Saving Money on Your Cable, Phone, Internet, and Cell Bills - Part 2

I’m sorry it’s been so long since I brought you part 1.  Life….life gets in the way some time.  The summer was busy, then I had to get ready to start homeschooling all 4 kids  - at the same time we were getting ready to go on a 2 week trip to Disney World and Universal Studios with 13 people.  When we got home, I had to get ready to start a new fitness challenge group that needed revamping, because I added a Bible study to it.

Well, things have finally calmed down.   This morning, I slept in till 10!!!  I then went to pick my older boys up at a friends house and was able to sit and chat with her for an hour without feeling like I should be doing something else.   When I got home, I made a homemade chicken soup and put some ingredients in the bread maker to make fresh bread.  My house smells good and looks pretty clean, so I feel like I have some time to sit down and help you all SAVE SOME MONEY!

In part 1, I showed you how to easily save money on your cell phone bill.  This time, I’m going to tell you how we save money on TV, phone, and internet.  Many people have all 3 things bundled together.  I haven’t checked recently, but last I knew, the bundle price for all 3 was pretty hefty.

The first thing you need to do is stop bundling and fire your cable company!!!  This step might be the hardest for many people. If you are that tied to one channel that you must watch on cable, then I challenge you to go without it for a little while.  I promise you….YOU CAN LIVE WITHOUT IT.  We haven’t had cable TV service for 12 years and it’s been one of the best decisions we’ve ever made.Second thing you need to do is call your local phone provider or cable company and ask them what the cost of ONLY a high-speed Internet connection is (cable, DSL or fiber-optic).  Some companies call it “Naked DSL.”  At first, I was told we couldn’t do this, but after some persistence on my end, they did it for me.  The price ended up being $29.99/month (includes all taxes/fees).   This is for DSL with Frontier in Upstate NY.Third thing to do is purchase an OOMA box.  We have been using an Ooma box for our home phone for about 6 years.  Ooma provides free home phone service once you purchase their device for a one-time fee (About $130).   All you have to do is plug your high-speed Internet and existing home phone into Ooma.  Once you do that, you can call anywhere in the U.S. for free. You pay only applicable taxes and fees (ours run about $3.50/month).  You'll enjoy clear, landline quality voice calls with caller-ID, call-waiting, and voicemail included.  In many cases, you can port your current phone number to Ooma.  Number porting allows you to transfer your home phone number from your current service provider (whether VoIP or landline) to Ooma. This can be done for a one-time charge of $39.99 or get free porting request when you purchase a yearly subscription to Ooma Premier (we do not have Ooma premier, but if you’d like to do that, it’s $120/year – personally, I don’t use any of the extra features with that, so I don’t think it’s worth it).Step four – You know those shows you’ve been watching on TV?  The ones you can’t live without?  MOST of them can be watched on your computer or on your TV.  Here are a couple things we have so that we can watch the shows we want. 1.  A subscription to Amazon Prime - $99.99/year (approximately $8.33/month) 2.  A subscription to Netflix - $7.99/month for streaming only 3.  A subscription to Hulu Plus $7.99/month 4.  A Redbox account to rent movies for $1.20/day All the TV’s in our house are hooked up to some kind of device that allows us to watch movies from Amazon, Netflix or Hulu.  One TV is hooked up to an xbox 360, one is hooked up to a Wii, and one is hooked up to a Roku box.  If you don’t have any gaming systems, the Roku boxes can be purchased for about $40.  There’s also the new Fire TV.  Although I haven’t tried it yet, I’m considering it.  It seems to have better features than the Roku.  Like the Roku, it is a tiny box you connect to your HDTV. It's the easiest way to enjoy Netflix, Prime Instant Video, Hulu Plus, YouTube.com, low-cost movie rentals, music, and much more.  Some of the features of the Fire TV are:

Massive selection—Over 200,000 TV episodes and movies, millions of songs, and hundreds of games. Show me Free 30-day Prime trial—Unlimited access to thousands of popular movies and TV shows including award-winning series from HBO and exclusive titles like Downton Abbey. Voice search that actually works—Simply say the name of what you want to watch and start enjoying in seconds Tiny box, huge specs—Fast quad-core processor, 2 GB of memory, dedicated GPU, plus 1080p HD video and Dolby Digital Plus surround sound Easy to set up and use—Pre-registered to your Amazon account so you can enjoy favorite titles and personalized recommendations Instant streaming—Exclusive new feature ASAP predicts what movies and TV episodes you’ll want to watch and buffers them for playback before you hit play Perfect for parents—Amazon FreeTime lets you easily limit screen time and create personalized profiles just for kids Great for gaming—Play blockbuster titles like Minecraft-Pocket Edition, The Walking Dead, and Monsters University, plus free games and Amazon exclusives. Paid games start from just 99 cents

So let’s add everything up:
1.  DSL:  $29.99/month
2.  Ooma:  $3.50/month
3.  Amazon Prime:  $8.33/month
4.  Netflix:  $7.99/month
5.  Hulu Plus:  $7.99/month
6.  Redbox:  Averages about $4.80/month for 4 rentals per month

Total Cost:  $62.60/month!!!  Can you beat that price?  If you can, PLEASE let me know!!  The more I can save, the happier I am.   If you’re spending more than that, I DARE you to fire your cable company and try this.  Save the money you’re saving every month for a vacation, give it to charity, or, for goodness sake, use it to better your health and BUY SOME SHAKEOLOGY FROM ME!  Sorry….I had to put that in there!  Whatever you do with the money you are saving, spend it wisely.  Seek God in prayer before you spend your money and make sure that it’s something that you really need.