April 15, 2025 • 43 mins
Nothing like a summer heat wave will remind us how expensive it is to stay cool…literally. But guess what? You don’t need to feel guilty about it at all. In this episode, Jen and Jill are breaking down free, frugal ways to cool your home and your energy costs without feeling guilty!
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Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:00):
Episode five oh two, how to Save money on your
Electric bill.
Speaker 2 (00:08):
Welcome to the Frugal Friends podcast, where you'll learn to
save money, embrace simplicity, and liver life. Here your hosts
Jen and Jill.
Speaker 1 (00:24):
Welcome to the Frugal Friends podcast. My name is Jen,
my name is Joe, and today we are talking specifically
about your electric bill. Ways that you can get electricity
for free, low cost, get a deal on it, or
feel good paying for.
Speaker 3 (00:39):
It, which is our new method of how we're going
about these episodes. We are not looking to the Internet
in the same ways that we used to. We're not
doing the old Google search and going through an article.
We've got our own framework how to get it for free,
low cost, deal, guilt free. But first, this episode brought
(01:00):
to you by electrifying experiences, not the kind that hurt,
but the kind that are fun, exhilarating, thrilling, inspiring, like
the friend Letter, which is at least two of those things.
Every Monday, Wednesday and Friday, we're inspiring you with a
weekly money move you can make to get one step
closer to better financial management. And we're thrilling you with
(01:24):
some freebies ways to save money on stuff you're already
buying and helpful ways to reduce impulse spending and feel
less guilt about buying the things you love. So get
it for free at Frugal Friends podcast dot com. Be
electrified by our friend letter.
Speaker 1 (01:41):
Yes, I love checking out the friend letter. The gifts
are always on point. I opened it one time and
there was a ice skating dinosaur and I said, yep,
this is this is these are my people. I don't
write the friend letters, but I open them up and say,
this is on brand. This is us all right. So
(02:04):
we've talked about saving money on utilities and bills in
the past, and this year we have committed to updating
and publishing new information, new episodes everything how to save
money on X, how to save money on Everything, because
it's been quite a long time since we recorded episodes
(02:24):
specific like this, and a lot has changed. AI technology
has made a lot of lot, a lot of things
more accessible and a lot of new things. So that
is what we are talking about. If you do want
to get some more summer specific episodes, check out episode
(02:45):
four to eleven. Want to Budget for this Summer Episode
three ozho one Frugal living Tips for from the Great Depression.
It's not summer specific or bill specific, but people tend
to like that episode. But all right, let's get into
a ways to save money on your electric bill.
Speaker 3 (03:03):
So the first category that we want to look at
is how can you get it for free? This is
not going to be for everybody, but like our framework suggests,
we want to offer you a way or an understanding
of how you can meet these needs at various levels,
depending on where you're at currently. So there are programs
(03:27):
like lie HEAP stands for Low Income Home Energy Assistance
Program that will assist low income households, particularly those who
have low income but are paying a high proportion of
their household income towards home energy needs. So this is
a program that might just supplement how much money you're paying.
(03:51):
There are times, however, where they might pay your entire
electric bill through this program. So the guidelines are in
a vary state to state, but usually it's around two
hundred percent of the poverty guidelines. So if you are
one person earning an income living alone, the guidelines would
(04:13):
be about thirty one thousand dollars that you're making annually
where you could be eligible for lie HEAP. Two people
in a household would be forty two thousand dollars annually
a year for people in the household sixty four thousand
dollars a year. But you can find what you might
be eligible for with your local lie heat program, so
(04:36):
you can go to energyhelp dot Us to learn about
that one.
Speaker 1 (04:41):
Yeah, if you have kids, two or three kids, then
this is something definitely to look into. If you're a
single income household with multiple kids and your household income
is around sixty four thousand dollars or less, definitely head
to its energyhelp dot us and see if you qualify
(05:02):
for light heap. There's also the Weatherization Assistance Program WOP.
I think they made a song about this one, but
it helps low income families improve the energy efficiency of
their home and so are there are programs like this
that help everyone, and we'll talk about that in a minute,
but this one is specifically that it will not just
(05:24):
tell you how to improve the energy efficiency, but will
actually help you take those steps as well.
Speaker 3 (05:33):
I also know that many energy companies themselves will have
their own grants and programs, so you can go to
whoever your energy provider is directly and see if you
might be eligible for discounts or free energy again depending
on your need.
Speaker 1 (05:53):
Yeah, it's very often most of those programs are like
funded by lie heap. But also so they will have
separate ones as well. So even if maybe you did
not qualify for this one, see if your electric company
has any other grants or programs. All right, So the
(06:14):
next one is how do we get it for low cost?
How do we get our electricity at the lowest cost
possible without doing anything illegal or sacrificing quality?
Speaker 3 (06:26):
So just plug into your neighbors.
Speaker 1 (06:28):
Yeah right, No, that's not what we're talking about. So
I see on the internet a lot of all kinds
of recommendations, and this is kind of where we're going
to debunk some of those and tell you where you're
going to get the most bang for your buck. So
one thing I see recommended a lot is getting energy
(06:49):
efficient appliances that will help you pay less for your
energy bill. And so I think that is from doing
research on how much your appliances actually contribute to your
energy bill. It's full stop, pointless. If you have an
appliance that works, if it is not energy efficient, keep
(07:14):
with it, because you will you will spend more money
upgrading than you will save on your energy bill. The
place where you're going to get the biggest bank for
your buck is your air conditioning and your heating or
your furnace, And so that's really what we're going to
hone in on the rest of the episode. That uses
about fifty percent of your total energy cost. The second
(07:40):
highest is at fourteen percent, and that's your water heater.
So if you're going to focus on two things, it's
going to be your HVAC and potentially your water heater
only if you really need to. Everything else is kind
of superfluous when we're talking about saving on your electric bill.
(08:02):
You can want energy efficient appliances, you can want a
new appliance. Sure they're all energy efficient at this point,
but you're getting a new appliance to get a new appliance,
not to save money on your energy bill.
Speaker 3 (08:14):
If you're already in the market for a new appliance,
then great, that's just an added bonus. And to kind
of think about what's going to be like I know,
for us when we went from a duct system to
mini splits, that significantly reduced our overall cost. Of course,
it would be super expensive if your whole system wasn't
(08:34):
broken already to switch to mini splits. I think we
got quoted at one point seventeen thousand dollars for just
like half of our house. So to your point, that
wouldn't have actually saved us money to make that switch,
just to make it, but our condenser was broken. We
did need a new system, so it's like, all right,
we might as well upgrade to something that's going to
(08:57):
be energy efficient for the long term. It's also worth
looking at whether or not there's rebates. I think we're
going to talk about that at another point, but there
can be reasons to replace for the sake of replacing
if there's rebates being offered. Yeah, but back to focusing
on what takes the most of our energy, that being
your ac, your heating, then we want to be looking
(09:20):
at insulating and air ceiling our homes. So and this
has even been corroborated by my husband, who has worked
in construction for many, many years, and he has worked
tirelessly to insulate our home. And I think it's so
ridiculous some of the measures that he takes, but he's like,
(09:40):
this is the number one way that heat or ac
escapes the home and the number one way bugs also
get into your home. So there's a double WHAMMYE reason
for making sure that the house is as sealed as possible.
One of the things that you can do to figure
out where you might be losing the most of your
energy is by doing a free energy audit through your
(10:05):
energy provider. So I know for us, Jen, I've done this,
Eric and I have gotten the free energy audit through
Duke who was our local supplier, and was really shocked
by the level of service that they provided that they
actually care to help us reduce our energy bill and
then ended up giving us something in the mail to
(10:28):
help reduce some of our energy costs, both on water
usage as well as on electric usage, like probably fifty
to seventy five dollars worth of things that they gave
us to be able to install throughout our home to
be able to reduce our energy. So look at this
for whoever your energy is. Energy provider is see if
(10:51):
they'll do a free energy audit for you.
