Social Media and Blog Marketing

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It seems like there is a new social media site coming out every week.  I understand that these can be used to promote your blog but none of them have ever really worked for me.  I have accounts at Myspace, Stumbleupon, and now Twitter but I haven’t done much with them.  I have received some traffic surges from Stumbleupon but not because of anything I did.  I just got lucky that someone stumbled my posts.  I am sure I could be making much better use of these media but these sites really don’t interest me.  I just want to write my blog.  Without some marketing though there won’t be anyone reading my blog and my blog won’t be producing much revenue.  I write this blog because I like to write but I also want to make money from it.

I just started on Twitter so I’m not giving up on it yet.  Otherwise, I don’t plan to sign up for any more social media sites unless they interest me for reasons other than blog promotion.  I’m thinking of hiring someone to do blog marketing for me.  This is an area where my frugality borders on cheapness.  The one time I did pay for some help improving my blog I received a huge return on my investment.  Yet I’m still hesitant to invest more money in my blogs.  I guess I need to get over that and come up with a plan for improving my blogs and then find someone to implement it for me.

More Extreme Frugal Housing Options

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Continuing where I left off on yesterday’s post here are some more extremely frugal housing options.  They are not quite as frugal as the previous options but still much less expensive than average.

One option would be to buy a small house in a small town.  In the town my mom lives in it is possible to buy a small, old home for less than $25,000.  I’m sure the same is true for many areas of the country.  You could even buy a house for less than that here in Kansas City.  The house might not be inhabilitable and the neighbord wouldn’t likely be one you would want to live in though.  I think this could be a viable option if I could find the right small town.

Another option would be to rent or buy a large house and rent out all the rooms individually.  My best friend has lived in houses like this on a few occassions.  It definitely kept his rent down.  He lived in the SF Bay Area last year and was only paying $400 a month for a room.  This option doesn’t really appeal to me though because I value my privacy too much.  There is also the occassional hassle of roommates that are late paying rent, are messy, and such.  The cost savings are not worth the drawbacks to me.

A less extreme option would be to rent a small house or apartment.  There are small rental houses across the street from us that are only $600 a month.  That would be just $300 each for my GF and me. The drawback to this option is that those rents will eventually increase.  I would only consider this option as a temporary measure while preparing to transition to one of the other options.

It looks like the RV option is the most popular among the readers so far.  It isn’t really a good option here though since lot rent would be almost as much as renting a house or apartment.  None of these options will happen until at least next year but I like to have some options in mind.

Extreme Frugal Housing Options

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The number one expense for most people is housing.  If you can make a significant cut in your housing expenses than you will most likely have a significant reduction in your overall expenses.  There are several extremely frugal housing options that I am considering for the future.

The first would be to live in a van.  I’ve done quite a bit of research on this and it would be possible for me and I think I would actually enjoy it.  I don’t think I could convince my GF to move in a van with me though.  Living in  a van probably works better for one person.  There are other possible problems with living in a van such as having to worry about breakdowns, finding a place to park, going to the bathroom, etc.  There are solutions for all of those problems though and the advantages of reduced housing expenses and freedom of living in a van would more than offset the problems for me.  It isn’t likely to happen for now though.

Another option would be to live in an RV.  It seems to be working pretty well for Jacob.   It would provide more room than a van but I still don’t think my GF would go for the idea.  Especially since she has two dogs that would take up a lot of room.  I’m not sure that there would be nearly as much savings here in KC when comparing renting a house or apartment to renting an RV space as there is in Jacob’s area.  I don’t really like driving large vehicles either.  It could just stay parked but I would prefer to be more mobile.  Living in an RV is a possibility but not one of my favorite options.

Living off the grid in a place like this simple cabin is yet another possibility.  As long as I had Internet it would work for me.  I don’t like the idea of staying one place all the time but I do like the idea of having a home to come back to after traveling.  Depending on the location of the cabin I would travel to avoid the worst cold of winter or heat of summer.  Then enjoy the cabin and the outdoors the rest of the year.  This option would take a little more planning than the first two options but it would provide a permanent home.  It would possibly be even cheaper than the first two options and provide a better quality of living.  This is my favorite option right now.

There are some more extreme frugal housing options but I have to go and this post is long enough already.  I will write about the other options later.

Eating for Free

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There are lots of opportunities for for free food.  For example, I receive two free meals from McDonalds each week, I could attend different presentations at school where pizza or other food is served frequently at school, I can receive free meals for doing mystery shops, I often see food for free or better after coupons at sites like MoneySavingMom, IHOP and Denny’s both had free meal promotions this month, and there is the occassional candy dish as well.  With all these ways to get free food I considered trying to go a month eating only free food.  I decided against it though because I knew I would be too tempted to eat my GF’s food.  She probably wouldn’t be real happy with us not going out to dinner for a month either.  I still believe it is possible to eat only free food though.  It probably wouldn’t be a very good diet but you would receive enough calories.

I used to eat well for free when I worked at the casinos when I lived in Nevada.  Almost all casinos serve their employees a free meal with varying degrees of restrictions on how much and when you can eat.  When I worked at the more generous casinos I would come in before my shift and have breakfast, have a quick sandwich lunch during my shift, and then have dinner after my shift.  I only spent money on food during my days off or for an occasional snack or beverage after work.

Anyone have a free food story or tip they want to share?

How Much is Enough?

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The fourth chapter of Your Money or Your Life deals with fulfillment.  It includes three questions that will assist you in clarifying what fulfills you.  The three questions are:

  1. Did I receive fulfillment, satisfaction and value in proportion to life energy spent?
  2. Is this expenditure of life energy in alignment with my values and life purpose?
  3. How might this expenditure change if I didn’t have to work for a living?

After asking yourself these three questions you will probably discover some expenditures that you would like to change or eliminate.  I still sometimes spend money on stuff that receives a “no” answer for one and/or two but doing this step helps me reduce such expenditures. The third question allows you to see that enough might be less if you didn’t have to work.

This is a brief summary of this chapter of the book be sure to read the book to get the full details.