To the Savvy Savers- Help Me Find Money!!

[JenzyHP]

You can combine the gift cards into bigger ones on the disney giftcard site and only give her a couple instead of a bunch of $50 ones.

 

[havaneselover]

I forgot about the app!
Thanks, I will download it.

The fuel points with the Disney gift cards will be even better than a target discount! I should have been doing either one for the upcoming trip!
I used a TA, so will she have to enter in the codes, or can I do it myself?

I pay for all my cruises with Disney gift cards. My budget is really tight so here's my strategy.

1) pay with gift cards (saved 30% doing this for my August cruise)

2) swagbucks-- since end of June I've been able to buy $1550 in Disney gift cards using my swagbucks earnings. This is covering photo disk, excursions, tips, souvenirs, placeholder booking, etc.

3) shopkick for my kids' souvenir money

4) used a TA. Cash back will cover hotel and parking at the port

5) used the dreaded DVA (you can call dcl and pay directly even if you use a ta). The bonus I got covers one night at pop century pre cruise (we had left over no expiration tickets).

I think my total out of pocket for 7 nights on the Fantasy with my two children will be $3,000.

 

[21stamps]

I pay for all my cruises with Disney gift cards. My budget is really tight so here's my strategy.

1) pay with gift cards (saved 30% doing this for my August cruise)

2) swagbucks-- since end of June I've been able to buy $1550 in Disney gift cards using my swagbucks earnings. This is covering photo disk, excursions, tips, souvenirs, placeholder booking, etc.

3) shopkick for my kids' souvenir money

4) used a TA. Cash back will cover hotel and parking at the port

5) used the dreaded DVA (you can call dcl and pay directly even if you use a ta). The bonus I got covers one night at pop century pre cruise (we had left over no expiration tickets).

I think my total out of pocket for 7 nights on the Fantasy with my two children will be $3,000.

Wow! This is amazing!!

You are my new hero!!!

I just took a screenshot of this post.

 

[havaneselover]

Wow! This is amazing!!

You are my new hero!!!

I just took a screenshot of this post.

I have a DCL taste on a Carnival budget!

 

[21stamps]

I have a DCL taste on a Carnival budget!

You're doing awesome!! I should have posted this months ago and implemented for our upcoming Fantasy cruise!

Now I really am going to do swagbucks!!

I work a lot, often well into the evening, is it something that can be done with that kind of schedule?

 

[havaneselover]

You're doing awesome!! I should have posted this months ago and implemented for our upcoming Fantasy cruise!

Now I really am going to do swagbucks!!

I work a lot, often well into the evening, is it something that can be done with that kind of schedule?

So part of the reason I do well I think (besides a high tolerance for boredom is because I do most of it in the morning before work while I'm exercising. I'm pretty much done with it by 7am. I'm stuck on the stairmaster and watching tv so I throw my laptop and phone on the reading rack. It's sort of weird, but it's efficient for me. But you can do it while you're cleaning, folding laundry, etc. it's pretty easy to do while you're multitasking. It definitely takes a while to figure out what works for you and it will be aggravating from time to time. But for me it's so worth it.

 

[aprincessatlast]

I have a DCL taste on a Carnival budget!

Awesome! me too! You rock the house on some of those ideas. I need more patience for swagbacks (not even sure I know what that is) and gift cards.

We do pay with gift cards but just use the Kroger fuel points or standard Target 5% but it is something. As far as saving money ideas. My biggest 2 to try this year was eating out way less. This was hard because we have so many awesome authentic ethnic restaurants around. So I just had to go and find out how to make some of this at home.

My biggest savings came from shopping at Aldi's. It was a challenge at first because I loved my nice grocery stores like Fresh Market and Kroger. Yet hated the checkout line. lol However I got over it and soon found all those awesome items from Germany, Italy, England etc. and those amazing deals. It reduced my budget by a substantial amount. We only hit the other stores for things they do not carry. I also stopped going to Costco! I got trapped by those samples one to many times.

 

[MimiOfTwo]

My Kroger has the gift cards that you can load whatever amount you choose. I tend to do $250 when they have the 4x points as that gets me $1.00 off per gallon of gas. I then load it onto my Disney Vacation Account so that every 1000.00 I spend I get the $20.00 gift card from Disney. I know there are some horror stories about DVA but I make sure to keep my entire account number. I've not had a issue but I also would not wait last minute to pay my trip off because it has been down for days at a time.