Speaker 1 (10:53):
And if they won't, if they send you to a
private energy company, it's not a scam. That company is
probably subsidized buy your city. Your energy provider is subsidized
by your city to do these energy audits. It benefits
the city, so they subsidize it. So if you're like,
is it a scam? No, of course they're going to
(11:13):
try and push you to buy something, whether it's a
private company or they're going to offer rebates from the
energy provider to get kickbacks from a company to do
the insulation and air ceiling for you. But you don't
have to go with a company. There are things you
can do yourself. And this is an example where if
(11:35):
you need to buy some weather stripping or if you
need to buy something in order to be more energy efficient,
these are the things you want to be buying, not
the energy efficient appliances.
Speaker 3 (11:48):
Yeah, so where you might see the most energy loss
is in the attic if there isn't any insulation, or
the insulation is going bad, is missing in certain parts,
if you've got leaks in your duct work, windows for sure,
doors for sure, even checking your thermostat settings. So the
(12:11):
lower barrier to entry would be absolutely your windows and doors,
making sure that you don't see any light coming through
some of the cracks in there, or if you can
kind of feel with your hand where you might be
getting drafts. So that's where cock window ceiler can come in.
(12:31):
Even the plastic weather stripping like you already mentioned for
those of you in the north during the winter, even
putting plastic over your windows. You know you're not going
to be opening the windows, so getting one of those
like plastic windows ceiling kits can be worth it to
be able to keep the heat in. And then of
(12:52):
course checking your thermostat settings, making sure that you're not
overdoing it, but also that you're allowing your areas where
you are living to be monitored by the temperature that
you want it, but allowing a few degrees difference in
maybe some of the rooms that you're not currently utilizing.
Speaker 1 (13:13):
Yeah, and then if you're going to buy an appliance, well,
if you're going to upgrade, so we talk about sinking funds.
You should always have a sinking fund for repair, maintenance, upgrades,
stuff like that. So saving for your AC or furnace
like replacement. If you know you're going to need a
(13:35):
whole new system, like Jill died, start figuring out whether
it's best to go with the with the standard that
has been in most houses, the central system, or if
it might behoove you to go to a mini split system.
And there's also di you can get it done professionally,
but you can get mister cool offers DIY mini split
(13:59):
installation kits, so you can do that.
Speaker 3 (14:03):
That is what we went with. That's what we were
able to do our whole house for I want to say,
eight thousand.
Speaker 1 (14:11):
Dollars, three bedroom, two bath.
Speaker 3 (14:13):
Uh huh. So compared to the seventeen thousand dollars quote
we got from a company to do it for us,
eight thousand dollars was far better for it. But of
course we had we did have to do it ourselves.
It does take a little bit of no how, but
there are plenty of YouTube videos out there.
Speaker 1 (14:29):
Yeah, and you should have a friend in the HVAC
industry who can help you if the free on goes
a little hey wired, because not everyone will repair those.
Speaker 3 (14:38):
Systems, right.
Speaker 1 (14:39):
And then a tankless water heater, so a gas powered
one if you're in the North. If you're in the South,
you can go gas or electric.
Speaker 3 (14:49):
Yeah, tankless doesn't totally work in the North, but we
love it here in the South. It saves until the moony.
Speaker 1 (14:56):
Yeah.
Speaker 3 (14:57):
All right, now we're onto a d How do we
get a deal on this electric that we're paying for? So,
of course, when it comes to insulating, sealing up our homes.
Definitely look for rebates that might be offered to you
from that free energy check that you ended up doing.
(15:18):
Not only might they give you some free stuff. They
gave us some weather stripping in that little package that
they sent to us afterwards, but they also alerted us
to if you were to replace these windows, we would cover,
you know, fifty percent of the cost of that. I
also know in a lot of places this is more
(15:40):
to do with water usage, but to use it as
an example, many cities might offer rebates on replacing your toilets,
making it absolutely free. You know, you guys did that,
and replacing old toilets that are going to use far
less water and to get a free toilet totally worth it.
So check into what rebates might exist when it comes
(16:03):
to tankless water heaters. Check Black Friday sales. Water heaters
are more likely to break in the winter, so that
could be a time to consider replacing them kind of
when Black Friday comes around.
Speaker 1 (16:15):
Yeah, because if your water heater breaks in the winter,
you don't have time to search sales and to get
a deal, right, So if you know this is the
season when most water heater break, then you'll want to
be looking for these deals in the summer, the fall,
stuff like that, so be prepared so that you don't
(16:39):
have to pay more in a crisis. Next is the
time of use discount from your energy company. Most energy
companies offer this. I didn't even realize we had it
in our area. I thought this was some kind of
special thing that other people had, but no, we have
it too, and it is deaf inconvenient times. So you
(17:03):
would have to be doing your you know, most of
your so like running your washer and your dryer and
your dishwasher in the middle of the night essentially. So
if you have one of those washer dryers that can
switch automatically from washing to drying, this is a great thing.
(17:24):
Just set it up to run in the middle of
the night. So I actually called Duke and wanted to
know if it would benefit me to change to this,
and they were so good in walking me through. They
walked me through on I was on my laptop and
they told me where to go so that I can see,
(17:46):
this is my energy usage. This is what I'm paying
for killowater, whatever unit of energy. This is what it
would change to if I went to time of day
discount program. It would increase the price per use during
peak hours and then decrease it during off hours. So
(18:10):
what I decided for me is that when I looked
and it even did the math for me, they're like,
this is what you're paying now, this is what you
would pay with the same habits if you got time
of use discount, and I would pay more, but obviously
I would change my habits. But then I was thinking, actually,
(18:31):
with the kids and everything, I don't really want to
change my habits. So I think I'm just going to
stay with what I have. But look it up, see
how it would change for you, and really consider if
you could change your habits. If you work nights, if
you're a night owl or super early like you've got
one of those four am wake up routines or something,
(18:54):
check it out, do the math and see if it
will work for you.
Speaker 3 (18:59):
Yeah, if you're not someone who's always cranking your AC
or your heat, you know, through the evenings, or if
you've got one of those newer washer dryers where you
can tell it to start you don't even have to
be awake, but do a delay start on at least
one of those cycles. I think it could be worth it. Then,
(19:21):
there is a thing called energy Wise Home, and this
is something that can help, particularly when it comes to
people who have a pool or a tankless water or
is it tank or tankless water heater.
Speaker 1 (19:38):
It's regular regular water heater and AC, but I think
it really helps people with pools. That's where I'm thinking
this will have the most benefits.
Speaker 3 (19:49):
So it's kind of it's an automation that you can
add to your system that will cycle your pool, pump,
your water heater, your AC on and off automatic to
reduce usage in peak times so that you can get
up to one hundred and fifty dollars in rebates. So
if you've got these types of systems in your home,
(20:11):
this is definitely something to consider that you don't even
have to be a part of the process. It will
do it for you and you just got the one
time installation and then set it and forget it.
Speaker 1 (20:23):
Yeah. I think if you're in a temperate climate like California,
or you have a pool, or you have a tank
water heater, I wouldn't do this with a tankless but
definitely it's an energy wise home search that put it
ask chat gpt if the program because it's a trademarked program,
(20:47):
So this isn't just like a duke thing, but see
if it's available in your area. More often than not,
something like it is going to be. It's just a
little thing that they install that's cycles the power on
and off without your consent. So again something that I
looked at and I was like, I don't have a pool,
(21:08):
I don't have a tank water heater. I do not
want them to turn my AC on and off at
their leisure for whenever they feel like it, So it
wasn't the right move for us.
