Save money when buying a car

If you want to save money when you buy your next car then you will need to haggle with the salesman to get a better deal. The salesman will expect you to haggle and if you are a good haggler then you could save yourself thousands on your car purchase. We have listed below some top tips to help you negotiate a better deal.

1. Do as much research as you can before you visit the garage. Try to find out how much cars are selling for at other garages and other sources. If you let the salesman know that you can get a similar cheaper elsewhere they should be willing to offer you a better deal.

2. Keep an eye on car models that are about to be replaced or are slow sellers as the garage may be more likely to offer a better deal.

3. Visit garages near the end of the month when they are more willing to offer better deals on their cars in order to meet their sales targets.

4. Be polite and friendly to the car saleman and avoid being rude as that it just likely to annoy them and make it harder for you negotiate a good deal.

5. Try to stay calm and focused, remember that the salesman negotiates with people for a living and will therefore use different selling tactics on you so be alert for these.

6. Don’t be afraid to ask for a discount and to haggle with the salesman. If you are slightly embarrassed then why not say something along the lines of “My wife/husband will hit the roof if I spend that much on the car, couldn’t you reduce the price a bit?”. This will allow you to remain friendly with the salesman whilst at the same time asking for a discount.

7. Never accept the first offer the salesman makes and respond with something like “surely you could do better than that?” or just be patient and keep silent and eventually the salesman may throw in some further extras to close the deal.

8. If you want to make an offer for a car then start at a low opening price but try to be realistic and allow the salesman to negotiate you up to a price that is acceptable to you.

9. If you show that you are serious about buying a car the salesman should work harder to try and reach a reach that will suit both parties.

10. Don’t be persuaded by the salesman to buy a car specification that you do not want or that does not meet your requirements.

11. If you feel that you are getting close to making a deal say that you will buy the car at a particular price if the salesman agrees now.

12. Do not be afraid to just walk away if you do not feel you are getting a good deal, there are lots of garages out there and one will offer you a good deal for your custom.

13. Be careful that if the salesman gives you a very good discount that they do not claw back their profits and your money by undervaluing your trade in. Similarly they could try this the other way round and give you a good price for your old car and a low discount on the car you want to buy.

14. Special finance or insurance deals are often used by garages to attract potential customers. Some salesmen will then use these as an excuse not to give a discount but often the special offers are funded by the car manufacturer and not the garage. If you can combine a decent discount with a cheap finance package then you will have negotiated yourself a good deal.

Reduce your electricity and gas energy costs

With energy prices constantly on the increase 123money have listed what we consider to be some useful money saving tips to help you reduce your energy costs and your electricity and gas cosumption.

1. By simply turning your thermostat down by 1 degree you could save up to 10% on your heating bill.
2. Heat your home for an hour less each day.
3. Close your curtains at night to stop heat escaping through your windows.
4. Don’t overfill your kettle just put in the amount of water you actually need.
5. Fit energy saving light bulbs these use a quarter of the electricity and last about eight times longer.
6. Take showers instead of baths.
7. Try not to leave your fridge door open for too long as this allows cold air to escape and your fridge will have to work harder to keep your food cool.
8. Switch off any unnecessary lights.
9. Fit a good insulating jacket to your hot water tank.
10. Fit aluminium foil behind any radiators fitted to outside walls. Ordinary kitchen foil will do or you can buy special panels from most DIY stores.
11. Draught proof your windows and doors.
12. Try to use a full load in your washing machine and use a low temperature programme unless your clothes are very dirty.

Paid Online Surveys

Why are companies willing to pay you to complete surveys?
All around the world companies are constantly launching new products and services and these same companies are desperate for people to tell them their thoughts and opinions on these new products and services. They want to know if people will want them, how much will people be willing to pay for them and if not then why not.

