It’s Frugal Confessions Friday!!!
Posted on | December 18, 2009 | 10 Comments
Hello Frugal Confessions Readers! If you are new to this series, check out the introduction here.
Here’s mine for the week:
We are switching our home insurance companies. Ever since we purchased our home, I thought the amount we were paying for insurance was insanely high. Granted, I have been told that it is more expensive to insure a home in Houston because of the greater risk of floods and hurricanes. Still, I decided to shop around.
I am happy to say that I found very comparable coverage (trust me, we would never be foolish enough to risk our home to save some money) at a savings of $739!!!!! How great is that? With this insurance, we can have flood insurance, and regular insurance, and still save $479 off of the last company we were with. Hurrah!!!
What are ways you’ve saved money this week, or in the past? I’d love to hear them. And Happy Friday!!!!
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Tags: homeowner's insurance > Insurance > Saving Money > shopping around
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10 Responses to “It’s Frugal Confessions Friday!!!”
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I have Joined the Yakezie Challenge!
December 18th, 2009 @ 11:01 am
We literally saved about 15% (closer to 20%) by switching to Geico from Farmers for our home and auto insurance. State Farm quoted us double for homeowner’s insurance…
We live in Spring near 249 in a house valued to be rebuilt at $160,000 and pay $740 a year for homeowner’s insurance and get our flood insurance at the set state rate of about $300…have you found better? If so, can you please email me the company? Thanks!
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December 18th, 2009 @ 11:05 am
Wow Crystal!!! Our home insurance was originally $2500, for near Meyerland in Houston, and now we are getting it at $1564 and considering ourselves lucky!! The company we are switching to is Allstate, so maybe you should get a quote from them and see if it is comparable, and cheaper.
Thanks for your comment!
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December 18th, 2009 @ 11:18 am
Hmm. My homeowner’s for my house at the beach (I rent with my brother here now) is about $560 for coverage of $123k. It’s the seperate windstorm policy that is a killer but well worth it. It goes up for sale today if anybody wants to buy it
Definitely shop around for any insurance policies though. Recently for my car, there was over a $300 gap between the highest and lowest quotes for a 6 month policy for coverage that was virtually identical. That’s $600 a year! What was unexpected is that the lowest quote came from State Farm while the highest came from Geico.
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December 18th, 2009 @ 11:39 am
BluSky: Thanks for your information as well! That is awesome that you shopped around on car coverage, and you’re right, it’s utterly amazing that comparable coverages can be so different in prices…
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December 18th, 2009 @ 11:43 am
When we bought our house we shopped around for homeowner’s insurance and ended up switching our car insurance to the same insurance company in order to save even more on both policies!
Something I’ve done to save money recently: We knew we were going to buy a new toilet from Lowe’s for one of our bathrooms so I checked out PlasticJungle to see if they had any discounted Lowe’s gift cards. It seems like their selection for some stores varies and changes quickly, but I was able to find gift cards worth about the same as we planned to spend, for an 8% discount! On top of that, I signed up for an email that got us a 10% off coupon, and since we live in PA close to the Delaware border we decided to drive a couple extra miles to the Lowe’s in DE where there is no sales tax, which saved us another 6%! All in all I calculated that we saved around $45 for my efforts. The only other thing we might have been able to do if we had bought from a different store, would be if we bought it online though ebates but selected a “store pick-up” option (unfortunately Lowe’s isn’t on ebates!)
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December 18th, 2009 @ 12:12 pm
Aurora: Hello, and awesome job on the toilet! Also, I love how insurance companies will do multi-policy discounts, like car and homes together. Woohoo!
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December 18th, 2009 @ 12:20 pm
@Aurora
I love buying and using discount gift cards! It only makes sense if you know you need the money at a specific place in advance, but then it is awesome. I usually find great deals on Ebay, but make sure you only buy from someone who has tons of great feedback and free shipping.
We also use our Discover cash back rewards to get discount gift cards to places we’d go anyway like Bath and Body Works since we’re addicted to their hand soaps. $25 gift card costs $20 from the cash back rewards, so we are using free money to get an additional 20% off!
It works well for gifts too since you can get $25 values for $20 from a variety of places like AMC Theatres, Bed Bath & Beyond, Borders Books and Music, Gap, Staples, Men’s Wearhouse, The Container Store, Waldenbooks, etc.
You can get $50 gift cards for $45 from places like Applebees, CVS, Chili’s, Dillard’s, Kohl’s, TGI Friday’s, Olive Garden, Lowe’s, Panera, Red Robin, Starbucks, etc.
Discount gift cards bought wisely in advance completely rocks!
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December 19th, 2009 @ 4:57 pm
I shop around for insurance at least once every 2 years and it pays off every time. In fact, we recently switched all our policies to save over $1,500/year.
I recommend to shop around once in while, because your risk profile and insurance rates may change frequently. You may be losing money by sticking with the same company for years.
A time saving tip: Keep a document with the informacion you need to get quotes (coverage amounts, deductibles, driver license #’s, vehicle VIN #’s, etc.) That will allow you to get quotes from many companies in a short time. I set aside 2-3 hrs. to get quotes from several companies in one shot.
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June 14th, 2010 @ 8:09 am
[...] Your Fixed Expenses: If you own a home, you can shop around for lower home insurance, as well as fight the appraisal to your home to see if you can get your tax load lowered. If you [...]
August 16th, 2010 @ 9:15 am
i always apply for home insurance whenever i bought a new house, this gives additional level of security*,”
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