Speaker 3 (21:22):
Final category is how do we pay for electricity guilt free?
And I do think some of this has to do
with making sure that our usage is really buttoned up,
that we are not being wasteful or over consuming our
electric usage. So I do think it's worth kind of
(21:43):
going through these first three categories, raining in how we
are engaging with our usage, being sure that when we're
out of the house for the majority of the day,
our AC isn't pumping sixty six degrees, like we're not
leaving the doors and windows open. We are being aware
of how much we're taking.
Speaker 1 (22:04):
But if you are somebody who likes your AC sixty
six degrees when you're home? How can you do that
guilt free? And so the thing we think for this
is we're looking at the servicing and the services we
get around our electric items, mainly our HVAC, but all
(22:26):
of our appliances. Really how can we pay How can
we save money and pay for that guilt free too?
And so I'll let you in on a little stat
Private equity investors have purchased nearly eight hundred HVAC, plumbing
and electrical companies since twenty twenty two. In three years,
(22:53):
private equity investors have purchased nearly eight hundred HVAC, plumbing
and election companies. And what these private equity companies do
is they go in, they clean house, raise prices, repaint
the sign on the on the front door, make it
(23:14):
look you know, a little less CD. And then every
dollar you use in that company now leaves most of
it leaves your community. Whereas when it was just the
CDHVAC company, most of that money stayed in your community,
not C, not CD. But you know, you know what
(23:34):
it looks like. You're like, I don't know if I
can trust Jed the HVAC gun, right.
Speaker 3 (23:40):
But Jed's been doing it for thirty years.
Speaker 1 (23:42):
Right and Jed, if you've just got to know him,
he is legit, but he retired and nobody wanted to
buy his business except for the private equity companies. So
you'll be able to tell you know, the private equity
back companies, they're very polished, they've got money, but the
money goes to them, not your community local companies. They
(24:03):
may not have the signs, may not be as shiny,
the colors may not be as bright, or maybe they're
too bright. But I'll also say when you go with
a local company, you don't sacrifice quality to buy local,
and you usually save money when you go with local companies.
(24:24):
So that's how we believe that you can save money
on your electric bill. Guilt free is when you need
these appliances serviced, you go with locally owned companies. So
what you can do is get your recommendations from your friends,
go about how you would normally do, go search, narrow
(24:48):
it down to a couple companies, and then you can
actually ask chat GPT are these companies backed by private
equity and chat GPT will tell you, which is an
amazing thing because before AI you would have to pay
for that answer from a company called pitch Book which
(25:14):
details and tracks data of private equity deals so you
don't have to You don't have to pay for that anymore,
which is amazing. You can ask chat GPT and it
will tell you if the company is publicly traded or
backed by private equity. You have to answer. You have
to ask those questions either separately or differentiate and you'll
(25:39):
and you can find out quickly. So yeah, find out,
take the time and go with a company that, yes,
is you know, well rated but local.
Speaker 3 (25:53):
So to recap. If you are looking for ways to
get your electric for free and you are low income,
can to lie heap look into Weatherization Assistance Program WAP
for short. If you're looking for low cost or a deal,
go directly to your energy provider, ask for ask for
(26:13):
an overview of your energy usage and maybe areas where
you might be leaking, and you can do some of
these things to make your home more energy efficient. Focus
on what is taking up the majority of your energy,
right it doesn't. You don't need to be worried about
unplugging things that aren't in use or absolutely turning off
(26:37):
every single light everywhere. Of course, we do want to
be you know, utilizing like led wherever possible when they
need to be replaced. But take take a look at
your ac heating, your water heater. These are the things
that are going to be taking up the most. Do
some of these audits and do some of these simple
(27:00):
maintenance things around your home in order to not be
heating and cooling the entire neighborhood. And then spend guilt
free by supporting local companies and knowing that your energy
usage is enough where it should be for you and
(27:21):
your family's needs.
Speaker 1 (27:22):
Absolutely, you know what else is there for my family's needs.
And it doesn't help us save money on anything, but
it does really make us feel good.
Speaker 3 (27:37):
It's electrifying.
Speaker 1 (27:39):
The bill of the week.
Speaker 4 (27:51):
That's right, it's time for the best minute of your
entire week. Maybe a baby was born and his name
is Williams. Maybe you off your mortgage, maybe your card
died and you're happy to not have to pay that
bill anymore. That's bills, butffalo bills, bill clean.
Speaker 1 (28:08):
This is the bill of the week.
Speaker 5 (28:12):
Hi guys, this is Jodan from Paris again. Oh my god,
this is amazing. I am listening to my favorite podcast
which happens to be on books, which are my favorite
thing in the world. And I'm, you know, mining my
own business, cleaning my apartment that is going to be
on Airbnb during my Christmas vacation. And then what does happened?
(28:32):
My voice is on the podcast. My bill of the
week is on the podcast. This is so insane. By
the way, it also shows that I my English is
getting worse and worse, which brings us to the bill
of the week. What did I do with that unexpected
amount of money I was talking about on our last conversation. Well,
(28:53):
you're gonna be so proud of me. Half of it
was put on a life in sih ssurance, which I
didn't have before, and the other health was put on
a plane ticket to America. Yes, that did happen. I
am so excited. I'm going to Boston and Providence and
(29:17):
then Vermont in early January. Yes it's going to be cold, Yes,
I'm aware of it. I'm visiting friends and they just
invited me, and out of the blue, I decided to go.
And I was able to because I saved the money
I had in July. And this is all thing to
thanks to you guys. Thank you so much. Vizoo from Paris.
Speaker 1 (29:39):
Yes, Oh my gosh, Vermont, New Rhode Island, Boston, Providence.
Speaker 3 (29:47):
She's a Providence, Okay, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah yeah.
Fantastic places, amazing and I'm never going to get tired
of listening to your voice. You don't need to do
anything with your English. I understood you. Just yeah fine,
and I loved it. Thank you for giving us this
follow up about what you did with this unexpected money
(30:07):
that you received back in the summer, and I love
that you were able to allocate it to a couple
of different things. One thing that is maybe a little
bit more responsible, achieving this goal of having life insurance
that you didn't have before, and now this unexpected money
allows you to be able to have that. And then
(30:28):
something we're fun and life giving to get to see
friends in the US. So glad that you came to
our little almost neck of the woods since the East Coast,
so we'll count it, and we hope that you just
had such a lovely visit. Thank you so much for
calling again. We love our follow up bills. If you
(30:48):
all are listening and you have a bill that you
want to share, if it has to do with an
update on a previous bill that you left us. We'd
love to hear it. If your name is Bill, if
you were able to spend your bills on things that
help you achieve financial goals or just help you spend
time with friends, we want to hear it all. Frugal
(31:10):
Friends podcast dot com slash Bill leave it for us,
and now it's time for lightning round.
Speaker 1 (31:21):
Okay, what's the highest your electric bill has ever been?
Speaker 3 (31:26):
Yeah, I changed the question.
Speaker 1 (31:27):
You did change the question. I don't have an answer
for it.
Speaker 3 (31:31):
The other question was what do you spend the most
a mount on your electric bill? And we kind of
already answered that, like everybody spends the most on heating
an AC.
Speaker 1 (31:41):
You're so right, Okay, you go first and I'll look
it up.
