Cheapskate Computer Project - June Update

For background see my original post Cheapskate Computer Project and the April update


EDIT :  Double OOOPS!!!    Looks like I forgot to hit submit when I was ordering that motherboard at Newegg.  Thats a bummer.   I went to the newegg site and the item was still in my shopping cart, i see no order in their records and theres no email confirmation of the order.   Sigh.


I haven't had any activity in my computer project since my last update in April.   I just haven't seen any particularly good deals worth doing.   But a good deal came up this week.  

Citibank had a Citiwallet promotion for $20 off of a purchase of $50 or more at Newegg.    By buying with Citiwallet via Masterpass and using CITIWALLET promo code at Newegg you'd get $20 off.   The deal ends July 12th.   [edit :   the Citiwallet promotion is closed now, as they used all the  available discounts]

None of the items on my computer project shopping list were over $50 individually.   I thought about getting the memory and motherboard combined which would run me roughly $70 and I'd save $20 but thats only about 28% savings.    

Instead to maximize the deal I used a free after rebate for a Refurbished battery for $11 with a $11 rebate (ends June 30th) plus the $40 motherboard to pad the purchase up to over $50.  

MSI H81M-P33  motherboard for $40
Refurbished battery for $11 + $2 shipping
CITIWALLET promo - 20
total spent $33

I should also then get that $11 rebate to give me a total net cost of about $22.   I have to buy a stamp to mail in that rebate form so its really more like $22.50 in the end.  

I still need to get a processor and memory.     I think my best shot at getting those at a discount rate is the kind of promo deals like the one I used today with the $20 off for using my Citibank card.

I neglected to use Ebates to make the purchase at Newegg so I lost out on their 1% cashback.   Opps.


--

Best of Blogs for Week of June 26th

Every Friday afternoon I share some of the more interesting or notable posts that I have seen in the personal finance blogs and other sources for the past week

The Simple Dollar discusses How Much Does Car Insurance Cost? in which they have a couple lists of average costs per state

TSD also answers What Is a CPN, or Credit Privacy Number?
subtitled - spoiler alert : its a scam

Planet Money looks at  Husbands And Wives: Who Works, Who Doesn't?

MoneyBox asks What Happened to the Teen Summer Job?

The Big Picture points out that Where You Live Correlates to a 20% Investment Bias 
and Home State Investing Bias May Be Skewing Your Portfolio


--

Some Interesting FIndings from the American Time Use Survey

The BLS' American Time Use Survey for 2014 is out. 

Looking at Table 1. Time spent in primary activities and percent of the civilian population engaging in each activity, averages per day by sex, 2014 annual averages

Here's some findings I thought were interesting : 

0.1% of men don't sleep.   It says that 99.9% of the male population engages in the activity so that means 0.1% don't.  Huh.   I suppose they could be pulling an all nighter with double shifts or college students studying all night.   Maybe its just reporting errors but who knows.    It says 100% of women sleep, so good for them.

We spend 8.8 hours sleeping on average.   That seems like a lot to me.  But the averages are raised by kids and retirees and other people who don't work.

4.4% of the population doesn't eat or drink.     This ones difficult to believe, but the study found that only 95.6% of people engage in those activities during the day.   I wonder how it works if someone eats while engaging in other activities?    Or is this really a result of poverty?

20% of people don't watch TV in a given day.    The average time spent is 2.82 hours.   Nielsen studies claim people spend 5 hours a day watching TV.   I prefer to believe the more reasonable ATUS figures.

We spend more time shopping than engaging in religious or volunteer activities.    Purchasing consumer goods averaged 0.36 hours and religion was 0.14 and volunteering was also 0.14.


Women do everything more frequently then men except for lawncare, work and sports.   The biggest difference is work.   47.6% of men work and 36.8% of women do.

--

Entertainment coupon book for $4.95

Entertainment.com has their 2015 coupon books on sale for $6 using promo code MISSYOU6

If you shop via Ebates you also get 17.5% cashback on the deal so with a cost of $6 on the book thats $1.05 cash back for a final net cost of $4.95.

Make sure to check out the deals available on the Entertainment.com site first before you buy.   In my area the coupon books are giving lower value than they used to (at least for me).   The last books I bought were $5 and I only found one very good $5 in the book so they barely paid for themselves.    YMMV.

Note : This deal is good through 6/25 only.

Standard Ebates blurb:To get cash back from Ebates you need to be signed up with Ebates.  Then simply go to Ebates to get the referral to the store before you do your shopping.  I also get a referral bonus if you use my links to sign up with Ebates.  




--This article may contain referral links which pay this site a commission for purchases made at the sites.