SavingAdvice.com forum post on
price book.I didn't think to take one of the little notebooks I gave to the school teaching staff last month, so I bought a recycled-paper small one to fit in a purse. The price book idea I read in The Complete Tightwad Gazette, but OrganizedHome.com also has a downloadable template.
YNAB v3.6.0.5, perhaps considered "faddish" by some, so far has kept me mindful. My Money Market Account (MMA) is $600 larger than it would have been if I weren't keeping track. We're not completely denying ourselves either: I bought nibbles for our board game sessions. I'll be shelling out $$ on NYE. My attention deficit disorder had me drafting and redrafting some asset allocation/spending plan schemes. With YNAB I can keep better track of my savings goals and where our money is going.
I also don't include my gold and silver amounts in YNAB because of their daily fluctuations, so I look more broke than I am.
Today I give blood.
My Price Book so far has entries for items we commonly buy from Costco, or find ourselves walking to yonder national chain every week to get.
Thinking I might not do a Target (TGT) Direct Purchase Plan, but rather put some cash in one of my stock accounts: the initial purchase fee in the DPP is equal to the commission the investment service applies, and I've had a number of free trades, so averaging the commission cost is lower.
The spouse of one of my alt.obituaries Dead Pool picks died: no points.
December 27th, 2011 at 09:20 pm 1325020841
December 28th, 2011 at 12:48 am 1325033283
December 31st, 2011 at 12:29 am 1325291359
I thought I looked like a corporate spy when I put entries in my price book at the store. On the other hand, it is a free country, you can write things in a little book as you are shopping.
Some tricks - at first, try to limit it to 20 or so items that you shop for all the time, but be expansive in the places that you shop - grocery stores, produce stands, Costco/Sam's Club/WalMart, drug stores. I was still a little surprised at finding that Walgreens had the best deal on a couple of food items. Costco usually did not. Final trick is to note the unit price - per pound, per ounce, can size, etc. The price book really highlights the rot-in-hell way that stores shrink items. Like the bottom punt on the plastic peanut butter jar carving out a couple of ounces so that the price remains the same.