Speaker 3 (31:45):
Okay, mine at one point was So I'll preface this
by saying we live in a three bed, two path
fourteen hundred square feet, not a large large home home,
not not the tiniest either. We did at one point
live in one hundred and seventy five square feet. So
(32:06):
instead it's a burger from that. And our electric bill
got up to three hundred and fifty dollars, which is
a lot for us. Yeah, normally we sit around to
thirty two fifty, so this was quite quite a shocker. However,
(32:29):
we go in spurts of our I mean, our electric
bill fluctuates throughout the year, as I think most people's does,
because our heating and AC is on electric, but certainly
through renovations using a lot of power tools, we would
see an increase in our electric bill. But I remember
that it might have even been three seventy Honestly, it
(32:56):
was when we had a month where we had guests
in our house literally every weekend, and Eric's parents were
parked in their RV at our house, and in any
spare time that we had we were doing renovations. So
power tools so reasonable for how much we were doing,
(33:18):
but it still was a little gut punch.
Speaker 1 (33:22):
Yes, okay, ours August of twenty twenty three where we
were doing renovations, for sure, we had renters in the back,
(33:44):
so we actually started that in June of twenty twenty three,
so that would have been our first for a right
at the beginning three seventy seven, and we kind of
just had three months back to back two seventy two,
(34:06):
three seventy two, three seventy seven, three forty seven, And
this is July August September. That is just what July
August September looks like because it's all a c and
this house is just an older it. The walls in
(34:28):
most of the house are not insulated and we did
not want to open them up to insulate them. So
we opened up the walls in our bedroom and in
the bathrooms and those got insulated. So any while we
did open that was exterior did get insulated, but a
(34:51):
lot of them did not. And then the windows just
so this month it's like one wow, I see one twenty.
April of last year was one twenty, even with guests
in the back, one nineteen. Yeah, because the first, yeah,
(35:14):
one twenty we had because it's just airy. We open windows,
we enjoy outside and the AC doesn't run. So yeah, yeah,
so we make up for it. We pay, you know,
those summer months guilt free because during the winter.
Speaker 3 (35:35):
We just.
Speaker 1 (35:37):
You know, let nature be our air conditioning. Yes, So
thank you so much for listening. I hope this was
helpful for you. I hope you're going to take action
on something we talked about in the episode. If you're
listening to this on Spotify, please leave a comment. If
you're listening on YouTube. Please leave a comment let us
(35:59):
know the action that you are going to take and
if you have any other helpful tips. The hive mind
is real. We may have missed something if it's not applicable.
Really to know what we the knowledge we have access
to and if it helped you. We'd also love if
you leave a rating and review for the show and
(36:23):
or for our book By What you Love Without Going
Broke that released in January. This one, in particular is
for the book. It's from KHF. Finally, a personal finance
book we all can relate to. This book is spot on.
Jen and Jill holistically present in a very digestible related
approach many of the primary influences in why and how
(36:46):
we value our financial resources and how we can find
balance with them amidst all the social media and other
noise that competes for our attention and it follows our money.
I work in financial services, have read about twenty personal
finance books, listen to many of the major personal finance podcasts,
and By What you Love Without Going Broke has quickly
(37:07):
moved to the top of the list in helping me
understand my current mindset and behavior and how if at all,
I can better align both with what has the most
meaning and impact for me. Also, I'm a huge fan
of the Frugal Friends podcast and listen to every episode. Wow,
such a high compliment. Thank you so much. It means
(37:31):
so much that somebody in this space would think like
that about our book.
Speaker 3 (37:39):
So humbling because we hear this from both sides, both
from people like yourself who are saying I've read so
many personal finance books and this is becoming a beloved one,
and people who buy what you Love Without Going Broke
is the first personal finance book they ever pick up.
That is so fun that our book kind of hits
(38:01):
both people that it really could be the first book
you ever read, or it could be the twenty first,
and there still might be something in it for you.
So thanks everyone for listening, Thanks for reading our book.
If you have enjoyed the show, please leave us or
rating a review for the podcast. If you read the book,
please leave us or rating and review for the book.
If you've done both, leave both. We love you and
(38:25):
we thank you for it, and we'll see you next time.
Speaker 1 (38:27):
Yeah, and if you want to get your own copy
of the book, buy What you Love book dot com
get it from bookshop dot org, or there's information on
how to request it at your library if your library
doesn't already have a copy. See you next time.
Speaker 5 (38:40):
Bye.
Speaker 1 (38:42):
Gorugle Friends is produced by Eric Sirianni.
Speaker 3 (38:55):
Jen. I just had, like I just I just had
a core memory. I just had one of the best
experiences of my life recently.
Speaker 1 (39:11):
Tell me about it.
Speaker 3 (39:13):
I thought you were going to know automatically. So Eric
and I went to Cleveland, Ohio, the exotic Cleveland where
my sister lives. She has four children, and we spent
like a long weekend there hanging out with all the kiddos.
And when we were out, one of the children, Lydia,
(39:33):
who is the only girl, asks myself and Eric, can
I come home with you guys? And we were like,
h it was her spring break, so she had the
rest of the week off and we were like, we
don't see why not. And then she asked her parents
and they were like, yeah, we can make that work.
(39:57):
And what a dream to just last minute, spontaneously be
able to say yes, you can come back with us,
spend five days in Florida with us, and I mean
we still had work to do, but she was able
to come to the office and we went to the
beach in the afternoon.
Speaker 1 (40:16):
She was probably our quietest employee. Yeah, she was the
best definitely best behave employee all week.
Speaker 3 (40:22):
Yeah, she's ten. She kept herself busy with reading books
and coloring and some fun videos and it was literally
so fun, so cool that it was able to happen.
But also side story with this, because she is a miner.
(40:43):
We had to also then take her back to Cleveland,
and she wasn't comfortable flying by herself, understandable, so while
her parents purchased her ticket, her round trip ticket down
to us, we got a ticket to be able to
go back with her on a Sunday, and I was
planning on doing this, flying her back to Cleveland, walking
(41:06):
her out to the car to see her mom, turning
right back around, getting on a plane home, and we
plan for this. Then we come into the office one
day and I look at my calendar and I realized
that you and I have a book event for by
What You Love Without Going Broke. There was a local
bookstore doing a book club on our book and they
(41:27):
invited us to go. Two months in advance to this
event has been on the calendar for two months, but
in my excited stupor of booking the flight making sure
that Lydia could come down to Florida with us without
her parents and enjoy her spring break here just ride
out the dome, totally forgot I got the dome booked
(41:49):
ticket for myself, and then we remember. I'm like, oh no,
so what I was able to relatively easily change it
to be from me to Eric for him to take
her back. So bless him for doing a six hour
kind of round trip fly to Cleveland, fly back in
(42:12):
the matter of a few hours. But so that had happened,
and you knew about it, like you did not book
a ticket to fly to Ohio for this thing that
we've had planned for two months, and I'm like, I totally did,
as my bad. So then I get there that Sunday
morning to our book event and I'm fifteen minutes early.
(42:35):
And usually you beat me places you are. I am
typically punctual, meaning like right on time, and Jen, you
are usually early by like ten to fifteen minutes, so
I was surprised to not see you there. So I'm like,
I'm just going to shoot her a text like I'm
here and glad I did because you show up a
(42:58):
little later saying I totally forgot that we had this event.
So we both took our turns in forgetting about this
book event that we had. But you know what, we
both showed up.
Speaker 1 (43:10):
We got up on time, and none nobody was the wiser.
Speaker 3 (43:15):
That we that both of us almost didn't show up, and.
Speaker 1 (43:18):
It was such a great event, like it was wonderful.
Speaker 3 (43:22):
We've been saying that it does take the two of
us that like our two brains combined makes one hundred
and fifty percent brain. Like you bring seventy five, I
bring seventy five, and it's more than enough.
