Today's Prudent Financial/Credit Move

[cv91915]

I took the SUV into the dealer for routine service this morning, which costs the same as Jiffy Lube or similar (before any coupons).

The dealer washes the car too, so I'm calling it even.

 

I declined their recommendation for a pair of new wiper blades for $109.60, and instead I ordered a pair from Advance Auto Parts (online/store pickup) for $23.98 less 2% back from Ebates.

 

AAP put them on for me when I got to the store.

[Sidewinder]

 

Another tip - use an empty plastic milk jug, fill it with water.

 

 

From where?

[centex]

I declined their recommendation for a pair of new wiper blades for $109.60, and instead I ordered a pair from Advance Auto Parts (online/store pickup) for $23.98 less 2% back from Ebates.

 

Good god...even Jaguar doesn't gouge me like that for blades. They put the last pair on the XK8 for under $40 when I had it in for an oil change (now THAT is a $100 bill most times, although it does take more than many vehicles out there given its 8qt capacity).

[IndyPoolPlayer]

 

I declined their recommendation for a pair of new wiper blades for $109.60, and instead I ordered a pair from Advance Auto Parts (online/store pickup) for $23.98 less 2% back from Ebates.

 

Good god...even Jaguar doesn't gouge me like that for blades. They put the last pair on the XK8 for under $40 when I had it in for an oil change (now THAT is a $100 bill most times, although it does take more than many vehicles out there given its 8qt capacity).

 

For that price I thought those would be Mercedes or BMW wiper blades, but he did get an oil change for a reasonable price and there's nothing reasonable about Mercedes or BMW.

 

Last time I spent over $125 for an oil change was prior to 2011 when I owned a Ford Super Duty with a Power Stroke. 14 qts of oil and two filters.

Edited May 29, 2018 by IndyPoolPlayer

[policebox]

I didn't do this today, but a couple months ago.

 

I opened a NFCU Certificate during one of their specials, with an APY of 2.23%. Instead of cashing out and spending my cashback rewards from my credit cards and Ebates, I'm putting all the cashback money into the certificate. Come June 2019, hope to have enough saved for flight school.

[centex]

 

 

I declined their recommendation for a pair of new wiper blades for $109.60, and instead I ordered a pair from Advance Auto Parts (online/store pickup) for $23.98 less 2% back from Ebates.

 

Good god...even Jaguar doesn't gouge me like that for blades. They put the last pair on the XK8 for under $40 when I had it in for an oil change (now THAT is a $100 bill most times, although it does take more than many vehicles out there given its 8qt capacity).

 

For that price I thought those would be Mercedes or BMW wiper blades, but he did get an oil change for a reasonable price and there's nothing reasonable about Mercedes or BMW.

 

Last time I spent over $125 for an oil change was prior to 2011 when I owned a Ford Super Duty with a Power Stroke. 14 qts of oil and two filters.

 

Never paid a dealer for changes on the 350...always did those on my own. Of course, there was also enough space under that engine to pitch a tent and set up camp LOL!. The fuel filter was the tough task just to avoid smelling like diesel for a week...

 

The fun task was pouring those 15 quarts (2000 F350 with the 7.3l) into containers to go dispose of it properly...oh, and always keeping an eye on who had the best price on Rotella.

[cv91915]

 

 

I declined their recommendation for a pair of new wiper blades for $109.60, and instead I ordered a pair from Advance Auto Parts (online/store pickup) for $23.98 less 2% back from Ebates.

 

Good god...even Jaguar doesn't gouge me like that for blades. They put the last pair on the XK8 for under $40 when I had it in for an oil change (now THAT is a $100 bill most times, although it does take more than many vehicles out there given its 8qt capacity).

 

For that price I thought those would be Mercedes or BMW wiper blades, but he did get an oil change for a reasonable price and there's nothing reasonable about Mercedes or BMW.

 

Last time I spent over $125 for an oil change was prior to 2011 when I owned a Ford Super Duty with a Power Stroke. 14 qts of oil and two filters.

 

 

The blades on my Mercedes E500 were in the $200 territory.

 

At the time there were no perfect non-OEM options, but I was lucky enough to find a guy at the local Pep Boys who had a hack that did a good job for under $50.

 

This car took just short of 9 quarts of synthetic oil, but thankfully it went 10,000 miles between oil changes. Life's small mercies.

[muso]

I canceled myFICO today and I'm going to add $29.95 a month to the extra principal payments we are making on our mortgage.

 

Did they make you a retention offer?? I'm curious how low they'll go ;-)

[cv91915]

 

I canceled myFICO today and I'm going to add $29.95 a month to the extra principal payments we are making on our mortgage.

 

Did they make you a retention offer?? I'm curious how low they'll go ;-)

No retention offer, but I really didn't need to continue even at a discounted rate.

 

Six years ago I couldn't have imagined being able to make this statement, but it was starting to get boring watching my scores bounce around in the 830s and 840s.

