Couponing My Way Out of Student Loans Wednesdays

It's Wednesday and that means I'm going to tell you all about my savings this past week.

Previous Balance = $174.19

Date	Notes	Saved
5/23/2013	Amazon Sale Savings	$58.00
5/25/2013	Shopping Savings	$148.29
5/25/2013	Claire's Clearance	$169.83
5/25/2013	Redbox Free Trial	$8.00
5/28/2013	Amazon Sale Savings- REFUND	-$58.00
	Total Savings This Week	$326.12
	Total Savings This Month	$500.31

So, about the Amazon Sale Savings- Refund: I ordered the chicken fryer for like 58% off. It was delivered today. The handle is broken. This is a heavy pot/skillet/whatever, so it needs a good handle. I have to return it. :(

See the entry for Claire's Clearance? I only spent $49.17 on $219 worth of merchandise. These items will go into my stash of future Christmas and Birthday gifts for my people.

I included the price of one month to the Redbox subscription even though it is a free trial. I did this to stay in line with my "found or unexpected savings or income" rule. We would probably be spending $8 renting movies from Amazon Instant Video in a month, anyway, but now we're saving that much by participating in this free Redbox trial. See how that works?

Saving is fun! 

Shopping with Coupons and Sales Weekly Update

Hello y'all! I went shopping on Friday and Saturday and here's what I saved!

Walgreens

Value	$9.98
Card Savings	$3.00
Coupon Savings	$6.40
Total Paid	$1.07
Taxes	-$0.49
Total $$ Savings	$9.40
Total %% Savings	94%

Safeway Value $88.92 Card Savings $37.09 Coupon Savings $6.50 Total Paid $45.82 Taxes -$0.49 Total $$ Savings $43.59 Total %% Savings 49%
Target

Value	$50.70	$13.97	$19.47
Card Savings	$0.00	$0.00	$0.00
Coupon/Sales Savings	$21.72	$8.00	$13.00
Total Paid	$30.38	$6.33	$7.41
Taxes	-$1.40	-$0.36	-$0.94
Total $$ Savings	$21.72	$8.00	$13.00
Total %% Savings	43%	57%	67%

Walmart

Value	$3.94
Card Savings	$0.00
Coupon/Sales Savings	$2.50
Total Paid	$1.60
Taxes	-$0.16
Total $$ Savings	$2.50
Total %% Savings	63%

King Soopers

Value	$117.42
Card Savings	$47.08
Coupon Savings	$3.00
Total Paid	$68.28
Taxes	-$0.94
Total $$ Savings	$50.08
Total %% Savings	43%

Overall

Value	$270.96
Card Savings	$87.17
Coupon Savings	$61.12
Total Paid	$160.89
Taxes	-$3.48
Total $$ Savings	$148.29
Total %% Savings	55%

"Hey, Cassi, you went to Target THREE times, you say?" you ask.

"Why, yes. Yes I did." I reply. "The first time I went, I forgot my Aveeno* coupons that I made such a big fuss** over. The second time I went, I went to a different Target than the first one which didn't have the same products on sale***, so I bought some other Aveeno items that were on sale at this Target and went back to the other Target to buy my other Aveeno items."

*Aveeno = My favorite goop ever! I have bad skin in general and Aveeno is the bomb. Love that oatmeal goodmess!

**Fuss = My printer was being a complete witch to me and all of my computers and I missed out on printing a couple of coupons because I hit my limit on hitting the "print" button on the coupon website. Hours. HOURS! That's how long I messed with that mess.

*** "didn't have the same products on sale" = The prices weren't marked according to the sale prices in the ad. I left the ad out in the car. I'm pretty sure, now, I could have found an ad in-store or gone out and gotten my ad in my car and showed them what the prices should be. But I didn't think of that. I just went back across town to the other Target. I'm still new at this couponing/sale thing.

Couponing My Way Out of Student Loans Wednesdays

It's Wednesday again and that means an update on my monthly coupon savings or found money to make an extra student loan payment.

First, I decided not to include the unexpected income as "found money". It's a gift card, so we can't really deposit it into any of our accounts. We decided to use it for our entertainment expenses, which will last us months.

Previous Balance from Last Week = $564.83

$564.83 - $500 gift card = $64.83 Adjusted Balance Last Week

New Items:

Date	Notes	Saved
5/17/2013	Coupon/Sales Savings	$99.36
5/14/2013	Plink Reward	$10.00
	This Week's Total	$109.36
	Monthly Total to Date	$174.19

Woohoo!  I hope that I can get it up to $200 by month's end.

Coupon Savings Roundup - 05/17/2013 - Saved a total of $99.36!

I went shopping last Friday...and here's what I saved...

Safeway- Saved 62% with sales alone
King Soopers – Saved 45% with sales and 1 coupon matchup
WalMart – Saved 17% with coupons alone 
Walgreens – Saved 58% with coupon matchups and sales
Target – Saved 30% with coupon matchups

Saved a total of $99.36!

Using "found" money to pay off debt

I got the idea from Couponing to Disney. It basically goes like this: any money that you come by that was unexpected or purposely saved (savings from couponing) goes into a fund. Over at Couponing to Disney, she uses her fund to pay for her family's annual Disney World trip. I'm using my fund to make extra payments towards my student loans.

I keep track of my fund in an Excel spreadsheet. Here is what my May fund looks like halfway through the month:

Date	Notes	Saved	Balance
5/6/2013	Coupon Savings	$34.83	$34.83
5/14/2013	SwagBucks	$25.00	$59.83
5/14/2013	Copay Refund	$5.00	$64.83
5/15/2013	Unexpected Income	$500.00	$564.83

This just happens to be a very lucky month for us because we normally do not receive an extra $500 in unexpected income. But, who knows? Maybe we come across more "found" money than we realize and keeping a record like this will highlight that. *crosses fingers*

Note: This specific post contains referral links.