Speaker 1 (43:34):
It's more, it's more than enough.
Speaker 3 (43:38):
Yeah, look gay bite
Episode five oh two, how to Save money on your
Electric bill.
Speaker 2 (00:08):
Welcome to the Frugal Friends podcast, where you'll learn to
save money, embrace simplicity, and liver life. Here your hosts
Jen and Jill.
Speaker 1 (00:24):
Welcome to the Frugal Friends podcast. My name is Jen,
my name is Joe, and today we are talking specifically
about your electric bill. Ways that you can get electricity
for free, low cost, get a deal on it, or
feel good paying for.
Speaker 3 (00:39):
It, which is our new method of how we're going
about these episodes. We are not looking to the Internet
in the same ways that we used to. We're not
doing the old Google search and going through an article.
We've got our own framework how to get it for free,
low cost, deal, guilt free. But first, this episode brought
(01:00):
to you by electrifying experiences, not the kind that hurt,
but the kind that are fun, exhilarating, thrilling, inspiring, like
the friend Letter, which is at least two of those things.
Every Monday, Wednesday and Friday, we're inspiring you with a
weekly money move you can make to get one step
closer to better financial management. And we're thrilling you with
(01:24):
some freebies ways to save money on stuff you're already
buying and helpful ways to reduce impulse spending and feel
less guilt about buying the things you love. So get
it for free at Frugal Friends podcast dot com. Be
electrified by our friend letter.
Speaker 1 (01:41):
Yes, I love checking out the friend letter. The gifts
are always on point. I opened it one time and
there was a ice skating dinosaur and I said, yep,
this is this is these are my people. I don't
write the friend letters, but I open them up and say,
this is on brand. This is us all right. So
(02:04):
we've talked about saving money on utilities and bills in
the past, and this year we have committed to updating
and publishing new information, new episodes everything how to save
money on X, how to save money on Everything, because
it's been quite a long time since we recorded episodes
(02:24):
specific like this, and a lot has changed. AI technology
has made a lot of lot, a lot of things
more accessible and a lot of new things. So that
is what we are talking about. If you do want
to get some more summer specific episodes, check out episode
(02:45):
four to eleven. Want to Budget for this Summer Episode
three ozho one Frugal living Tips for from the Great Depression.
It's not summer specific or bill specific, but people tend
to like that episode. But all right, let's get into
a ways to save money on your electric bill.
Speaker 3 (03:03):
So the first category that we want to look at
is how can you get it for free? This is
not going to be for everybody, but like our framework suggests,
we want to offer you a way or an understanding
of how you can meet these needs at various levels,
depending on where you're at currently. So there are programs
(03:27):
like lie HEAP stands for Low Income Home Energy Assistance
Program that will assist low income households, particularly those who
have low income but are paying a high proportion of
their household income towards home energy needs. So this is
a program that might just supplement how much money you're paying.
(03:51):
There are times, however, where they might pay your entire
electric bill through this program. So the guidelines are in
a vary state to state, but usually it's around two
hundred percent of the poverty guidelines. So if you are
one person earning an income living alone, the guidelines would
(04:13):
be about thirty one thousand dollars that you're making annually
where you could be eligible for lie HEAP. Two people
in a household would be forty two thousand dollars annually
a year for people in the household sixty four thousand
dollars a year. But you can find what you might
be eligible for with your local lie heat program, so
(04:36):
you can go to energyhelp dot Us to learn about
that one.
Speaker 1 (04:41):
Yeah, if you have kids, two or three kids, then
this is something definitely to look into. If you're a
single income household with multiple kids and your household income
is around sixty four thousand dollars or less, definitely head
to its energyhelp dot us and see if you qualify
(05:02):
for light heap. There's also the Weatherization Assistance Program WOP.
I think they made a song about this one, but
it helps low income families improve the energy efficiency of
their home and so are there are programs like this
that help everyone, and we'll talk about that in a minute,
but this one is specifically that it will not just
(05:24):
tell you how to improve the energy efficiency, but will
actually help you take those steps as well.
Speaker 3 (05:33):
I also know that many energy companies themselves will have
their own grants and programs, so you can go to
whoever your energy provider is directly and see if you
might be eligible for discounts or free energy again depending
on your need.
Speaker 1 (05:53):
Yeah, it's very often most of those programs are like
funded by lie heap. But also so they will have
separate ones as well. So even if maybe you did
not qualify for this one, see if your electric company
has any other grants or programs. All right, So the
(06:14):
next one is how do we get it for low cost?
How do we get our electricity at the lowest cost
possible without doing anything illegal or sacrificing quality?
Speaker 3 (06:26):
So just plug into your neighbors.
Speaker 1 (06:28):
Yeah right, No, that's not what we're talking about. So
I see on the internet a lot of all kinds
of recommendations, and this is kind of where we're going
to debunk some of those and tell you where you're
going to get the most bang for your buck. So
one thing I see recommended a lot is getting energy
(06:49):
efficient appliances that will help you pay less for your
energy bill. And so I think that is from doing
research on how much your appliances actually contribute to your
energy bill. It's full stop, pointless. If you have an
appliance that works, if it is not energy efficient, keep
(07:14):
with it, because you will you will spend more money
upgrading than you will save on your energy bill. The
place where you're going to get the biggest bank for
your buck is your air conditioning and your heating or
your furnace, And so that's really what we're going to
hone in on the rest of the episode. That uses
about fifty percent of your total energy cost. The second
(07:40):
highest is at fourteen percent, and that's your water heater.
So if you're going to focus on two things, it's
going to be your HVAC and potentially your water heater
only if you really need to. Everything else is kind
of superfluous when we're talking about saving on your electric bill.
(08:02):
You can want energy efficient appliances, you can want a
new appliance. Sure they're all energy efficient at this point,
but you're getting a new appliance to get a new appliance,
not to save money on your energy bill.
Speaker 3 (08:14):
If you're already in the market for a new appliance,
then great, that's just an added bonus. And to kind
of think about what's going to be like I know,
for us when we went from a duct system to
mini splits, that significantly reduced our overall cost. Of course,
it would be super expensive if your whole system wasn't
(08:34):
broken already to switch to mini splits. I think we
got quoted at one point seventeen thousand dollars for just
like half of our house. So to your point, that
wouldn't have actually saved us money to make that switch,
just to make it, but our condenser was broken. We
did need a new system, so it's like, all right,
we might as well upgrade to something that's going to
(08:57):
be energy efficient for the long term. It's also worth
looking at whether or not there's rebates. I think we're
going to talk about that at another point, but there
can be reasons to replace for the sake of replacing
if there's rebates being offered. Yeah, but back to focusing
on what takes the most of our energy, that being
your ac, your heating, then we want to be looking
(09:20):
at insulating and air ceiling our homes. So and this
has even been corroborated by my husband, who has worked
in construction for many, many years, and he has worked
tirelessly to insulate our home. And I think it's so
ridiculous some of the measures that he takes, but he's like,
(09:40):
this is the number one way that heat or ac
escapes the home and the number one way bugs also
get into your home. So there's a double WHAMMYE reason
for making sure that the house is as sealed as possible.
One of the things that you can do to figure
out where you might be losing the most of your
energy is by doing a free energy audit through your
(10:05):
energy provider. So I know for us, Jen, I've done this,
Eric and I have gotten the free energy audit through
Duke who was our local supplier, and was really shocked
by the level of service that they provided that they
actually care to help us reduce our energy bill and
then ended up giving us something in the mail to
(10:28):
help reduce some of our energy costs, both on water
usage as well as on electric usage, like probably fifty
to seventy five dollars worth of things that they gave
us to be able to install throughout our home to
be able to reduce our energy. So look at this
for whoever your energy is. Energy provider is see if
(10:51):
they'll do a free energy audit for you.
