Lazy Man and Money

Best Idea Ever Series – Part 1 – Mystery Beer

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I have spent my whole life in one place, so it’s interesting to move to a new place and see how things are done. It hasn’t been two weeks and there are a couple of genius ideas that have smacked me in the face.

Just a couple of days, I was walking through a Trader Joe’s grocery store. They are in MA and I’m a frequent customer, so I thought I knew what to expect. However, an interesting display hit me. It was a pile of grocery bags all stapled shut with a sign of Mystery Beer on it. For $3.99 you get a bag of random single beers. There was no way I could resist the temptation to pick up a couple. One bag had six beers and the other had seven. They were all microbrews or varous types. If you had actually bought a 6-pack of the microbrew itself, it would probably cost you $6.99. So for getting a mystery sampler you save yourself three dollars.

The brilliance behind the idea is that by playing on the mystery or surprise, it gets to buy in when they might normally not. The price $3.99 is pretty good for a six-pack of most beers, but turn it into a game and you’ve sold me.

On a side note, I’ve wondered for years why Coca Cola hasn’t put together a variety pack for parties or just to keep around the house. I’d like to offer guests there choice of a few beverages, but I don’t drink Dr. Pepper, so I shy away from purchasing a 6-pack of it. Plus it seems the deals are all on 12-packs lately making me less likely to purchase it. However, include it with some Sprite, Diet Coke, Orange, etc. and I’m pulling out my wallet.

Why I don’t have an Emergency Fund

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Before you shoot me for the title, I do need an emergency fund. In fact everyone needs to have one. However, I had one that’s a little non-traditional. Of the people that have emergency funds, it seems like most have them in bank accounts earning very little interest. Some of them are smart and get an account like an ING or Emigrant Direct that pays a much higher interest rate. I can’t argue with that plan, but I chose to go a different route.

I set up a Home Equity Line of Credit (HELOC). I’ve tapped into it from time to time and it’s hurting me a bit to pay 8% on the loan. However, I’m making about 19% (16% after adjusting for risk) on my Prosper account. I’d make 8% by simply borrowing more from my HELOC and lending it out on Prosper. With Prosper being new and somewhat unproven, I’ve decided to hedge my bets and split my money between paying off the HELOC and lending out money.

Back to the HELOC as an Emergency Fund. I think people generally tend to be in the “emergency state” for 6 months and typically they are very rare. If I can earn better than 4-5% more on a 6 month safety cushion than I can in a high interest bank account, I think I’ll come out far ahead over 30 years.

Brine your Meat

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It looks like Boston may be finished with it’s newly coined monsoon season. In celebration, it’s time to BBQ up some dinner. There are a ton of grilling tips and I thought I read them all, but a friend taught me about brining meat this past winter (what you don’t grill all season?) and everything has been better since. Basically brining is putting the raw meat in a salt water solution.

I could go into the details, but this article does it better than I ever could. Plus I’m lazy – it says it right in the title. So what does this have to do with money? With brining you can get great taste with cheaper cuts of meat.

Save money on the web

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I’m going to highlight an older trick today, only because I don’t think too many know about it or use it. EvilSoft.org uses Thunderbird to find deals on the web. I suggest you skip down to Billy’s comment about using “Thunderbird’s ‘Saved Searches'”. It was a lot easier for me to set it up this way. Here’s how it works… 1) You set up a bunch of sources (they provided for you on the jump) 2) You set up a keyword for something you are looking to buy 3) When it’s found, Thunderbird alerts you by putting it in the right folder almost like “incoming mail”.

You can also search all the sources if you find a sudden need for say, a blender. In fact, I just did a search for blender to prove my point and there are about 7 different deals in the last ten days – brands include Magic Bullet, KitchenAid, Hamilton Beach, Oster, and Tribest.

As an added bonus you are introduced to a tool that you probably already should be using for e-mail – Mozilla Thunderbird rocks.