Are you a member of your local library? If so, great! You all ready have access to one of the places that make living much more frugal. If you aren't all ready using your library, you should be.
My local library is free to join and use. That's because a portion of our property taxes go towards funding the library. But, I've lived in places where that wasn't so, where the library charged it's members an annual fee. Even if your library isn't free, you still should join. Membership fees are usually very low, and pay for themselves in no time with the savings you'll get from borrowing books and materials from the library instead of having to buy them in order to read/use them.
Libraries aren't just about recreational reading (fiction books) or educational reading/research (non-fiction books) any more. Libraries also offer:
- computer usage with internet access and printers
- DVD 'rentals' (free at my library, unless you return it late, in which case it's $1 per day late fee)
- music CDs
- magazines and current newspapers (magazines can be checked out, newspapers have to be read in the library)
- book clubs
- children's summer reading programs
- fun and educational activities for adults
- books containing the local residential building codes (these came in sooooo handy when we were building the house at this little place here ourselves)
Think about how many books you read in a year (most of us at this little place here are voracious readers). If you could read every book this year for free, how much money would you save versus having to buy each book in order to read it?
What about every movie you watch on DVD? Every new release that would cost you $20 at the store, you could view for free by borrowing it from the library. Or even that monthly DVD rental program you're in--you wouldn't need it anymore, because the library doesn't just have movies on DVD, it also has TV series on DVD. How much money would that save you?
How many music CDs could you listen to before deciding if you liked them enough to purchase? How many could you listen to, decide you only liked one or two songs from it, and then purchase online just those couple of songs for your ipod or mp3?
How much money could you save by not subscribing to every magazine you were slightly interested in? How many of those you currently own do you read all the way through? Read more than once? Save and have room in your home to store? You could borrow them from your library, read the articles you were interested in, maybe photocopy the few articles you wanted to be able to refer to at a later date, and then return the magazine to the library, without having to worry about where to keep stacks of magazine back issues in your home.
This is a technique I do with cookbooks. I have a collection of old faithful cookbooks at home, the newest one acquired five years ago. Because since then, I've been borrowing cookbooks from the library, copying the few recipes I wanted to have, and returning the cookbook. It's a whole lot easier to store a few sheets of recipes in a folder in my kitchen that it is to store dozens and dozens of cookbooks that I'll only use a few recipes from.
For books that I borrow from the library, absolutely love and want to have on hand regularly, I look online for used editions, and only when I find one in good shape for a good price, do I buy it. No impulse shopping at the book store where I'd have to pay full price. Nope, a free preview courtesy of the library, then smart, frugal shopping.
Use your library. It's a wonderful resource. Your taxes may all ready be paying for it anyway. Why spend more money to buy books, magazines, or movies you'll only view once?
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