For Smokers Only: Save a ton of cash with e-cigarettes

I just wanted to take a moment to tell you about e-cigarettes, and how much cash you will save if you switch. I wanted to post sooner, but I feared my enthusiasm was simply brought about by the newness of my stylish e-cigarette. Now that I have some time under my belt, I think it's fair to say that I no longer smoke cigarettes. The statistics shown in my screenshot are for my husband and I combined. As you can see, we have saved well over $2000.00, not to mention the time added to our lives. There are others ways that switching to e-cigarettes can save you money, and perhaps you hadn't thought of these. First, how many times have you run out of cigarettes and had to make a special trip to the store to get them? Gas is certainly not cheap, and all those little jaunts to feed your addiction will add up. Second, burn holes. Holes in your car upholstery, your blanket, your clothes. The saving there are obvious. Third, cleaning expenses go way down once you make the switch to e-cigarettes. No more tar coating your walls, furniture, curtains, etc. I could not believe what a filthy habit I had given up; it took me a month of cleaning to get everything clean again, but now it stays pretty clean. Household cleaners are pretty expensive, and you will use less once you switch. Fourth, insurance premiums will go down after you have quit for one year, because your medical expenses will likely go down as well. We spent around $80.00 for our initial e-cigarette kits, still cheaper than a carton of cigarettes. We are spending an average of $25.00 a month for liquid nicotine. I sometimes spent that much in a DAY for regular cigarettes. We did some research and decided on Halo brand rechargeable, refillable e-cigarettes. I am not necessarily endorsing the brand, but one of the reasons we chose them is because their nicotine is made in the United States, so I feel more confident about the ingredients. Disposable e-cigarettes can end up being costly, but we have really hit our cash-saving groove with the rechargeable ones. Now that we have our hardware, we order bottles of nicotine to keep them filled. Bottom line, if you just can't give up the nicotine, e-cigarettes are the way to go. The cash savings is indisputable, and like me, you may find that you can take it or leave it after a few months. Do your research, and give it a try.

Making a little extra cash

Well, I tried this a couple of nights ago, but the website was down for maintenance and I lost the whole page, so here I go again. What I wanted to talk about was way to make a little extra cash to get you through some hard times. None of my resources will make you rich, and I haven't been paid for promoting them. The are genuine resources I have used, and they have put groceries on my table more than once.

The first one, of course, is eBay. First, make sure your PayPal account is set up properly so you can maximize your profit. Your PayPal account should be set up as a Business Premier account. If you are selling on eBay, this is perfectly legit. This will give you a cash back bonus when you use your PayPal debit card. You do have a debit card, right? If not, that is step two. It works just like your check card, but with a 1.5% cash back bonus when yo use it. Third, sign up for a PayPal mutual fund. Any balance in your account will then start drawing interest monthly. Now your ready to sell on eBay. Here's link that can help you decide what you need to charge for your items. http://www.ebcalc.com/ It even calculates eBay fees for you. Make sure you research similar products on eBay to see what others are paying for them, and what shipping fees are being charged. It's better to start your initial price low. This will assure you of a lower insertion fee and attract more bidders.

Another way to pick up some decent cash is by selling your used books. If you have fairly recent college texts, Cash4Books, found at http://cash4books.net/index.php?ref=55351 is a great resource. I recently sold four books and netted $59.00. If you accept their payment to you via your PayPal account, you get a bonus. The only drawback if you are in dire need of cash is that it takes about two weeks to get the money. They provide you with a prepaid shipping label bu it is Media Mail, which is very slow.

Another source of cash is http://www.listasaurus.com This is a fairly new site where you can list items you have for sale. The beauty of it is that they not only don't charge a fee to list, they pay you .25 for each item you list. All they ask is that you upload an original (not stock) photo so they know it's really your item.

Last but not least is Amazon's Mechanical Turk use the Google search box at the top left of this page to find it). This is an amazing site where people post little jobs they need done and pay you for them. For example, I just posted to a guys blog and he paid me a quarter. I know that doesn't sound like much, but there are hundreds of thousands of these little jobs. Do a few each night and they add up. I usually get in six to ten a night.

This little list should give you a start on your extra cash flow. My next blog will be a review of paid survey sites. I promise to only post legit sites, no $500 gift cards if you sign up for 7,000 offers! They will be sites that I personally belong to and have been a member long enough to get paid. I may even talk about being a mail decoy...yes, that job does exist, but it's top secret.