In order to obtain these opinions companies approach market research organisations and pay them to conduct surveys on their products. These market research organisations used to have to send people out on to the streets to question passers by on their opinions in order to complete the surveys. Although this still goes out most market research companies now prefer to use the internet to find out peoples opinions as this is more cost efficient for them.

When people join a survey company online they have to register which involves giving details on their age, where they live, if they have children, occupation etc. When the company comes to carry out a survey on a new product, such as nappies, they will look up each of their members details and contact those with young children to find out why they prefer one brand of nappies to another. By being able to target the audience for the survey in this way they can get opinions of the people who are most likely to buy the new product.

To encourage people to participate in the online surveys the market research companies offer incentives for people to complete the surveys. These incentives can be money, vouchers, CDs, entry into prize draws amongst others. Although the surveys are interesting it is unlikely that the market research companies would be able to find enough volunteers online to meet their target if they did not reward the participants. By doing so the participants are rewarded for completing the online surveys, the market research companies get their surveys completed and can then analyse the information and feed the results back to the company who requested the survey and let them know what people really think of their product.

How much can you make from completing online surveys?
The rewards and incentives paid to participants for completing surveys varies depending on the market research company, the length of the survey and the time taken to complete it. Some companies will pay you cash for completing surveys using Paypal or straight into your bank account. Others offer vouchers, such as Amazon or luncheon vouchers, whilst some offer CDs, entry into prize draws and all sorts of prizes and rewards for completing their surveys.

It is possible to get paid reasonable amounts of money from completing online surveys if you join several different survey companies but it is unlikely you will earn enough just from surveys to be able to give up your current job. However, if you are a student a stay at home mother or are retired they could certainly be worth your while.

In general for completing each survey you will be paid between £1-£5, some surveys do pay significantly more but it just depends on the individual survey itself. Each survey company should be able to offer you at least 2 surveys a month some offer you much more than 2 a month but just to get some average figure lets say you receive and complete 2 surveys a month. So if you join 10 survey companies and complete 20 surveys a month you should be able to earn about £750 a year, which is not bad for just a couple of hours each month. Obviously if you want to make more you just join more survey companies.

Some surveys offer follow up surveys or telephone surveys or an invitation to a discussion group and if you are lucky enough to be invited these offer significantly more rewards as they are really keen to find out your opinions and are willing to read you appropriately.

Online freebies

There are literally thousands of freebies available on the internet ranging from free software, cosmetics, pet foods, magazines and in some cases free money. So why do companies give away free stuff, what are the catches and where do you find them?

Many companies give away free stuff or freebies as a way of promoting their business and its products. The three main types of freebies are free samples, free trials and free rewards. There are other types of freebies such as buy on get one free or free delivery but to get these freebies you need to pay for something and although these can be useful and save you money they are not included within this article.

Free samples are smaller than the normal sized product and are given away to allow you to try a product for free. The companies know that most people will always choose the same brand because they trust it and in order to wean you off your current brand of product they give you a product you would not have bought yourself. The hope is that you will like the product, buy it in preference to your old brand in future and also encourage your friends and family to buy the new product.

Free trials generally involve you receiving the first few products for free and then if you take any more you have to pay the full price for them. This is very common with subscription products such as magazines where you sign up for the magazine and receive the first months magazine free but then have to pay the full price for the rest of the magazines you receive. Free trials are useful in that they allow you to try a product for free before you buy it.

However care should be taken when applying for a free trial as in the majority of cases you are required to provide either bank or credit card details to pay for you future subscriptions. If you try the product and do not like it then you need to contact the company and cancel your subscription otherwise you will end up paying for products that you do not want. If you are just after a freebie or do not like the product you should be able to cancel your subscription during your free trial period and this will save you having to pay a penny for the product you received.

Free rewards involve completing a small task and being rewarded with a free product, voucher, cash or some other freebie. Common types of such free rewards involve completing surveys, using a  cashback rewards website and applying for insurance quotes.

