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Websites For The Frugal?
fwc writes "Like most people, I like being able to get the most benefit out of my money. In pursuit of this, I use several websites which help stretch my dollar even more. For instance, I have found smarterliving.com which I consult for good travel-related deals. I also use slickdeals.net and fatwallet to make sure I don't miss those almost-too-good-to-be-true deals. When looking for the best price on a specific item, I usually consult Froogle, Pricewatch, and Shopper.com. I also use a collection of online stores which sell stuff dirt cheap, such as newegg, PC Surplus Online, and of course half.com. Recently, I was looking for some tools at Harbor Freight's Website and a friend suggested that I might want to also look at Homier's. I was pleasantly suprised to find that they have some prices which are even lower than at any other site which I have found. This makes me wonder what other sites are out there I haven't found yet which are in the same category." I know techbargains has "saved" me money on some things I might not otherwise have bought. Where have you been best led?
The Frugal Living Tip File has some top notch advice. It disappeared from the net awhile back, but archive.org has a copy.
EVERYDAY IS CATURDAY
always check Reseller Ratings before buying...
--IronHelix
Tiger Direct has pretty good prices on tech stuff.
Tiger Direct
"What we have here is a failure to communicate"
The Warden, Cool Hand Luke
In no particular order:
In my experience, Amazon is almost ALWAYS the cheapest place to buy something, not because of their prices on items, but because of their free shipping on orders over $25.
Cloud City Digital: DVD Production at its cheapest/finest
What about eBay? It's a pretty good place, and yes, of course, you do take the risk of getting screwed by a seller every so often, but in general I've gotten pretty good computer hardware off there (think SCSI and SCSI RAID) for a whole lot less than in the store.
...can be bought cheap, too. Go to Cheap Ass Gamer; it relies on different users posting the deals they have found, but it seems to be a very effective system. The availability of some deals depends on your area (and the brick & mortar stores you have access to).
I think Yahoo bought a lemon when they acqured Kelkoo... Or maybe they just have a damn good buisness plan for them...
http://www.gotapex.com/
:-)
superior. they update every day with new deals, coupon codes, and much more. i check up every day when i get home
He posts a ton of stuff daily, and seems to aggregate what's on some of the other sites and combines it with coupon codes, etc. link
"Want in one hand and spit in the other and see which one fills up first." - My Dad
There is a local am radio talk show host that is nationally sydicated that you might have hear of. His name is Clark Howard http://www.clarkhoward.com/. He has pretty good advice and some links to some sites that might not already be added to the posts.
A.K.A. SurplusComputers
Old rack mount systems, SCSI drives, motherboards, and a lot of cheapo tools.
For Canadians, Red Flag Deals is a great site. Coupons, links to online deals, freebies, and forums.
biddingfortravel.com contains a whole lot of valuable information on how to bid on priceline.
CD-Wow for your CDs.
Ebuyer for your computer kit.
Holborn Books for your computer books.
Click Ink for your generic ink cartridges.
Cahoot for your banking.
Ebay. No explanation needed!
Netto to check out what deals they've got on. Shortcut to Netto's offers.
I had a dealing with Homier. They came through town and was offering a door, a specific door, that normally would sell for.. at least $500.. and was only $100. We stood in line, assured we had a door to find out the guy in front of us changed his mind and talked them into selling him two -- his door and ours. Then when we spoke up they told us we could basically fuck off.
Their prices were really crazy cheap, but a few things I bought broke later on (but doesn't most things today).. and that was only a month ago.
I've left to find myself. If you happen to see me, please, keep me there until I return.
I've purchased several item from TD with no problem and my rebates went through without a hitch. -However- they have a terrible reputation for denying rebates, hiding rebate information, and otherwise abusing rebates.
If you find something at TigerDirect and you can get it out the door at a bargain price by all means go for it, but it it requires a rebate be warned, you may have trouble.
-dameron
Goto Dealmac.com for the best deals on Mac-related deals.
As an eBay seller, I find that in most cases shipping outside the continental US is a pain in the ass (Excluding Canada)
1. Not all postal systems are equal - Yes, the Italian and Spainish postal systems are as bad as the rumours say.
2. Customs routinly hold items
3. Lack of shipping insurance available
4. Postal forms need to be filled out
5. If the customer wants to return the item, it would cost me much more than a domestic return
A great place to get a good pirce on power tools, but their handtools both mechanical and woodworking are of horrible quality.
:/
Cheap woodworking tools lead to serious injuries. And mechanical tools lead to broken knuckles. You get what you pay for and then you pay some more to Blue Cross Blue Sheild
Mack, Snapon and Craftsman really can't be beat, you get durability, quality and Sears will replace about any tool even if it's from doing something stupid with em.
Oh yeah, it also has forums for Living Below Your Means (LBYM) which has tons of general money-saving tips for you penny-pinchers.
