Canceled Cable and WHAM! A Poop Storm!

[angwill]

I am going to put a sour note to it all when I say just be thankful you do not cancer and huge medical bills due to it.

That should put the others stuff into perspective especially when you have saved enough not to go into debt for it.

 

[Mickeefan]

These are some of the many reasons I rent an apartment...

On another note, OP, how was/is it going without cable? I'm really thinking about doing this, too. Any pointers you can give? Thanks.

 

[clh2]

The poop storm would have happened with or without the cable being cancelled.

 

[bumbershoot]

The poop storm would have happened with or without the cable being cancelled.

Prove it.

 

[turkey1031]

I got rid of cable last year or the year before. We now stream netflix movies for $8 and watch all of our current season tv shows on hulu plus for another $8. Huge savings a month.

 

[PrincessCooper's Mom]

I have been threatening my husband with turning our cable off and he is not having it.

How hard was it to transition to no cable and Netflix?

Can you watch all the new episodes of current shows on Netflix?
For example, Once Upon A Time?

Thanks

 

[turkey1031]

I have been threatening my husband with turning our cable off and he is not having it. How hard was it to transition to no cable and Netflix? Can you watch all the new episodes of current shows on Netflix? For example, Once Upon A Time? Thanks

Only the seasons of TV shows that are out on DVD can be watched on Netflix. So your example of ouat you can only watch season one and two since they're the only seasons released on DVD. You can watch season one, two, and this seasons on hulu plus. That reminds me I don't think I watched this weeks episode.

 

[Egdisney]

I have been threatening my husband with turning our cable off and he is not having it. How hard was it to transition to no cable and Netflix? Can you watch all the new episodes of current shows on Netflix? For example, Once Upon A Time? Thanks

Netflix does not have current episodes. You should be able to pick up local channels with a digital antenna. I could pick up over 20 channels with mine. The reason we can't drop satellite is because of football. I am worse than my husband on this. I am trying to figure out if you can switch programming easily and what the lowest tier of Direct tv offers and what it costs.

 

[Iowajes]

These are some of the many reasons I rent an apartment...

On another note, OP, how was/is it going without cable? I'm really thinking about doing this, too. Any pointers you can give? Thanks.

We don't have cable and we love it- it is nice to not spend the money (though it sucks when people tell you to cancel cable to save money: I don't have it, so I can't! I've never thought cable was worth it, I can't believe it took us like 5 years of marriage to just say no). I still watch TV almost every night for an hour or two but watch a ton less junk "just because it is on". I go to a gym that has TVs on the cardio equipment so I do get about an hour of HGTV a week.

We don't have Netflix, so no pay TV at all.

We had to get a really large antenna, and it takes up the majority of our utility room in the basement. We can't pick up NBC because the station is too far away. We watch NBC shows the next day on Hulu.

We used to have a DVR type thing in a computer that we attached to the TV, but now so many shows are available next day on the network website or Hulu, we don't bother with that anymore. But it is available if you can't watch shows right on time. (Once Upon a Time is available next day on ABC's website, btw. I watch Amazing Race during the live timeslot, though that is available nextday on CBS's website.)

So at least for us, we found most of our shows were network show anyway, and there wasn't much of a transition at all. Mostly I'm just happy my time isn't sucked by House Hunting and Housewives fighting anymore.


On topic: yeah, every time we find we have something extra, something happens. Every time.

 

[ceemys]

That isn't the way I look at it. I am thankful I gave up X, so that I now have a surplus and can pay for Y without needing to pull out the credit card.

this!

 

[borgthe]

Allow me to vent...

I love TV. So for me to cancel cable and live with just Netflix was scary! But I bit the bullet and did it late summer. This saves me about $100 a month which I thought I could put towards other bills and/or save (imagine that). YAY!

Fast forward to Monday night. I was doing laundry and heard a gurgling in my kitchen sink, bathroom sink and *gasp* toilet when the washer was draining. What in the BLEEEP?! I called the septic pumpers on Tuesday morning early and they came at 1:00 p.m. to pump the tank and, yup, you guessed it ... a blockage. And why was it blocked?! Because the entire line from inside of the house to the tank was broken in a few places. Yup, they had to dig up the works and replace the pipe through the wall and to the tank. Argh - there goes the money I was saving by not having cable.

So does this happen to everyone? When you come into a little money or strive to save it, that something comes along to suck it up? BAH!

We are debating cutting cable and I'd like some advice since you did it.

Internet service seems to be expensive. That will cost about $50 to $60. Did you find a cheaper alternative?

Is Netflix enough? Do you use an antenna for local channels? If so does it work well?

Thanks!!!!!

 

[Stacy's a freak]

I'm glad I'm not alone!!!

About cable - I'm not missing it at all! I still pay for internet through Time Warner. I was able to negotiate them down to a $30/month fee for their "basic internet" which is about 3 bps. It's fine for me (it's just me in the house and I only have a few devices that use wifi).

I also have a Wii that I used for watching Netflix streaming so I pay about $8 a month.

Dfiance had an "extra" Apple TV (they cost about $100) so I use that now to watch my streaming Netflix AND I can watch itunes movies on it. There are usually two shows that I cannot live without per season. This year it's The Walking Dead and American Horror Story. So I bought these two seasons on itunes for a total of $45 for this season. I had a hard time finding them for free online so I just bought them and can take them wherever I want to go on the iPad if I don't watch at home on the Apple TV.

I don't have hulu but with the above, I don't need to watch anything else really. I was the same as most - just watching whatever is on for background noise. And I can live without flipping through the channels and always ending up on some House Hunters or house remodeling shows. That just makes me want to spend more money anyway - haha!

 

[LJSquishy]

Ugh, I'm so sorry you had to deal with all of that. I can totally relate -- just this past Saturday our sewer main line got clogged! We had to move out of our house for the weekend and stay with my in-laws...with our 2 dogs!

$1,000 later we are working again.

Luckily nothing "backed up", we called as soon as we noticed the toilet wasn't flushing properly and the tub was slow to drain. Saturday they took the toilet out to gain access, snaked it with a 3" blade which got bent (yikes!), snaked it with a 2" blade which didn't fix the problem...then they put the toilet back and then had to come back on Monday to use a different access point and do the whole fiber optic camera thing & then hydrojet the line...which worked!

And, on top of all of that...I had tried to lower our cable/internet bill by just cancelling the tv portion but they said it won't lower our bill any. We don't even watch tv because we only get the boring channels!

 

[Stacy's a freak]

And, on top of all of that...I had tried to lower our cable/internet bill by just cancelling the tv portion but they said it won't lower our bill any. We don't even watch tv because we only get the boring channels!

A whole weekend!!! I'm so sorry!

I hate to suggest such shananigans, but when I tried to get a better deal I had to threaten to cancel and go to the other guys. I sorta feel bad about it but I also know that the pricing structures are a giant scam! If my neighbor can get a major discount from the same carrier, I should be able to also.

 

[alan_renfroe]

We've enjoyed Dish Network with four different DVR receivers throughout the house for the past few years, but at $160/month, we are looking at alternatives. For now, we are going to cut back our channel package and get rid of two of the DVR receivers, replacing them with a Roku. This would drop our bill to about $70/month. Then we will add a subscription to Netflix & Hulu Plus, which will cost $16/month. End result: Savings of almost $75/month.

 

[Flamingeaux]

My DH says "It's always something"

My father-in-law wanted that on his headstone. Despite protest from ny brother-in-law, DW and I were able to fulfill FIL's wishes.