 

High quality problem.

[ukaserex]

This is an older tip; but somehow I'd forgotten about it. I'm sure I'm not the only one who's noticed that whatever product I was comparison shopping for seems to turn up on just about any website I look at - in the margins. Got a pair of shoes online last week - and the ads for shoes are still showing up.

But - my tip is this: When you buy online, be sure you have more than one browser. Anecdotally, I can confirm that those who use Safari will pay more than those that use Edge, Chrome or Firefox. I was looking for tires about 6 months ago, and it was still true then. So, when price shopping - don't just compare Amazon to Jet to Walmart to Target -- check the same places with a different browser, and check in private mode, too, just to see if it makes a difference in price.

[cv91915]

 

 

Today I canceled rental car coverage on the car I have in California. The other two cars we keep at the Mud Hut are next.

 

We would have to have an accident AND max the payout on the coverage ($500-600) once every nine years just to break even. This is too small of a potential loss to insure.

 

The savings goes toward extra principal payments on our mortgage.

 

 

This meager insurance savings inspired me to review our entire insurance situation.

 

First, we've decided to move all of our policies (home, auto and umbrella) from State Farm to Amica.

 

Price-wise using comparable coverages and deductibles it was about a wash, but Amica is a much better insurance company by all accounts I could find. The change in insurer alone is worthwhile.

 

Some of the coverages and deductibles no longer made sense. By making some prudent adjustments we ended up with a total savings of 7.9%.

 

I'm taking (annual savings/12) and adding this amount to our mortgage payments every month beginning with 6/1/18 payment.

 

 

The move to Amica is complete.

 

Only the auto policy on the Mudmobiles offered a pay-in-full discount, so we opted to pay for that one upfront.

 

The rest of the policies are on a monthly auto-pay plan, which costs nothing additional.

 

 

The refund for the canceled California policies was in my mailbox when I got here last night. This will put us $129 closer to paying off our mortgage.

[cv91915]

This morning I did our 2018 backdoor Roth conversions.

[cv91915]

I am having this house cleaned every ~6 weeks now, instead of every ~4.

[cv91915]

I skipped buying breakfast at O'Hare today and had Raisin Bran in the Admirals Club instead.  For lunch I had a comped sandwich on my flight.

 

I stopped buying food at restaurants at O'Hare a couple of years ago when I noticed the 11.5% sales tax rate.

[credit_help]

I skipped buying breakfast at O'Hare today and had Raisin Bran in the Admirals Club instead.  For lunch I had a comped sandwich on my flight.
 
I stopped buying food at restaurants at O'Hare a couple of years ago when I noticed the 11.5% sales tax rate.

Don’t you expense your meals at ORD? Or, you must be still in Chicago on vacation.

[cv91915]

17 minutes ago, credit_help said:

 

Don’t you expense your meals at ORD? Or, you must be still in Chicago on vacation.

 

This is a personal trip, but it really wouldn't matter.  I don't spend my employer's money on anything I wouldn't buy with my own.

[credit_help]

This is a personal trip, but it really wouldn't matter.  I don't spend my employer's money on anything I wouldn't buy with my own.

Isn’t this prudent financial/credit move for you not your employer thread?

[credit_help]

I skipped buying breakfast at O'Hare today and had Raisin Bran in the Admirals Club instead.

I bought Ezekiel 4:9 cereal this morning on grocery trip. I heard it is biblical.

[StarkRaven$]

Will schedule Uber to take me to SAN airport instead of taxi, saving nearly 50%. 

[cv91915]

16 minutes ago, creditmaze said:

Will schedule Uber to take me to SAN airport instead of taxi, saving nearly 50%. 

Uber Pool if you have all day.  

[StarkRaven$]

19 minutes ago, cv91915 said:

Uber Pool if you have all day.  

I use to take a taxi when my flight departed at 8am. I didn't trust that the gig economy would arrive when it was still dark. My outbound flight is after 9am this time. I will check that out for the future.

[cv91915]

New York Times automatically renewed my crossword subscription that I purchased for $19.99 for the first year at $59.99 for the second year.

 

Over chat they gave me a retention offer to stay for $16.99/year, auto-renewing at the same rate.

 

Done.

[cv91915]

I made a conscious effort to have our second home cleaned less often in 2018.  

 

In general I'm only here for 7-10 days a month (and sometimes less), usually by myself, and yet I was faithfully having the place cleaned every single month.

 

I just went through our 2018 expenses and found that - including the imminent 12/5 visit - we paid for the maid service just five times in 2018.  

 

I achieved this through a combination of absorbing some of the lighter recurring tasks, and, quite honestly, by lowering my standards to some degree. 

 

In 2019 I will put the equivalent of one cleaning visit toward mortgage principal on our primary home in the months when we skip the cleaning service on the place in California.  I should have already been doing that.