills.

While many people will find this a shockingly low income, we live quite comfortably on it most of the time.  We don’t have any real debt other than a small loan on the farm so what cash we have goes to the daily essentials of living.  Neither of us want to go into debt so we don’t even consider buying and financing a car.  Quite simply if we can’t pay for it, we don’t get it.

If there is something that we want which we can’t afford to pay for with cash, we do one of two things; we either save up for it or we  make a plan to make enough money to pay for it.  For example, we seriously need a tractor.  There are just some things that it is difficult for two people to do on a farm without one such as moving 800 lb hay bales or plowing our large garden and mowing 19 acres of pasture.

Even a small tractor is a large expense usually costing between 5,000 and 10,000 dollars so we do not have the cash on hand to purchase even a used one.   Our plan is two fold rather than getting a loan, we will save as much money as we can to put towards the tractor and we will also start selling some things to pay for the rest of it.  The final and probably hardest part is being patient.  We will wait until we have saved up enough money and then wait to find a really good deal on a used tractor before we purchase it.  While we wait, I will research the prices so that when we find one, we will know what it is worth.  I expect that it will take us a year to save enough money but if we financed it, we would be paying for it for five to seven years.

In the past we would have borrowed the money without a second thought and because of that we would have ended up not getting a very good deal.  We would not only have paid too much for the tractor, we also would have been paying interest on it for years.  Now we are forced to do our homework and so will get a better deal.  We will also have the bargaining chip of paying cash when we find it.

We got our truck the same way.  I spent months researching prices and searching online for a truck that we could both afford and that would meet our needs.  While I searched, we sold our old truck and saved enough money to purchase the newer truck.   When I found the truck of our dreams on craigslist, it was about 200 miles away and we bargained over the phone for a lower cash price.  We saved $500 off of his advertised price because we could come that same afternoon and we were bringing cash.  We saved an additional $1000 over what we had found the same truck priced for locally. We saved 8 percent by not having to pay interest on a loan.

Even smaller purchases sometimes come with a savings if you pay cash.  Several of the local gas stations give a discount on gas if you pay in cash.  It makes sense for them since merchants pay 1 – 3 percent on credit card transactions.  It’s nice of them to pass the savings along to their customers.

Even though we don’t have a lot of income, we live a pretty good life.  We grow most of our own food and we generally have enough to share with friends and family.  We don’t go out to the movies often but then we do spend quite a bit of time with our extended families playing cards or just socializing.  The food we eat is generally homegrown and fresher than store bought.  It doesn’t contain all of the pesticides and chemicals of processed foods.

There are some sacrifices when dealing only with cash.  There are times when we do without some things because we don’t have the cash to pay for them right then.  There are times when we miss a really good deal on something because we are unwilling to borrow money but overall, the money we might have saved by buying it right then we would have spent on interest on the debt.

For me, our lifestyle is based on cash.  I can see it, touch it, count it and know exactly how much we have and what we need to spend it on.  It is more of a different mindset than putting all of it in the bank and using my debit card to pay for things.  It is much more difficult for me to visualize and keep track of our finances when I used my debit card and checks to pay for things.   I have always been a visual learner but I can tell you that watching our cash dwindle physically is the best way that I have found to stay on a budget.  For the most part, we are pretty happy with what we have and don’t miss too much of what we don’t have.

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Black Eyed Peas -  There are several different opinions on why these dried beans are a New Year’s staple.  I have heard that the eye in the pea looks ahead and will give you wisdom in the coming year.  I have also read that the dried beans are used because they swell during cooking which symbolizes the swelling of your purse through the year.   Whichever reason you believe, I cook a pot of these with fat back and onions.  We purchase a bag of dried peas and I put them in water to soak on New Year’s eve.  This morning I rinsed and added the smoked fat back and onions to the pot for seasoning and will simmer them all day.  They really are delicious.

Greens – Greens are another food that symbolizes prosperity.  Most believe that it is because they resemble folded money.  I can’t really see the resemblance myself but they are green so I suppose they will do.  We barter for collard greens and I think we get the best part of the deal.  We have a man who comes and cleans out our barn for the manure to put on his garden.  He brings us collards a couple times a year.   We not only get fresh collards but we also get the barn cleaned out for free.  He gets free fertilizer for his garden.  It’s a win win situation.

The collards are also cooked with a piece of fat back for flavoring.  They are washed, chopped and cooked most of the day along with the black eyed peas.  Collards are one of the cold weather vegetables that grow on into the winter here in Virginia.

