The past few years in the economy has been pretty bad; the job market in the markets we’ve been living in even more so. My wife and I have made our way around the nation on little more than the cost of gas using hard work and some pointed belt-tightening.
Crash With Family: More and more these days people are resorting to all sorts of non-traditional living arrangements; for my wife and I this has been no different. Since we’ve been married (September 2007) the precursor to this economic malaise my wife and I have stayed with friends in Los Angeles, my grandfather in South Carolina, my mother in Florida, my in-laws in Connecticut, and my father in South Carolina. One must never be too proud to ask for a handout when helping hands are needed.
Stay Out of Restaurants: One of the great joys of my childhood was taking that first bite into the diner hamburger when I was out on my own; these days there’s no room for that. We refill bottles of juice and water from the grocery store with tap water and powder iced tea mix, we buy every meal from the grocery store, we brown bag it when we’re working somewhere and we have a fun cooler when we’re out on the road. It’s the only way.
Cut Back on Driving: One of the ways we got hooked up with my mother at one point and my in-laws for a protracted period of time was because of gas prices. When gas got over $4.00 a gallon in the northeast and the commensurate amount in the south, we did what we had to do and hunkered down.
Time is Money Unless You’ve No Job: When you have things going on; every second counts. When you’ve been unemployed for a period of months or years, time is relative. Clipping coupons, enjoying specials, and shopping around is easily done on foot when you’re out of work and hard up. Another more time efficient way is to shop around from stores websites and see what the deals are that are coming, how long they’re there, and see if you can’t save some coin joining membership clubs.
Being frugal is becoming more and more a necessity in these strapped times we’re living in.
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Personal Finance Meltdown: Emergency Funds
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