Care should always be taken when giving out personal details such as your name, address, phone number and bank details out as although most companies are genuine there will always be a few rogues who will try to take advantage of you. In order to avoid these rogue you should not provide any more information than you think is necessary, for example, if you are to receive a free sample – the sender will need your postal address but they should not be asking for your credit card details unless it is a free trial.

Always check that the website has a privacy policy telling you that the will not disclose your details to any third parties. Consider using another e-mail address for corresponding with free offers from sites you are not familiar with as this will prevent you being bombarded with spam from any rogue sites.
Only download software from websites that you trust. If you do download something from an unfamiliar site always check your computer immediately afterwards with your virus protection software.

Money managers

Is the amount of money you earn sufficient to allow you to live comfortably? If you are similar to the majority of the people in the UK, the answer is no. It does not seem to matter how much we each earn because we all seem to have trouble living on it. It seems to be in our nature that even if we get a pay increase or make money some other way all we do is to go out and spend this extra income.

The problem with spending all our money is that we never put enough away for any unexpected costs (such as car repairs, burst pipes etc). When they happen we have to borrow money to cope and then have to pay back the amount we borrowed along with interest. However, by doing this we have entered into a vicious circle as our earnings have stayed the same but our outgoings have now increased by the amount of the loan repayments. We are therefore forced to reduce our standards of living as we cannot afford to spend so much money on items we could afford before we had to borrow the money. It then becomes even harder to save money than it was before and if another unexpected cost comes arises and we have to borrow more money then the circle gets smaller and smaller and we are on a downward spiral in monetary terms.

It could be suggested from the above that all we have to do is to earn more money in the first place but as stated above all we would do is to increase our outgoings to meet those additional incomngs. No, what we really need to do is to manage our money better.

There are a variety of reasons why we do not manage our money better.

Lack of knowledge
Most people lack the financial knowledge to manage their money better. This can be due to them being bad money managers as they believe they are unlikely to be come rich because their parents and friends are not rich and so they do not make the effort to learn how to manage their money better. Instead they simply follow the crowd and if their friends have poor money management skills then they will inadvertently copy these bad habits. A good money manager should try to improve their knowledge by reading the financial pages of the papers, or financial sites on the web to find out how best to maximise their money. This would allow them to find out about the best places to save their money, the cheapest places to borrow money and to find out about tax free products.

Lack of planning
Most of us live for today and try not to think of tomorrow, we have no plan that we follow in terms of our spending habits. A good money manager would have a budget, showing his income (wages, dividends and interest) and a list of his expenditure (mortgage, electricity, food, clothing, alcohol etc). By comparing these two lists the good money manager will know if his income exceed his expenditure in which case he can save money or alternatively if his expenditure exceeds his income then he needs to either reduce his expenditure or to increase his income.

If you draw were to sit down write now and draw up a budget you would probably be surprised as to much money you spend on items that are not essential and that you could live without. Living without a few of these luxury items would allow you to save money up for any unexpected emergencies that might arise and would save you having to borrow money.

Once you can start saving you can set yourself targets, for example to increase your savings by £1,000 by this time next year. The following year you could increase this target to £2,000, then £4,000 the next year and so on. If you can meet your targets you will be well on your way to having a financially secure future.

Want it now attitude
In the UK at the moment there are very few people who live within their means, most of us see something we want and instead of waiting and saving up for the item we either put it on our credit card or take out a loan to pay for it. The banks and credit card companies are almost throwing money at us with “But now, pay later” advertising so we end up taking their money, paying them a hefty amount of interest and hoping that at some point in the future we will be able to afford to pay them back.

However, a good money manager should be willing to wait because they know if they save money up to pay for the item they are earning interest on their savings whilst a bad money manager ends up paying interest on their borrowings. Given that some credit cards are charging in excess of 20% it does not seem a good idea to borrow money when we could just wait a little bit longer and save up for the item.