Hog Jowl - This seasoned bacon like meat also symbolizes prosperity in the coming year.  There are many opinions on why hog jowl symbolizes prosperity.  Some believe that it’s because the pig roots for it’s food and so it’s nose is always pointed to the future.  There is also a belief that the pig grows fat from eating the leftover scraps of food from the family.  When everyone had a family pig, all leftovers were put into a slop bucket and fed to the pig daily.  When it was butchered, every part of the pig is used for something, even the feet and tail are traditionally cooked or pickled.  I must admit that I have never tried either and don’t really plan on it.

R fries the hog jowl like bacon and I must admit that it is delicious.  I will most likely make biscuits to eat it.  Hopefully with all this New Year’s luck, 2010 will be a bountiful year and our finances will take a turn for the better.  Maybe we can bring the country and economy along with us.

What are your New Year’s Traditions?

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I bought the turkey well over a month ago when they were on sale.  We have four different families who come to dinner for Thanksgiving and each person brings their favorite dish.  It makes for a varied menu and means that all of the cooking and preparation doesn’t fall on Randy and I.

With Thanksgiving being so close, I have been thinking about Christmas presents.  There are a few that I have bought throughout the year, just because it was something that I knew someone would enjoy.  It takes some of the pressure off at the holiday season.  I have always envied people who start Christmas shopping in January.  I am not organized enough to do that.  I also can’t stand having something here for someone for so long.  Once I buy it for them, I want to give it to them.

We have quite a few bachelor friends and close friends who we like to give something.  I usually start baking cookies and breads right after Thanksgiving.  Each one of our friends gets a box of cookies & breads for Christmas.  Those who entertain during the holidays have some extra cookies to give away and our single friends really appreciate them.

I am also going to be giving some of the pickles and relish that I have made over the summer.  I doubt that we can eat 20 pints of green tomato relish before next fall.  It will be a nice and inexpensive way to let our friends know that we are thinking of them.

I still need to find some frugal ideas for some of the family and the children.   What do you do for your family and friends at Christmas?  Do you have any frugal ideas for children’s presents?  Leave a comment and I will be using reader’s feedback for an upcoming post.

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Benefits of Wood Furnace

1. Free Heat – We cut downed trees up to use for firewood during the winter.  It doesn’t cost us anything but time and work.  Generally it takes us a day to get a truckload of wood and that includes splitting and stacking.
2. Free Hot Water – Our wood furnace uses hot water to heat the house.  The hot water goes through a coil and heats the air in the house.  We also use the furnace to heat our hot water during the winter.
3. Moist Heat -  Rather than having gas or electric burner heating the air in the house, it is heated by hot water.  It does not dry out the air and cause sinus and dry skin.
4. Burns Efficiently – The wood furnace has a draft fan on it that cuts on when the water temperature drops.  This blows air over the wood and the fire heats up.  When the water temperature  reaches 200 degrees, the draft fan cuts off.  At most during the coldest weather, we have to fill the furnace twice a day.
5. Lower Electric Bills – Because we use the wood furnace for both heat and hot water, our electric bill drops significantly during the winter.  I don’t believe we had one that was over $50 last winter.  This saves us hundreds of dollars over the year.
6. Renewable Resource – Unlike oil, coal, gas, etc. wood is a renewable source of fuel.  We can plant more trees while we cannot manufacture more oil, coal, or gas.

Drawbacks of Wood Furnace

1. Cost of Wood -  The wood furnace suits us very well because we have an almost unlimited supply of wood but if you had to purchase wood you would have to weigh the cost of wood against the cost of oil, gas or electricity.
2. Air Pollutant - While the newer wood furnaces burn efficiently and cause less pollution, they do cause some.
3. Load Outside -  Someone has to load the furnace twice a day.   This means going out and putting wood into it even when it’s 10 degrees outside and snowing.
4. Time, time, time – We do not buy wood but we do spend a few weeks a year cutting, splitting and stacking it.  We don’t do it all at the same time but this week we have gotten a load every day and it has taken most of the day to do it.  If you plan on cutting your own, you need to plan on spending several days per month getting wood.

Overall I love the wood furnace.  I love the heat, the really hot water and I REALLY love our electric bill during the winter.  I really don’t mind running out in the morning and loading the wood furnace.  And loading and stacking wood is great exercise for arms and shoulders.

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