Speaker 1 (10:53):
And if they won't, if they send you to a
private energy company, it's not a scam. That company is
probably subsidized buy your city. Your energy provider is subsidized
by your city to do these energy audits. It benefits
the city, so they subsidize it. So if you're like,
is it a scam? No, of course they're going to
(11:13):
try and push you to buy something, whether it's a
private company or they're going to offer rebates from the
energy provider to get kickbacks from a company to do
the insulation and air ceiling for you. But you don't
have to go with a company. There are things you
can do yourself. And this is an example where if
(11:35):
you need to buy some weather stripping or if you
need to buy something in order to be more energy efficient,
these are the things you want to be buying, not
the energy efficient appliances.
Speaker 3 (11:48):
Yeah, so where you might see the most energy loss
is in the attic if there isn't any insulation, or
the insulation is going bad, is missing in certain parts,
if you've got leaks in your duct work, windows for sure,
doors for sure, even checking your thermostat settings. So the
(12:11):
lower barrier to entry would be absolutely your windows and doors,
making sure that you don't see any light coming through
some of the cracks in there, or if you can
kind of feel with your hand where you might be
getting drafts. So that's where cock window ceiler can come in.
(12:31):
Even the plastic weather stripping like you already mentioned for
those of you in the north during the winter, even
putting plastic over your windows. You know you're not going
to be opening the windows, so getting one of those
like plastic windows ceiling kits can be worth it to
be able to keep the heat in. And then of
(12:52):
course checking your thermostat settings, making sure that you're not
overdoing it, but also that you're allowing your areas where
you are living to be monitored by the temperature that
you want it, but allowing a few degrees difference in
maybe some of the rooms that you're not currently utilizing.
Speaker 1 (13:13):
Yeah, and then if you're going to buy an appliance, well,
if you're going to upgrade, so we talk about sinking funds.
You should always have a sinking fund for repair, maintenance, upgrades,
stuff like that. So saving for your AC or furnace
like replacement. If you know you're going to need a
(13:35):
whole new system, like Jill died, start figuring out whether
it's best to go with the with the standard that
has been in most houses, the central system, or if
it might behoove you to go to a mini split system.
And there's also di you can get it done professionally,
but you can get mister cool offers DIY mini split
(13:59):
installation kits, so you can do that.
Speaker 3 (14:03):
That is what we went with. That's what we were
able to do our whole house for I want to say,
eight thousand.
Speaker 1 (14:11):
Dollars, three bedroom, two bath.
Speaker 3 (14:13):
Uh huh. So compared to the seventeen thousand dollars quote
we got from a company to do it for us,
eight thousand dollars was far better for it. But of
course we had we did have to do it ourselves.
It does take a little bit of no how, but
there are plenty of YouTube videos out there.
Speaker 1 (14:29):
Yeah, and you should have a friend in the HVAC
industry who can help you if the free on goes
a little hey wired, because not everyone will repair those.
Speaker 3 (14:38):
Systems, right.
Speaker 1 (14:39):
And then a tankless water heater, so a gas powered
one if you're in the North. If you're in the South,
you can go gas or electric.
Speaker 3 (14:49):
Yeah, tankless doesn't totally work in the North, but we
love it here in the South. It saves until the moony.
Speaker 1 (14:56):
Yeah.
Speaker 3 (14:57):
All right, now we're onto a d How do we
get a deal on this electric that we're paying for? So,
of course, when it comes to insulating, sealing up our homes.
Definitely look for rebates that might be offered to you
from that free energy check that you ended up doing.
(15:18):
Not only might they give you some free stuff. They
gave us some weather stripping in that little package that
they sent to us afterwards, but they also alerted us
to if you were to replace these windows, we would cover,
you know, fifty percent of the cost of that. I
also know in a lot of places this is more
(15:40):
to do with water usage, but to use it as
an example, many cities might offer rebates on replacing your toilets,
making it absolutely free. You know, you guys did that,
and replacing old toilets that are going to use far
less water and to get a free toilet totally worth it.
So check into what rebates might exist when it comes
(16:03):
to tankless water heaters. Check Black Friday sales. Water heaters
are more likely to break in the winter, so that
could be a time to consider replacing them kind of
when Black Friday comes around.
Speaker 1 (16:15):
Yeah, because if your water heater breaks in the winter,
you don't have time to search sales and to get
a deal, right, So if you know this is the
season when most water heater break, then you'll want to
be looking for these deals in the summer, the fall,
stuff like that, so be prepared so that you don't
(16:39):
have to pay more in a crisis. Next is the
time of use discount from your energy company. Most energy
companies offer this. I didn't even realize we had it
in our area. I thought this was some kind of
special thing that other people had, but no, we have
it too, and it is deaf inconvenient times. So you
(17:03):
would have to be doing your you know, most of
your so like running your washer and your dryer and
your dishwasher in the middle of the night essentially. So
if you have one of those washer dryers that can
switch automatically from washing to drying, this is a great thing.
(17:24):
Just set it up to run in the middle of
the night. So I actually called Duke and wanted to
know if it would benefit me to change to this,
and they were so good in walking me through. They
walked me through on I was on my laptop and
they told me where to go so that I can see,
(17:46):
this is my energy usage. This is what I'm paying
for killowater, whatever unit of energy. This is what it
would change to if I went to time of day
discount program. It would increase the price per use during
peak hours and then decrease it during off hours. So
(18:10):
what I decided for me is that when I looked
and it even did the math for me, they're like,
this is what you're paying now, this is what you
would pay with the same habits if you got time
of use discount, and I would pay more, but obviously
I would change my habits. But then I was thinking, actually,
(18:31):
with the kids and everything, I don't really want to
change my habits. So I think I'm just going to
stay with what I have. But look it up, see
how it would change for you, and really consider if
you could change your habits. If you work nights, if
you're a night owl or super early like you've got
one of those four am wake up routines or something,
(18:54):
check it out, do the math and see if it
will work for you.
Speaker 3 (18:59):
Yeah, if you're not someone who's always cranking your AC
or your heat, you know, through the evenings, or if
you've got one of those newer washer dryers where you
can tell it to start you don't even have to
be awake, but do a delay start on at least
one of those cycles. I think it could be worth it. Then,
(19:21):
there is a thing called energy Wise Home, and this
is something that can help, particularly when it comes to
people who have a pool or a tankless water or
is it tank or tankless water heater.
Speaker 1 (19:38):
It's regular regular water heater and AC, but I think
it really helps people with pools. That's where I'm thinking
this will have the most benefits.
Speaker 3 (19:49):
So it's kind of it's an automation that you can
add to your system that will cycle your pool, pump,
your water heater, your AC on and off automatic to
reduce usage in peak times so that you can get
up to one hundred and fifty dollars in rebates. So
if you've got these types of systems in your home,
(20:11):
this is definitely something to consider that you don't even
have to be a part of the process. It will
do it for you and you just got the one
time installation and then set it and forget it.
Speaker 1 (20:23):
Yeah. I think if you're in a temperate climate like California,
or you have a pool, or you have a tank
water heater, I wouldn't do this with a tankless but
definitely it's an energy wise home search that put it
ask chat gpt if the program because it's a trademarked program,
(20:47):
So this isn't just like a duke thing, but see
if it's available in your area. More often than not,
something like it is going to be. It's just a
little thing that they install that's cycles the power on
and off without your consent. So again something that I
looked at and I was like, I don't have a pool,
(21:08):
I don't have a tank water heater. I do not
want them to turn my AC on and off at
their leisure for whenever they feel like it, So it
wasn't the right move for us.