Delaying saving
If you invested £10,000 in an account at a fixed rate of interest of 5% with the interest compounding every year, it would build up to £26,533 in 20 years, ignoring the effects of taxation. Lets imagine a friend invest £10,000 at a fixed rate of 10% it would seem reasonable to expect his balance after 20 years would be £53,066, being double the £26,533 but in fact it would £67,275. This shows that a small difference in interest rates can make a significant difference in the value of money over time. This is known as compound interest because you are earning interest on the interest your initial deposit has earned.

The earlier you start to save the more money you will earn as shown by the fact that if you invested invested £10,000 when you were 20 for 40 years at a fixed rate of 10%, it would be worth £452,593 when you were 60. However, if you invested the same amount when you were 30 you would only receive £174,494 when you were 60. Worse still if you waited until you were 40, your investment would be worth only £67,275 by the time you were 60.

Interest rates are currently considerably less than 10% but the above signifies how important it is to make your money work for you and to highlight how small differences in savings rates can really add up. You should therefore keep an eye on the interest rates you receive from your savings to make sure they are competitive against other savings accounts.

Good money managers
To become a good money manager we need to improve our knowledge of financial matters as this will ensure we get the best savings rates and pay the lowest rates on our borrowings. We should shop around and not just ask the nearest bank or building society if they will lend us some money.
We need to have a plan as to where we are going based on our current income and expenditure. By sticking to a budget and being prepared to wait for something we want it will save us money rather than costing us money. The sooner we start to apply these ideas then the sooner we can become good money managers and start out on our road to financial security.

Make money with Ebay

Making money on eBay is one of the most popular methods of making money online. There are literally millions of people making money on eBay auctions every day from either selling bits and pieces lying around their own homes or more professional power sellers who have their own shop on eBay which they use to sell their products and make money. There are also loads of people who buy stuff on eBay cheaply and then sell those very same goods at a higher price within a few days or weeks of buying the items.

Learning how to buy low allows you to sell high, learn from the mistakes people make and use proven techniques to sell their items at high prices and earn money from ebay by buying low, re-listing the items and selling high for a decent profit.

To buy low you should aim to find an item with a badly worded description with spelling mistakes in their titles and use software called auction snipers to ensure you get the items at the last possible auction moment for the lowest price.

To find products with spelling mistakes there are freely available websites that will turn your correct spellings into common mistaken spellings and find the items on eBay for you such as Fatfingers.
Once you have located and won some items cheaply you then need to sell them on at a higher price to make your profit. The most important way of doing this is to give your item a good title, a good description and to show a picture of the item.

The title you choose is extremely important as this is what eBay uses when people enter the details of the items they are looking to buy. The title should therefore include a full description of the item not just one or two words. The more detailed your title the more likely it is that people will view your auction items and the more bidders it is likely to attract. The more bidders the more likely you are going to sell your item at a high price.

Make money with Mystery Shopping

If the thought of getting paid to shop appeals to you then mystery shopping may be a useful additional source of money for you.

Shops and restaurants are always keen to find out if their staff are seen to be doing a good job or if they are seen as creating a bad impression of their company. The work of a mystery shopper involves visiting a retailer, buying something and asking some questions to the staff to find out how knowledgeable they are about the products they are selling.

Once you have completed your visit to the shop or restaurant you are required to complete a report about your shopping experience and will cover how well dressed the staff were, if they were polite, if they knew about the products, the cleanliness of the store etc.

Once you have submitted your mystery shopping report you will normally be paid. Payment will be in either cash or gift vouchers. Your expenses for your purchases are normally reimbursed and you generally get to keep whatever items you have bought.You can earn up to £30 a day as a mystery shopper although the amount offered varies from one agency to another. Some of the most popular mystery shopping sites are RetailEyes, TNS Global, Grassroots, Frontline Focus and Retail Maxim.

Mystery shopping could provide you with extra income but is unlikely to be a full time job and is suited to mothers looking after children at home, students, people who have retired or anyone else interested in making money.