March/April 2006 

LIVING ON LESS

5 Books Every Frugal Household Needs

BY HEATHER T. SHAW

Are you trying to save money and live a simpler life? I have five wonderful books I use on a weekly, if not daily, basis that help save money on home repair, the food bill, holiday gift giving and more. These books can save you time, help you use the time you have more effectively and free you up for the activities that are truly valuable and meaningful to you and your family:

• The Complete Tightwad Gazette, Amy Dacyczyn. This wonderful book is a compilation of Dacyczyn’s excellent newsletter, cram-packed with great ideas for saving money, recycling, using what you have on hand and getting the most value for your money. Her idea for creating a "price book" — a listing of the best price and location for every item on your grocery shopping list — can help you start saving on your grocery bill immediately. Dacyczyn offers financial ideas and strategies for parents who would prefer to have one parent at home full time with the children and has excellent tips from readers including paying less for your new car, making your own Christmas gifts, cooking from inexpensive recipes and low-cost home moving. Although she has been occasionally accused of focusing too much time on child-related information, this book has good tips for all ages, whether you’re a young, single student, a family or a retired couple, and it’s equally interesting to both genders.

• How to Fix Damn Near Everything, Franklynn Peterson. We have used this how-to guide to fix a clothes dryer and several leaky faucets; install a new kitchen faucet and a bathroom sink; and make several TV repairs. This book is very handy if you can bear to sift through the tedium and follow Peterson’s excellent step-by-step directions, accompanied by superb technical illustrations by an uncredited illustrator. Although excruciatingly boring to this reader, Peterson also covers the art of reading electronic schematic drawings and "mechanical hang-ups in listening equipment." In a rare moment of levity, Peterson’s practical advice regarding measuring will make you laugh: "The art of measuring is one of the biggest mental blocks in the repair field. More grief and sloppy work have resulted from people who could and wanted to do better but did not because of bad measurements. When measuring a board, belt, bolt, or bauble, if you say, ‘That looks like 3 ¼"and a little more,’ you’ll never get past the ‘hammer it till the damn thing fits’ stage." My edition came out in 1977 and I was unable to find a revised edition, so such things as DVD players and VCRs are not covered, but this is a good book to consult before taking out a second mortgage for the plumbing bill.

• The Joy of Cooking, Irma S. Rombauer and Marion Rombauer Becker. If I could only have one cookbook on a desert island (!) this would be the one. No glossy pictures of melting chocolate to torment one, no shiny, perfectly poached eggs, no Technicolor green vegetables glistening with butter, but packed with good, solid, reliable recipes with infinite variations, providing a bible of sorts for the beginner cook and a well thumbed reference for the more experienced. I turn to this book again and again (and it has the grimy fingerprints, gravy stains, cookie dough splatters and ripped binding to prove it) as the first book I look to when I want to cook a meal using only what I have on hand or when I am baking. There is nothing fancy or particularly inspiring in its pages, but I treasure my copy, which arrived in my husband’s boxes of stored items, unused and pristine, when we were married 13 years ago. One note: I have a strong preference for the early versions of this cookbook. Some of the later versions after this one (dated 1988,) have taken an experimental twist to generate more sales and are not as reliable as the basic recipes I turn to Joy for.

• Organize Yourself! Ronni Eisenberg with Kate Kelly. Here you’ll find wonderful ideas on how to organize everything from a job search to post-pregnancy to traveling with children to purchasing clothing. There’s a section on establishing a useful household notebook with lists of things "To Buy," "To Fix," "To Call" and "To Do," and tips on paying taxes and melding two households. My favorite section, "15 Ways to Use a Kitchen Timer," suggests using the timer when two preschoolers argue over whose turn it is to play with a toy and as a way to get started exercising, setting it for 10 minutes and telling yourself you’ll exercise for just 10 minutes (although this never works for me).

• Your Money or Your Life, Joe Dominguez and Vicki Robin. This inspiring book can help you get out of debt, figure out your priorities and live well for less money. The authors recommend keeping track of every expenditure and adding up the value of every possession to figure out your net worth. This exercise alone will earn you money as you will immediately want to have a yard sale and get rid of all unused items. The focus is on choosing how you will spend your life and your time and then finding a way to finance this through conservative investments and making conscious spending choices. Here’s hope for every broke, indebted, stressed-out person commuting hours in traffic to a meaningless job.