Lazy Man and Money

Deal: Get Amazon Prime for $73 this Weekend

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I like to consider myself more frugal than most people. My philosophy is to use the savings, invest them, and let them grow. This means that I look to cut any subscription services that don’t provide a ton of value to me.

A couple of years ago, we took the plunge to try Amazon Prime. I didn’t think we’d renew, because 2-day shipping usually doesn’t matter to me.

I was wrong.

Amazon’s prices are competitive so with free 2-day shipping it becomes one of our core places to shop. The 15% savings from Subscribe and Save only makes it more enticing. Recently, we’ve been using Amazon’s streaming media more. The kids love Go Diego Go (Dora the Explorer’s cousin) and Tumble Leaf and they are not Netflix. Now I can tell my Amazon Echo to play music by The Beatles for free. The Beatles are streaming on a lot of services now, but it is a game changer to simply ask out loud and have music fill the room.

My wife loves the Golden Globes and with Amazon Prime’s Mozart in the Jungle winning a couple of big categories. The only think I know about the show is that it is one of the few recorded in the 4K HDR format that would be perfect for my dream TV.

In honor of Mozart in the Jungle’s wins at the 73rd Golden Globes, Amazon is making a year of Amazon Prime available for $73 this weekend. That’s a saving of $26 from the usual $99 price.

I think it’s worth the $99 a year, but if you were on the fence, maybe $73 is enough incentive to give a try? This deal is only for new Prime members, so unfortunately, I won’t be saving any money on this. That’s the way the ball bounces sometimes.

How Do You Feel About Cashback Sites?

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I’ve been on the fence on cashback sites for a long time. I read so many trusted friends and bloggers who rave about them. Yet, I don’t think they’d work out that well for me.

I buy almost everything though Amazon. I think most cashback sites support Amazon. However, as a blogger, I know that if I use a fellow blogger’s affiliate link, Amazon will give them a little money crediting them for the sale. It’s a way that I can thank them for providing me great content free of charge. (By the way, if I happen to be one of your favorite bloggers, you can shop using this link.)

About ten months ago, I got an email from Rich at DollarDig. He wanted to tell me all about his great cashback site. I gave it a quick look and the design looked more dated than Lazy Man and Money. I made the too-quick judgment that there really wasn’t much to see here. However, when I shared my thoughts with Rich, I realized something was different about this company…

… he actually listened and cared. Sometimes I find myself spending hours helping companies provide better service (Fidelity, I’m looking at you) and they refuse to listen. (I’ve since gone on to charge a consulting fee, but DollarDig got my advice for free.)

I gave him a list of things that I’d do if I worked at his company. Well, he went and implemented all of them. The site looks so good I might need to ask who his designer is.

That still begs the question though, “What makes DollarDig.com different than the competition?”

Rich explained that they offer more cashback at most stores when compared to Ebates.com (one of the biggest companies in the space). He also pointed out that CashBackHolic.com, the leading site that rates cashback sites has great reviews. I looked up those reviews and they scored a 9.2 of 10. He said that people will get a $5 bonus for signing up and they’ve had 250% growth in members in just the last year.

He said that support is prompt and courteous… replies usually within hours (sometimes minutes!), and a day at the most. If it’s anything like my experience in talking with him, they deliver.

I’m biased because this is one of the few companies I’ve ever looked into, but more money back to members, better reviews, and solid customer service. As a small business myself, I can empathize with the challenges DollarDig has.

Seems like they might be would be worth a try, right? Readers, what do you say?

Deal: Get a TINY 128GB 3.0 Flash Drive for $28 (VERY limited time)

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I love Ultrabooks. They are thin and light, which is great not just for travel, but for someone like me who uses their computer constantly.

Unfortunately they often come with a few compromises. The biggest compromise in my experience is the size of the solid-state drive (SSD). When I’ve wanted to get more than 128GB, the price rockets up a few hundred dollars to get 256GB. While prices on SSDs getting cheaper, it doesn’t help me after I’ve made the purchase.

Today there’s a remarkable deal to end that frustration. I’ve been looking at micro-USB drives for awhile now, but I just couldn’t pull the trigger. They were either more than $60 or only USB 2.0 for a significant size (64GB). However, for just a few more hours it seems that Amazon is having a deal on this SanDisk Ultra Fit 128GB USB 3.0 Flash Drive.

The beauty is that I can put this in one my laptop’s USB slots and not even notice it… other than having twice the storage space.

You may ask what I’m going to use it for? I’ve got enough movies and music to make a dent in 128GB, but I’m also going to replicate my critical data on my main laptop there. Boom, instant back-up. Fortunately that data doesn’t take up a lot of space. The end result should allow me to off-load most of the data off my main drive which will help with performance.

As if it couldn’t get better, I’ve heard about this spend $60 to get $15 from American Express on Amazon (be logged into your AMEX account when you click it). So I’m almost halfway to getting it for $12, right?

Finally, there’s some kind of deal to get a free Shutterfly book with this. I’m not sure how it works or if I want it, but for free I’ll give it a look.

I usually don’t post individual deals like this, but this has to be a world record amount of storage for the money.

Special Saturday Deal Alert… (Today Only)

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It’s very rare that I write articles on a Saturday, but I can’t resist. Just a couple of days ago, I wrote about the best television on the market for the money here: Buying a Television? Read This First….

CNET declared an LG television as having the “Best. Picture. Ever.”

Unfortunately, in 2013, it was $15,000. Today you can remove a zero and get it for $1,500.

At $1,500 it has to be the best value in high-end televsions around. However, the price is just through BuyDig (a very reputable retailer) on Ebay’s Deal of the Day. Get it here.

The price is $385 less than the same product on Amazon. A very similar product (nearly the same specs, different model number) is also on Amazon with 93 great reviews here.

What do you think? A high-quality television with a $300 savings? I know that Black Friday is just around the corner, but there’s no need to deal with a crowd or wait in lines.

I’m Loving this Mind-Hack Deal

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One of the deal sites that I follow mentioned a great deal on Blinkist. I hadn’t heard of it before, but the description intrigued me. Blinkist is a website (with mobile apps naturally) that curates top non-fiction books (mostly business and self-improvement) into abstracts that you can read in 15 minutes. From my brief experience it’s around 250 words a chapter.

(Note: This is a quick mention due to the deal. However, here’s a better Blinkist Review.)

So instead of reading a whole book, you can read the equivalent of a lengthy blog post. Obviously retention isn’t going to be the same. But it is better to have read and lost than never to have read at all. Also, you can copy notes or send them to Evernote. The deal is new to me so I haven’t tried out all the features. I have just read a couple of books on my phone and web browser. So far, I’d say it’s the best thing I’ve done all week (and it’s been an exceptional week for me).

Normally it is $80/yr, but StackSocial has a $30/yr offer. (You might want to set your calendar to cancel so it doesn’t renew at the $80 price.) Blinkist has different tiers of memberships, but this is for the top tier that includes audio summaries.

I’ve already implemented some of the advice in Amanda Palmer’s The Art of Asking on this website.

If there was a measure of “money well spent”, I think this would get my highest recommendation. It’s a small investment in time, a small investment in money, and a large return in information. When people say you should invest in yourself, it can be hundreds, thousands, tens of thousands, or hundreds of thousands of dollars.

Getting the information in 1000+ books for $30 just slaps all the other “investments in yourself” in the face.

P.S. If you caught the terrible grammar in the title earlier, I apologize. I had to balance between writing something up really quickly to get the kids ready for the day or skipping informing you on the deal. I made a last minute change in the title and didn’t make the article agree. Ugh! In any case, I hope you find the deal helpful.