Speaker 3 (21:22):
Final category is how do we pay for electricity guilt free?
And I do think some of this has to do
with making sure that our usage is really buttoned up,
that we are not being wasteful or over consuming our
electric usage. So I do think it's worth kind of
(21:43):
going through these first three categories, raining in how we
are engaging with our usage, being sure that when we're
out of the house for the majority of the day,
our AC isn't pumping sixty six degrees, like we're not
leaving the doors and windows open. We are being aware
of how much we're taking.
Speaker 1 (22:04):
But if you are somebody who likes your AC sixty
six degrees when you're home? How can you do that
guilt free? And so the thing we think for this
is we're looking at the servicing and the services we
get around our electric items, mainly our HVAC, but all
(22:26):
of our appliances. Really how can we pay How can
we save money and pay for that guilt free too?
And so I'll let you in on a little stat
Private equity investors have purchased nearly eight hundred HVAC, plumbing
and electrical companies since twenty twenty two. In three years,
(22:53):
private equity investors have purchased nearly eight hundred HVAC, plumbing
and election companies. And what these private equity companies do
is they go in, they clean house, raise prices, repaint
the sign on the on the front door, make it
(23:14):
look you know, a little less CD. And then every
dollar you use in that company now leaves most of
it leaves your community. Whereas when it was just the
CDHVAC company, most of that money stayed in your community,
not C, not CD. But you know, you know what
(23:34):
it looks like. You're like, I don't know if I
can trust Jed the HVAC gun, right.
Speaker 3 (23:40):
But Jed's been doing it for thirty years.
Speaker 1 (23:42):
Right and Jed, if you've just got to know him,
he is legit, but he retired and nobody wanted to
buy his business except for the private equity companies. So
you'll be able to tell you know, the private equity
back companies, they're very polished, they've got money, but the
money goes to them, not your community local companies. They
(24:03):
may not have the signs, may not be as shiny,
the colors may not be as bright, or maybe they're
too bright. But I'll also say when you go with
a local company, you don't sacrifice quality to buy local,
and you usually save money when you go with local companies.
(24:24):
So that's how we believe that you can save money
on your electric bill. Guilt free is when you need
these appliances serviced, you go with locally owned companies. So
what you can do is get your recommendations from your friends,
go about how you would normally do, go search, narrow
(24:48):
it down to a couple companies, and then you can
actually ask chat GPT are these companies backed by private
equity and chat GPT will tell you, which is an
amazing thing because before AI you would have to pay
for that answer from a company called pitch Book which
(25:14):
details and tracks data of private equity deals so you
don't have to You don't have to pay for that anymore,
which is amazing. You can ask chat GPT and it
will tell you if the company is publicly traded or
backed by private equity. You have to answer. You have
to ask those questions either separately or differentiate and you'll
(25:39):
and you can find out quickly. So yeah, find out,
take the time and go with a company that, yes,
is you know, well rated but local.
Speaker 3 (25:53):
So to recap. If you are looking for ways to
get your electric for free and you are low income,
can to lie heap look into Weatherization Assistance Program WAP
for short. If you're looking for low cost or a deal,
go directly to your energy provider, ask for ask for
(26:13):
an overview of your energy usage and maybe areas where
you might be leaking, and you can do some of
these things to make your home more energy efficient. Focus
on what is taking up the majority of your energy,
right it doesn't. You don't need to be worried about
unplugging things that aren't in use or absolutely turning off
(26:37):
every single light everywhere. Of course, we do want to
be you know, utilizing like led wherever possible when they
need to be replaced. But take take a look at
your ac heating, your water heater. These are the things
that are going to be taking up the most. Do
some of these audits and do some of these simple
(27:00):
maintenance things around your home in order to not be
heating and cooling the entire neighborhood. And then spend guilt
free by supporting local companies and knowing that your energy
usage is enough where it should be for you and
(27:21):
your family's needs.
Speaker 1 (27:22):
Absolutely, you know what else is there for my family's needs.
And it doesn't help us save money on anything, but
it does really make us feel good.
Speaker 3 (27:37):
It's electrifying.
Speaker 1 (27:39):
The bill of the week.
Speaker 4 (27:51):
That's right, it's time for the best minute of your
entire week. Maybe a baby was born and his name
is Williams. Maybe you off your mortgage, maybe your card
died and you're happy to not have to pay that
bill anymore. That's bills, butffalo bills, bill clean.
Speaker 1 (28:08):
This is the bill of the week.
Speaker 5 (28:12):
Hi guys, this is Jodan from Paris again. Oh my god,
this is amazing. I am listening to my favorite podcast
which happens to be on books, which are my favorite
thing in the world. And I'm, you know, mining my
own business, cleaning my apartment that is going to be
on Airbnb during my Christmas vacation. And then what does happened?
(28:32):
My voice is on the podcast. My bill of the
week is on the podcast. This is so insane. By
the way, it also shows that I my English is
getting worse and worse, which brings us to the bill
of the week. What did I do with that unexpected
amount of money I was talking about on our last conversation. Well,
(28:53):
you're gonna be so proud of me. Half of it
was put on a life in sih ssurance, which I
didn't have before, and the other health was put on
a plane ticket to America. Yes, that did happen. I
am so excited. I'm going to Boston and Providence and
(29:17):
then Vermont in early January. Yes it's going to be cold, Yes,
I'm aware of it. I'm visiting friends and they just
invited me, and out of the blue, I decided to go.
And I was able to because I saved the money
I had in July. And this is all thing to
thanks to you guys. Thank you so much. Vizoo from Paris.
Speaker 1 (29:39):
Yes, Oh my gosh, Vermont, New Rhode Island, Boston, Providence.
Speaker 3 (29:47):
She's a Providence, Okay, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah yeah.
Fantastic places, amazing and I'm never going to get tired
of listening to your voice. You don't need to do
anything with your English. I understood you. Just yeah fine,
and I loved it. Thank you for giving us this
follow up about what you did with this unexpected money
(30:07):
that you received back in the summer, and I love
that you were able to allocate it to a couple
of different things. One thing that is maybe a little
bit more responsible, achieving this goal of having life insurance
that you didn't have before, and now this unexpected money
allows you to be able to have that. And then
(30:28):
something we're fun and life giving to get to see
friends in the US. So glad that you came to
our little almost neck of the woods since the East Coast,
so we'll count it, and we hope that you just
had such a lovely visit. Thank you so much for
calling again. We love our follow up bills. If you
(30:48):
all are listening and you have a bill that you
want to share, if it has to do with an
update on a previous bill that you left us. We'd
love to hear it. If your name is Bill, if
you were able to spend your bills on things that
help you achieve financial goals or just help you spend
time with friends, we want to hear it all. Frugal
(31:10):
Friends podcast dot com slash Bill leave it for us,
and now it's time for lightning round.
Speaker 1 (31:21):
Okay, what's the highest your electric bill has ever been?
Speaker 3 (31:26):
Yeah, I changed the question.
Speaker 1 (31:27):
You did change the question. I don't have an answer
for it.
Speaker 3 (31:31):
The other question was what do you spend the most
a mount on your electric bill? And we kind of
already answered that, like everybody spends the most on heating
an AC.
Speaker 1 (31:41):
You're so right, Okay, you go first and I'll look
it up.