 

[Jen and Ashwin]

If you don't like to coupon, but want to save on groceries, check out apps like iBotta, Savings Star, Checkout 51 and Receipt Hog. You basically just activate offers and then scan your receipts. I do this as I am unloading groceries when I get home. If there are offers on the same item on multiple apps, you can get them all and save even more. I have made about $100 using this stuff just since January.

 

[honeybunches]

Like Jen mentioned - ibotta is a great way to save money without using coupons. Even if you do use coupons, you can still use it! I also do surveys to earn free gift cards. No difference in my daily routine....I just do the surveys on my laptop while watching TV with my husband. In the summer, I do the same with Swagbucks, Mypoints, and the other sites like that (no time for it during the school year).

For meals, I buy extra ingredients when they are on sale and make a double portion. This week I made 3 meatloaves instead of 1, and a double batch of chicken corn chowder. The extras go in the freezer for later. It saves me time, and money - in two ways. The ingredients were cheaper, plus it's one less meal that we're tempted to eat out. My family prefers to eat at home so that's a bonus for me! As an alternative, you could just do this for lunches or whatever -- if you usually eat out for lunch, replace 1 or 2 lunches with leftovers.

If you want to save on Starbucks but still want to treat yourself, pay attention to when they have their deals. For example, if it's $1 off after 2:00, just schedule your trip then. You can even tuck that $1 away for your cruise.

 

[Jen and Ashwin]

Like Jen mentioned - ibotta is a great way to save money without using coupons. Even if you do use coupons, you can still use it! I also do surveys to earn free gift cards. No difference in my daily routine....I just do the surveys on my laptop while watching TV with my husband. In the summer, I do the same with Swagbucks, Mypoints, and the other sites like that (no time for it during the school year).

For meals, I buy extra ingredients when they are on sale and make a double portion. This week I made 3 meatloaves instead of 1, and a double batch of chicken corn chowder. The extras go in the freezer for later. It saves me time, and money - in two ways. The ingredients were cheaper, plus it's one less meal that we're tempted to eat out. My family prefers to eat at home so that's a bonus for me! As an alternative, you could just do this for lunches or whatever -- if you usually eat out for lunch, replace 1 or 2 lunches with leftovers.

If you want to save on Starbucks but still want to treat yourself, pay attention to when they have their deals. For example, if it's $1 off after 2:00, just schedule your trip then. You can even tuck that $1 away for your cruise.

You can also get discounted Starbucks gift cards pretty often. They ran a promo last month, buy a $10 gift card using Visa checkout and get $10 free. That is a 50% savings. If you couple deals like that with reduced trips, you will save a lot.

 

[Ngwira]

My best money saver was buying a deep freezer, stocking up on food when it's on sale and cooking dinner and packing lunches from leftovers. I've saved thousands this way.

 

[MinnieSweetheart]

That's awesome!!

I wish I could coupon!! I hear people talk about it and I decided to do it myself as well. Created an entire Pinterest board, purchased a binder and was ready to go.

That was 3 years ago. There still has not been one coupon placed in said binder.lol.

I keep thinking that someday I will find the time..

I used to coupon, but I don't really anymore. What I do that works for me is I know my "buy" prices on groceries and toiletries. So when something is on super sale, I stock up. You might also benefit from going to a couple local groceries stores in the next month and finding who has good prices on what. We shop mostly at the commissary, because the prices are amazing. However, they have a paltry selection for organics and because they don't have store brands, organics can be MUCH higher. For instance it's $4 for a half gallon of name brand organic milk at the commissary and $6 for a gallon of store brand organic milk at the local grocery store. Ours also has cheaper organic meat if you buy in the bulk pack.

We buy our fruit based on what is the loss leader/in season. My husband actually said this week "You haven't bought oranges in a while?" "Yes honey, they aren't cheap anymore!" We ate A LOT of oranges this winter...

The other thing I do instead of couponing is scan EVERYTHING at target into the cartwheel app and I only buy stuff from target when it's on sale. We also have the red card that we use there which saves us a bit, but offers additional coupons.

 

[verleniahall]

LOVE the commissary for savings! We are National Guard so we aren't on base, and we have to drive an hour to the nearest one. So we make it a once a month trip. We do the stockup there and fill in at the local store