How long have you been with Progressive? I had always understood that most of the time when an insurance company advertises a really great deal, it’s an “introductory offer” designed to entice people to switch, that lasts for a limited time and then resets to a higher rate. So is that the normal rate, or some promotional rate?
Based on post-claim consumer surveys, GEICO is about average, Progressive is effectively at the bottom.
That’s a pretty big drop for Progressive across five years…
A few years ago I ordered a new dishwasher from Lowe’s for $800.
- $50 off at checkout because of an advertised sale
- \approx $40 (5%) using the store credit card
- $100 back from an unadvertised manufacturer rebate, which I wasn’t expecting, but found when I was looking for the installation manual
- $100 “good will” refund from the store when the first one delivered was damaged in shipping
So in all, $200 less than the already $100 off I was getting. I’d have been upset about all of the delays If I’d had to go two months without a dishwasher, but it was just replacing an old one I hated that had an intermittent leak. A dog towel or two on the floor meant I could keep using the old one.
I quit smoking and drinking back in 2019. Since then I’ve saved over $20,000.
And, I quit my weekly Chinese food order, as well as stopped my daily morning coffee at Dunkin and instead make it at home. So it’s closer to saving almost $25,000 in three years.
5 years now. And my rates actually went down a little bit. I’m paying about 9 dollars a year less now than I did 5 years ago for the same coverage. Not much, I know. But better than paying 9 dollars more.
I don’t know why more people don’t use the reusable K-cups in their coffee machines. It’s way, wayyy cheaper than buying the pre-filled ones, especially the name brand ones.
And hell, you can get the reusable ones at the Dollar Tree for crying out loud. I’ve saved a ton using them.
We changed every light bulb in the house, including porch lights, to LED. Can’t say for sure if it was only that but our power bill went down an average of $11 a month after that.
I long ago had Geico and they went up every year until they were above everyone else. Progressive has progressively gotten less each year.
Uh, probably time to look for new moto insurance. Maybe this is why they are so cheap.
This came to my mind recently because of dealing with replacing phones due to the 3G shut down and such.
First, land line. We like it and prefer it as our main contact number. We do VoIP with the same number we’ve had for almost 40 years. Pay per minute used and that comes out to about $4 or less a month. A standard land line it going to be well over $30 and even a cable company will charge around $30 a month for mere VoIP once the signup deal expires. I also bought our VoIP box cheap a long time ago. No rental fee or anything.
As for cell phones, we use cheap lesser models or used ones that cost practically nothing. Or literally nothing in the case of the new phone for Mrs. FtG and buy minutes ahead of time. Which we use very little of. The main cost is getting the next year of service and deals abound on eBay. So one year of service for what others pay for 1-2 months of service.
People are always trying to sell us a “deal” that is at least 6 times more costly than what we currently pay. I tell the cable company: “Can you beat $4 a month?” Their whole marketing mentality is oriented towards people who are on their phones all the time. We barely use them.
I know my car insurance is not the cheapest, but I was sued a while back by people with a sleazy shyster lawyer. Their diagram wasn’t even physically possible with the damage they claimed. They also claimed physical injuries but went to one appt and never returned.
My insurance company backed me all the way, and they did NOT fold and just pay them off. We went to arbitration and won, and I wasn’t out a dime other than my normal insurance payment. And my payments did NOT go up the next year. Made me a customer for life.
Our insurance rep just switched our blanket policy (house, 3 cars) from Farmers to Travelers. We’ll save about 700 bucks a year in premiums.
Plus, an added bonus: Our policy with Farmers expired on June 3. One week later, I received a check from the company for an overpayment refund. The amount? Seven cents.
When my old refrigerator, which was probably original to the apartment (early 1970s), was on its last legs, indicated by rusty hinges, I contacted the rental office, and got a new one shortly afterwards.
Even though I changed nothing else, my electricity bill went down by $20 a month.
I wanted a synthesizer that could work as a vocoder. Instead of a vintage Roland VP-330 that costs 4K or so, I decided to get a Behringer VC-340 copy of one. Since I bought it used, it was $50-$200* less than new. Since I found a listing that had listed it as a “vovoder” instead of a vocoder, I figure I saved around $100 more.
So, I call it $50 off for buying used, $100 off for getting lucky. I’d figure I would have saved $300 if I really needed it now, but I only really wanted it, not needed it now. If I had patience, I could probably save more.
*I’m not certain why, but new ones on reverb are being listed for around $150 over list price right now.
I switched to Geico from Farmers when I bought a new car and had to carry full coverage insurance. We were paying over $200/month for liability only on two cars (adult drivers with perfect driving records both) and then when we added the new car we were quoted $350/month for liability on the two existing cars, full-coverage in the new car. So we switched and ended up paying ~$160/month for liability on two cars, full-coverage on one.
We now have a teenage driver and pay Geico less than what Farmers quoted us for just the adults for the same coverage.
I don’t remember exact dollar amounts, so these are approximations that convey the general idea. Shortly before the pandemic hit, I was toying with the idea of getting a new laptop. I prefer desktops for general use but I like to have a laptop around for portability, and mine was definitely getting long in the tooth.
Sometimes the Dell refurbished site has good deals on business computers returned from lease, and I found a nice Dell Latitude with a hi-res 1080p screen and i5 4310M processor for something like $400 that was discounted to $300 (approximately). Then a notice came up that for the next 24 hours any purchase would get an automatic $100 discount.
So I sprung for it, and it turned out to be a beautiful like-new pristeen laptop that I ended up getting for just $200. Then a few months later the pandemic hit and refurbished computers of any kind just totally disappeared. Now they’re coming back but I haven’t seen anything for less than $700.
I did spend some extra money replacing the mechanical HDD with an SSD just for extra speed and robustness, and that’s made it even nicer.
Five years ago I switched car insurance from whoever I was using to AAA, cutting my yearly premiums in half. During COVID they sent me a request for my odometer reading. A month later I received a check for $80 due to decreased driving!
There’s an easy way to save money if you live on Hawai’i Island - get Amazon Prime and buy all non-perishable groceries through them instead of at the local grocery store, where prices will generally be much higher. I’m sure I save several hundred dollars/year that way, even after taking the cost of a Prime membership into account.
For example, cans of Friskies pate are about 45 cents per can cheaper on Amazon right now. My cats share 1 can per day, so right there that’s $164/year saved. Not to mention all the other items I buy on line, like buttermilk powder, teff flour, Israeli couscous, laundry detergent, etc.