Check out Red Flag Deals for a nice selection of rebates, coupons and specials from Canadian dealers. The site covers all sorts of merchandise, but seems to be predominantly geared towards geek-analia.
Talk about a blinding glimpse of the perfectly obvious
Forgot to mention DealHunting.CA since everyone is griping about the lack of international stuff :)
Deep Discount DVD is usually the least expensive place to buy DVDs from. I will say their customer service is really slow so hope your order goes through without any problems. They offer free shipping (US and everything so they're usually cheaper than Amazon too. I've placed several orders with them and have had good luck so far.
While their selection can be a tad on the small side when considering the great internet at large... their prices kick major woo-ha's.
I recently managed to get a replacement vid card for my laptop for 10$. It was a bit of a deal. Granted the part wasn't tested and sold as-is working pull.... but all in all it worked out well for me.
I check them often... I hope you guys don't drive up the prices. Oh wait... pc surplus bad.. don't shop there... ever... please dont!
Kidding, I hope they do well.
"You should always go to other people's funerals; otherwise, they won't come to yours." -- Yogi Berra
Martin Lewis' site has some good tips and interesting forums.
I would recommend Clark Howard's site. Clark Howard has a nationally syndicated radio show and has written several fantastic books on smart financial principles. He is very well known here in the Atlanta area and his life story is very interested. He made his first million on an average salary by saving and investing for the long term (of course he makes a lot more now on his radio gig and his books).
His site contains an abundance of information on anything subject you can think of. Hey, he's pretty cool technology-wise...he even uses Vonage!
I often use PriceScan and PriceGrabber, among some of the others already mentioned by others. PriceGrabber even has a link under "Services" here on /.
if you're looking for a deal when it comes to textbooks, addall.com is pretty good. For example, Americans and Canadians can save quite a lot of money by purchasing their new school textbooks from the UK, even with the shipping added. However, that's not always true: some books are cheaper in North America than the UK, so be sure you compare before you buy.
As an example, I had to buy "Partial Differential Equations and BVP" by Asmar for my class. Using the site, I see that Amazon UK is selling it for 110.94, Indigo.ca for 134.95 while the Internet Bookshop is selling it for 104.28 amongst others. These prices always fluctuate due to exchange rate irregularities.
You can also search for not in print and rare used books as well.
I found this site that collects offers that are Free after rebate. It does a good job of finding the offers, and finding the best places to buy with cheap shipping.
Well, you know those soap chips that are left over when you're almost finished using a bar of soap? My father saves them, and then compresses them into a new bar of soap when he's saved up enough of them.
OK, I don't know if this marks me as cheap or just a geek, but my process for dealing with soap "slivers" is to stick them on the new bar. I really don't see what the point would be in saving a lot of slivers, but when you have one old one and one new one they stick together without much effort, since the wet soap kind of acts like its own glue. Future lathering wears down the old sliver, and eventually the new bar becomes a sliver and the process repeats. Hopefully your father finds this new algorithm useful. :-)
There are many places out there for cheap books, including the used book section of Amazon. Hamilton books is a great place for discount books. Some of their medical textbooks are 90% off. Also do a google search for "books" and you'll find many websites that find the lowest price for a particular book.
http://github.com/gbook/nidb
Bargainshare.com is sort of a better version of fatwallet. Deals tend to be killed by the shear volume of abusers at FW, and posters are chastized for posting deals (and trying to help their fellow man) by trolls and flamers who are simply out to spoil other peoples experiences. People at Bargainshare tend to be much friendlier, and deals that hit there first last much longer than on FW, giving you more of a chance of actually getting in on them. It's a lot more technically sophisticated, with board software that allows you to filter by criteria that are important to you.
Also, BS has a protected deal area for hot deals that would be killed if posted to the general public restricted to only positive contributors for the hardcore deal followers out there.
The bargain forum on DVDTalk.com is the best for finding the best prices on new releases, price cuts on DVDs, and finding out the circular prices about 5 days ahead of the newspapers.
Amazon.ca is the best for newly released box sets and other deals. Even with the exchange rate, there have been some outstanding deals. Babylon 5 Season 3,4 and 5 for $USD40, Scarface Gift Set for $USD25 are some recent deals I've gotten. Even with international shipping, it still blows any other prices away.
Amazon.com sometimes has a temporary price cut, and DVDTalk.com is usually one of the first places to find out about it. Recently, they had the Dick Van Dyke Show Season One for $19.99, and it sold out within about 20 minutes after being posted to DVDTalk.
FatWallet is great for finding other deals. Friday Amazon sales are usually posted there Thursday night. And for those with the time to do grocery coupons, FW is THE place to find the best deals. My weekly grocery bills have dropped from $150 to less than $50.
No boom today. Boom tomorrow. There's always a boom tomorrow. - Cmdr. Susan Ivanova
Clinko.com is just a module off of my full site Protista.com. But, it's the main attraction because it parses bensbargains and slickdeals so I can check them at work.
