I really dislike fees. Y’know, the kind that companies try to slip in at the very last second, hoping you won’t notice - y’know, the extra nickel or dime you’d already earmarked but which somebody else is determined to cruelly pry from your fingers.
Rental car companies are terrible about this. Local and state taxes, refueling [...]

Planning a road trip for this summer? You might want to reconsider after you take a look at how affordable it can be to travel with Amtrak - particularly if you take advantage one or more of the many discounts floating around online.
First, here’s how cheap an ordinary, non-discounted, advance purchase Amtrak fare can be: [...]

These days, it’s painfully obvious to anyone who owns a car that driving has gotten pretty dang expensive. But have you ever stopped to calculate exactly how much you’re paying per mile?
If you want to figure out how to cut back on your expenses, first you’ve got to have an accurate, thorough understanding of those [...]

This blog is about living cheap as a means of attaining financial freedom - that is, the ability to do what you love and to do it when and how you choose. I’m all about the nitty-gritty stuff that you have to do to get to that point. I’m not interested in idle dreaming. I [...]

Around where I live, gas is super expensive, so I always try to plan my gas purchases to coincide with car trips out of town. I know where to find pretty cheap gas close to some of the destinations I frequent, but you know what? Pretty cheap is not cheap enough! Especially in these days [...]

So I recently spent about $100 on bike supplies. It’s rare for me to blow $100 on any one project or thing, so you might guess that there was some special rationale behind this expenditure. There was.
I inherited my bike from my dad. It was a top of the line model in the 70s. The [...]

Cars are antithetical to the cheapskate lifestyle. They suck money like an engine-powered Hoover and I really wish I didn’t have one. It’s just that the alternative - lack of freedom to go where I want when I want - is even worse. So I have a car. I actually like my car; I just [...]

So a couple days ago I discussed the strategy I use to obtain the cheapest possible tickets on Southwest Airlines; just today I fired up Ding!, a proprietary piece of software Southwest uses to publicize special sale fares, to find that the airline is offering users of the software 15% off all travel from 8/23 [...]

I like flying Southwest. Their prices are good, their cancellation policy is one of the most liberal around, their customer service is generally friendly and helpful, and they don’t nickel and dime you with absurd fees. I know, this sounds like a paid advertisement, but it’s not. Other airlines are screwing up left and right, [...]