NEED EXTRA CASH? NEVER PAY FULL PRICE FOR ANYTHING!

Imagine if you lived in a magical world where you never had to pay full price for anything!  Well guess what, you're already there.  With so many promotional gimmicks, it's quite possible to avoid ever paying full price for anything you buy for the rest of your life.  You just have to figure out how to do it.

I've been a bargain hunter for years, but since my recent trip to the hospital, I've been looking for even more ways to save.  Here are a few of the things I've come up with.

CASH BACK ON PURCHASES:  You've most likely heard of people who use cash back credit cards to pay for their purchases, then pay the balance in full at the end of each month and collect the cash back on their purchases.  This is a great way to save on your purchases, in fact my sister does it all the time.  However, I've found what I think is an even better way to take advantage of this strategy.  One of my money market accounts provides a cash back debit Mastercard.  As long as I use it like a credit card at the point of purchase (I don't give them my pin number), I get cash back for everything I buy.  I have to admit I was not really taking advantage of this until just recently.  It occurred to me that I could transfer all the money I usually spend on cash purchases into this account, use the card and get part of my money back.  I now pay for gas and maintenance on my car, restaurant meals, grocery and department store purchases and anything else I used to pay with cash, I put on the card.  At the end of each month I get cash back added directly to my money market account.  What makes it really great is that I also earn interest on my average daily balance, so adding my spending money to the account has boosted my interest income as well.

USE COUPONS:  I've talked about this before, but again I have to admit that I truly hadn't taken full advantage of this easy money saving tip until just recently.  Now I scan the coupon section of the newspaper religiously, in search of manufacturer or store coupons for items that I use on a regular basis.  Recently I've saved several dollars on some of my favorites like Folgers coffee, Tide laundry detergent, Bounce fabric softener, Campbell's soup and Lever 2000 bar soap to name just a few.  These are all items I purchase on a regular basis, but with the coupons and the cash back debit card, I've saved a great deal of money and earned cash back.  

SALES AND REBATES:  Of course I've always watched the sales and taken advantage of manufacturers rebates on any of the items I buy, but I've become more committed to putting these money saving tips to better use as well.  I'm thinking the best case scenario would be to find items I use on a regular basis on sale with a manufacturers rebate, then use a coupon and my cash back card to purchase them, resulting in a quadruple discount!!!  Of course you may not always be able to use coupons on sale items, but when you can, what a deal!

By following these few money saving ideas, I've been able to make my hard earned dollars go a lot farther, helping to create extra cash to pay medical expenses and keep my savings and investment plans on track.