I'd say this was a shameless promotion, but i make Jack and shit off of this, so enjoy it.
I like it.
Gives some good hints on how to avoid a scam.
Explains how the car dealers make money, and how you can save some.
If you don't understand how they make money off you, then you can't tell if they're ripping you off. If you know what is going on, you have a chance.
If your near Alberson they been running a lot of 10 for 10 dollars items lately. Fill up 1/2 of the freezer with those small microwave meals { hey Im a programmer! } each batch of 10 save me almost 7 dollars. And they are not half bad!
Also if nears a frys check every so many days for their flyers. Usualy have some strange mb/cpu deal that usualy is prety good. Latest item are deals on DVD+R for about 0.60 for 25.
Also CompUsless have black ad's some times listed only on there site. BestBut and others usualy post ther weekly ad's late saturday night on there web site.
I hear there's this website called DealMeIn.net that's really good!
Computerlandcentral breaks down the deals by date by store like many sites. However, they are also good about publishing coupon codes, where many sites (TechBargains, XPBargains, FatWallet, ...) make you click through the link to get the coupon discount. The code is really helpful if you want to start shopping some place like eBates or FatWallet, to get a small rebate on total purchase.
Sometimes I worry that I'll develop Alzheimer's disease, but no one will notice.
No you aren't all rotten, but there is a lot more fraud with international orders.
The best way I have found to deal with this is either stop shipping international or use extra measures to make sure someone isn't trying to screw you.
1) Start using an extra service to get data on your orders. I use maxmind's service, they tell me many things that will set off a red flag. Did they come in through an anonymous proxy, are they using one of the many free email services, how far is their mapped IP from their billing address. Nothing personal just enough data to be relatively sure that they are who they claim to be. If the order was placed 8000 kilometers from the billing address, it's probably a stolen card.
2) If you are even remotely concerned about the validity of the order have them sign a form with a photo copy of their card, yes it's a pain, but too many charge backs and you start paying crappy rates or get dropped. If they are legit, they should have no problem doing that.
I order a fair number of things from eBay, and also AbeBooks.com (nice for buying used textbooks) so I don't really feel that I'm out of touch with international shipping rates. However, using BorderFree at Half.com results in absolutely outrageous shipping fees. If I spend $15US, once BorderFree's fees are added in I tend to end up with a bill of maybe $45US, versus somewhere in the neighborhood of $5 - $10 for shipping a similar item from other online retailers.
Clearly you know nothing of the value-add services like auto-sniping which have grown up around ebay. A manual snipe is a bid, but only the uninformed snipe by hand any more. Automated snipes are placed long before the end of the auction and only become bids when they hit their deadline.
Simple Living is a great resource for those interested in voluntary simplicity/general frugality.
http://www.vermontcountrystore.com
De sig boss de sig
No one mentioned the obvious overstock.com. I have had good experiences with their customer service and their price on books is awesome. I bought refurbished electronics from them on the cheap and havent had any problems with the products.
dealnews and dealmac have been 2 of my favorites for many years now. They are pretty good about freguently updating their site with "sold out, expired, price change, etc notices.
Here are the ones I have bookmarked:
n e.com
e max.com
Travel
orbitz.com (favorite)
expedia.com
travelocity.com
priceli
allcheapfares.com
hotels.com
hostels.com
hiayh.org/hostels
aaa.com
Books
bigwords.com (Love it; compares multiple stores)
bookpool.com
Random good deals on electronics in the weekly ad, especially around Thanksgiving
bestbuy.com
circuitcity.com
offic
officedepot.com
staples.com
Misc
allposters.com (posters)
outpost.com (you name it)
www.secondwindpcs.com (used computer stuff)
and naturally, ebay, amazon, and buy.com
It's also fun to google for: buy [name of what you want].
When in doubt, check it out at bbb.org (Better Business Bureau) - you can search for businesses by website.
Ebuyer seem to have mixed reviews.
A really great company are Crucial - they basically sell memory products (sticks/card readers/gfx cards/cf cards). Service like no company I know. You can find them at www.crucial.com/uk.
www.freeafterrebate.info
everything there is well... free after rebates
We have seen that living things are too improbable and too beautifully "designed" to have come into existence by chance.
These guys are sort of a consolidator of other sites. I use them for books - enter an ISBN and they'll tell you the price with and without shipping at several dozen online stores. Very handy. They also list prices on electronics, music, movies, and bikes(??).
I've soured on them. Good prices, but zero quality control. They ship a lot of DOA stuff and the returns policy is a pain in the ass.
Fundamentalism is a crime against humanity
It sounds like frimp.net is trying to do what Craigslist is doing... Regional FREE classifieds for just about anything... They charge for job want ads, but it is a great alternative for online paid classifieds and auctions...
Perspective is to Science what Interpretation is to Religion. Obama + Paul FTW