Speaker 3 (31:45):
Okay, mine at one point was So I'll preface this
by saying we live in a three bed, two path
fourteen hundred square feet, not a large large home home,
not not the tiniest either. We did at one point
live in one hundred and seventy five square feet. So
(32:06):
instead it's a burger from that. And our electric bill
got up to three hundred and fifty dollars, which is
a lot for us. Yeah, normally we sit around to
thirty two fifty, so this was quite quite a shocker. However,
(32:29):
we go in spurts of our I mean, our electric
bill fluctuates throughout the year, as I think most people's does,
because our heating and AC is on electric, but certainly
through renovations using a lot of power tools, we would
see an increase in our electric bill. But I remember
that it might have even been three seventy Honestly, it
(32:56):
was when we had a month where we had guests
in our house literally every weekend, and Eric's parents were
parked in their RV at our house, and in any
spare time that we had we were doing renovations. So
power tools so reasonable for how much we were doing,
(33:18):
but it still was a little gut punch.
Speaker 1 (33:22):
Yes, okay, ours August of twenty twenty three where we
were doing renovations, for sure, we had renters in the back,
(33:44):
so we actually started that in June of twenty twenty three,
so that would have been our first for a right
at the beginning three seventy seven, and we kind of
just had three months back to back two seventy two,
(34:06):
three seventy two, three seventy seven, three forty seven, And
this is July August September. That is just what July
August September looks like because it's all a c and
this house is just an older it. The walls in
(34:28):
most of the house are not insulated and we did
not want to open them up to insulate them. So
we opened up the walls in our bedroom and in
the bathrooms and those got insulated. So any while we
did open that was exterior did get insulated, but a
(34:51):
lot of them did not. And then the windows just
so this month it's like one wow, I see one twenty.
April of last year was one twenty, even with guests
in the back, one nineteen. Yeah, because the first, yeah,
(35:14):
one twenty we had because it's just airy. We open windows,
we enjoy outside and the AC doesn't run. So yeah, yeah,
so we make up for it. We pay, you know,
those summer months guilt free because during the winter.
Speaker 3 (35:35):
We just.
Speaker 1 (35:37):
You know, let nature be our air conditioning. Yes, So
thank you so much for listening. I hope this was
helpful for you. I hope you're going to take action
on something we talked about in the episode. If you're
listening to this on Spotify, please leave a comment. If
you're listening on YouTube. Please leave a comment let us
(35:59):
know the action that you are going to take and
if you have any other helpful tips. The hive mind
is real. We may have missed something if it's not applicable.
Really to know what we the knowledge we have access
to and if it helped you. We'd also love if
you leave a rating and review for the show and
(36:23):
or for our book By What you Love Without Going
Broke that released in January. This one, in particular is
for the book. It's from KHF. Finally, a personal finance
book we all can relate to. This book is spot on.
Jen and Jill holistically present in a very digestible related
approach many of the primary influences in why and how
(36:46):
we value our financial resources and how we can find
balance with them amidst all the social media and other
noise that competes for our attention and it follows our money.
I work in financial services, have read about twenty personal
finance books, listen to many of the major personal finance podcasts,
and By What you Love Without Going Broke has quickly
(37:07):
moved to the top of the list in helping me
understand my current mindset and behavior and how if at all,
I can better align both with what has the most
meaning and impact for me. Also, I'm a huge fan
of the Frugal Friends podcast and listen to every episode. Wow,
such a high compliment. Thank you so much. It means
(37:31):
so much that somebody in this space would think like
that about our book.
Speaker 3 (37:39):
So humbling because we hear this from both sides, both
from people like yourself who are saying I've read so
many personal finance books and this is becoming a beloved one,
and people who buy what you Love Without Going Broke
is the first personal finance book they ever pick up.
That is so fun that our book kind of hits
(38:01):
both people that it really could be the first book
you ever read, or it could be the twenty first,
and there still might be something in it for you.
So thanks everyone for listening, Thanks for reading our book.
If you have enjoyed the show, please leave us or
rating a review for the podcast. If you read the book,
please leave us or rating and review for the book.
If you've done both, leave both. We love you and
(38:25):
we thank you for it, and we'll see you next time.
Speaker 1 (38:27):
Yeah, and if you want to get your own copy
of the book, buy What you Love book dot com
get it from bookshop dot org, or there's information on
how to request it at your library if your library
doesn't already have a copy. See you next time.
Speaker 5 (38:40):
Bye.
Speaker 1 (38:42):
Gorugle Friends is produced by Eric Sirianni.
Speaker 3 (38:55):
Jen. I just had, like I just I just had
a core memory. I just had one of the best
experiences of my life recently.
Speaker 1 (39:11):
Tell me about it.
Speaker 3 (39:13):
I thought you were going to know automatically. So Eric
and I went to Cleveland, Ohio, the exotic Cleveland where
my sister lives. She has four children, and we spent
like a long weekend there hanging out with all the kiddos.
And when we were out, one of the children, Lydia,
(39:33):
who is the only girl, asks myself and Eric, can
I come home with you guys? And we were like,
h it was her spring break, so she had the
rest of the week off and we were like, we
don't see why not. And then she asked her parents
and they were like, yeah, we can make that work.
(39:57):
And what a dream to just last minute, spontaneously be
able to say yes, you can come back with us,
spend five days in Florida with us, and I mean
we still had work to do, but she was able
to come to the office and we went to the
beach in the afternoon.
Speaker 1 (40:16):
She was probably our quietest employee. Yeah, she was the
best definitely best behave employee all week.
Speaker 3 (40:22):
Yeah, she's ten. She kept herself busy with reading books
and coloring and some fun videos and it was literally
so fun, so cool that it was able to happen.
But also side story with this, because she is a miner.
(40:43):
We had to also then take her back to Cleveland,
and she wasn't comfortable flying by herself, understandable, so while
her parents purchased her ticket, her round trip ticket down
to us, we got a ticket to be able to
go back with her on a Sunday, and I was
planning on doing this, flying her back to Cleveland, walking
(41:06):
her out to the car to see her mom, turning
right back around, getting on a plane home, and we
plan for this. Then we come into the office one
day and I look at my calendar and I realized
that you and I have a book event for by
What You Love Without Going Broke. There was a local
bookstore doing a book club on our book and they
(41:27):
invited us to go. Two months in advance to this
event has been on the calendar for two months, but
in my excited stupor of booking the flight making sure
that Lydia could come down to Florida with us without
her parents and enjoy her spring break here just ride
out the dome, totally forgot I got the dome booked
(41:49):
ticket for myself, and then we remember. I'm like, oh no,
so what I was able to relatively easily change it
to be from me to Eric for him to take
her back. So bless him for doing a six hour
kind of round trip fly to Cleveland, fly back in
(42:12):
the matter of a few hours. But so that had happened,
and you knew about it, like you did not book
a ticket to fly to Ohio for this thing that
we've had planned for two months, and I'm like, I totally did,
as my bad. So then I get there that Sunday
morning to our book event and I'm fifteen minutes early.
(42:35):
And usually you beat me places you are. I am
typically punctual, meaning like right on time, and Jen, you
are usually early by like ten to fifteen minutes, so
I was surprised to not see you there. So I'm like,
I'm just going to shoot her a text like I'm
here and glad I did because you show up a
(42:58):
little later saying I totally forgot that we had this event.
So we both took our turns in forgetting about this
book event that we had. But you know what, we
both showed up.
Speaker 1 (43:10):
We got up on time, and none nobody was the wiser.
Speaker 3 (43:15):
That we that both of us almost didn't show up, and.
Speaker 1 (43:18):
It was such a great event, like it was wonderful.
Speaker 3 (43:22):
We've been saying that it does take the two of
us that like our two brains combined makes one hundred
and fifty percent brain. Like you bring seventy five, I
bring seventy five, and it's more than enough.
Speaker 1 (43:34):
It's more, it's more than enough.
Speaker 3 (43:38):
Yeah, look gay bite
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