Category: Personal

Our new house has a wonderful wine closet where the front hall closet used to be. When we first walked into the house it was a real Wow feature.

Unfortunately the cooler in the closet doesn't work. The cooling unit is a Brezaire WK1060. It is a 14 x 16 x 18 inch box installed in the top of the closet. Duke has taken the unit out of the closet to trouble shoot the problem. You can see the hole where the unit used to be in the top of the picture above. Right now the unit is in the back seat of our truck.

The compressor and fan in the cooler seem to run just fine but the unit doesn't cool. Duke talked to Breezeaire, the manufacturer and they said we could send it back to them in San Diego but since it probably just needs to be recharged with coolant it would be cheaper to find someone here in Reno to repair it. The problem is that we are having a heck of a time finding someone who will work on it. We have called or stopped by at least 10 different places. We'd just buy a new cooler but they cost about $700!! As I started writing this one place did call back and say they would have a look at it. So maybe we are in luck. I'll keep you posted. If anyone out there has any experience with something like this please let me know.

A  friend recently started a discussion among a group of us about ways to save money. She is retired and would like to stay that way. I feel the same way I would do a lot of cutting if it meant I can keep from having to go back to work. Like most of us her nest egg and thus her income has shrunk. The discussion that ensued came up with some good ideas both big and small. Some of these ideas are mine and some are from friends.

1. Track your expenses.  I've used both Quicken and now I just use a spreadsheet. One friend described what happened after she looked at her spending: "An
   immediate Ah-Ha moment came at the end of the first month when we
   looked at our food-related expenses.  We were spending more on the
   category "Eating out
   – because neither one of us is in the mood to cook" than we were on
   groceries and "Eating out – social" combined.  We did a quick
   adjustment to our grocery planning and made sure we always had
   something tasty in the freezer that could be cooked in a hurry."
2. Health insurance – I got this book from the library and found it invaluable.
   The New Health Insurance Solution: How to Get Cheaper, Better Coverage Without a Traditional Employer Plan by Paul Zane Pilzer.  The approach in this book can potentially save a lot of
   money. The
   approach is not just for people who are retired or unemployed – you can
   get health insurance on your own instead of through your employer at a
   big savings, assuming you don't have a health condition that would put
   you into the uninsurable category. 
3. Essential
   Expenses versus Discretionary Expenses.  Putting expenses into one
   of these two categories led to some really good discussions and
   decisions. Some expenses are obviously essential – food, property taxes, insurance, utilities, car registration,
   etc.  Others are not so clear.  Maintenance of my hair, for example, cost me more than $1000 per year. Is this an essential expense or not? I decided to let my hair go gray and Duke agreed to cut my hair for me. I love the result.
4. The biggest money saver for Duke and me has been moving out of the Bay Area. We figure it saves us more than $30,000 a year. We just bought a house as
   nice or nicer than our house in Union City for half the price. We
   have less money tied up and our insurance and property taxes are lower.
   There is no income tax in Nevada
   either. The icing on the cake is that I love Reno. The hiking,
   snowshoeing and four seasons are just a few reasons that I am beginning
   to sound like the Reno chamber of commerce!
5. Another MUCH smaller money saver is that I make my
   own bread. I have a bread maker that I use at least once a week and I
   have a great recipe. I think every loaf I make is about $2 cheaper than
   a loaf in the stores. Of course I probably eat more bread than I would
   otherwise so maybe that is a down side.
6. Here is an idea from a great friend, "I used to buy fresh squeezed orange or grapefruit juice.  But now I mix
   juice that costs a fraction of the cost of a quart of Odwalla and
   tastes pretty damn good. 4 oz RealLemon (really cheap at Costco,
   1 oz sugar, 4-8 oz 100% pomegranate juice (pretty cheap in the
   half-gallon size at Costco), and 24 oz water. Costco prices for
   RealLemon and Pomegranate juice are such that a quart of this juice is quite cheap."
7. And here is another idea that I haven't taken advantage of but it makes a lot of sense again it is an idea from a friend in her own words.

So what other money saving ideas to people have? I'd love to hear some from some of you.