The other day I was reading through The Consumerist and came across a post on 112 Ways To Save Money which was put together after readers submitted their money saving secrets. It is an interesting read that may provide a bit of inspiration to those who are looking to save money. Some of the ways listed in the post are interesting to say the least. The five ways that I found the most interesting were:

1. Brushing without toothpaste

2. Jack all the free soap in a hotel room

3. Buy nearly spoiled meat then freeze it

4. Have only 4 periods a year to save on sanitary supplies

5. DIY ladies sanitary items

There were a few money saving tips listed that are not new to me and are already a part of my life. These include:

1. Make a Garden – At the start of the year I put together a small wooden planter box to grow our own herbs which lead to planting our own vegetables as well.

2. Cut Your Own Hair – my wife cuts my hair which saves on having to go to the barber shop

3. Prepaid Cell Service – I don’t spend a lot of time on my mobile phone and there aren’t any plans that would work out better than being on a prepaid service

4. Using Farmer’s Markets – this works out to be much cheaper than going to the supermarket and the quality of the fruit and vegetables is much better

April 1, 2009 was the day that a new independent earner tax credit was introduced by the New Zealand government. The tax credit was supposedly put in place not only to let people keep more of their hard earned money but also to encourage spending to give the economy a bit of a boost.

Anyway, yesterday morning The Edge radio station put out radio ads, website banners and a press release telling their listeners that a Stimulus package had been announced where the government had rewarded those who earn over $50,000 per year with a $5,000 cash bonus into their bank accounts overnight. They even went as far as to set up an 0800 number for people to call and get more information on the bonus.

The first I heard of the bonus was when my wife got back from her early morning workout session. I was on my way to work and already running late and she was going on about whether or not $5,000 had been deposited into my account. I was a bit confused and wondering what she was going on about. I knew that some sort of tax cuts were coming into effect in April but didn’t think it meant a $5,000 lump sum so I kind of brushed the idea aside.

Things started to change as I was driving to work and listening to all the ads, news broadcasts and people calling up talking about the bonus they had received. It all seemed a bit too good to be true but I started wandering and asking myself “what if?” and “could it be?” and was starting to get excited but trying to stay calm. I was going too wait until I got to work to hear what, if anything my colleagues had to say about but no-one seemed to be talking about it. A few minutes after getting to work my wife called me to say that no deposits had been made into our accounts. It was then whilst I was speaking to her that it clicked that it was April the 1st. All I could do was laugh!!

What was your April Fools?

One thing that a number of people who are making money online tend to neglect or maybe ignore is the issue of paying taxes on their online earnings. One of the reasons for that is that they do not see the amounts they are making online warranted enough to pay tax. Truth of the matter is, there is a high chance you need to pay tax on your online earnings if you are earning a substantial amount of money.

When it comes to earning money via various publisher networks and affiliate programs (a lot of which are based in the US), people are asked to enter their tax information when they sign up. If the new sign ups are not based in the US they generally do not need to provide any information. I got into discussions on forums a while ago and from there on in, the general consensus is that a lot of people start earning, get paid out and forget about paying taxes.

A number of people are also turning to auction sites such as eBay and Amazon to sell goods for a few extra dollars and experience more success than they expected. With that being the case, it is not long before these people find themselves investing more time into selling more and more stuff online and making more and more money and more often than not they are going to receive payment via a service such as PayPal. Last year in the US, legislation was passed that requires the processors of third-party payments (such as PayPal) to report to the IRS individuals who receive at least $20,000 a year in credit or debit card charges from 200 or more transactions. When this legislation is put into place it will make it that much more difficult to evade the taxman.

As already mentioned, the tax laws are different from country to country. For example, if you are selling goods here in New Zealand on a site such a TradeMe, you should declare your online earnings if; you acquired the goods you are selling with the purpose of on-selling, the purpose of the activity is to make a profit or your business involves dealing in these goods. The tax department (IRD) is also said to work closely with TradeMe to make sure people meet their tax obligation.

What I am getting at is, if you are setting out to make a bit of money online it may be a good idea to check what tax laws apply to you. Leading on from that, it may also be a good idea to keep track of your earnings and this can easily be done with finance software such as Quicken, Microsoft Money and QuickBooks. You never know just how far you will get with making money online and if you get to the point where you really need to report your earnings you should be well on the way to being set to avoid the hassle of being chased around by the taxman.

Friday the 13th of March marked the day that our Toyota Corolla got repossessed by Toyota. I was working away at my 9 to 5 job when the office administrator came over to me and told me that there was a gentleman who had come over to see me. When I was walking through to the reception area and spotted the gentleman I had a bit of an idea about what was going to happen (It was N from Impact Recoveries Ltd and I had a run in with him late last year).

By the time I got to the reception area he had already made his way outside where greeted me politely and explained the situation. I was a couple of months behind on my payments and this time around he had been instructed to take the vehicle. He then proceeded to ask me for the keys and said that he would quickly fill out the paperwork he needed to fill out and drive off so that my co-workers wouldn’t have any idea about what was going on. I was a bit stunned at the time and I did not know what to say or do. As I mentioned earlier on he did pay us a visit late last year when we were behind on our payments. At that particular time, we worked out a payment plan to catch up on the payments which if we hadn’t met, he would have returned to cease our vehicle. On Friday there was no two ways about it and he had to take the car and that was that. He took a quick look around the car to check that everything was as it should be, wrote down the mileage, filled out some paperwork, some of which he gave to me and he drove off.

I stood in the parking lot for a little while trying to digest what had just taken and then called my wife to tell her the car had been repossessed and she was in a bit of shock as well. I guess the tiny bit of consolation from the episode was that he was very discreet about it and, he did say that I still had a chance of getting the car back. What I needed to do was to get in touch with Toyota Financial Services to see if I could work out something with them. After getting in touch with them, they told me that I could pick up the vehicle after paying the overdue amount, warrant fee and agents costs. The episode was all a bit of a shock because I was under the impression that late payments were usually referred to external debt collection agencies but it may have been different in this case because of my history with them and maybe even the current economic climate (it is no secret that Toyota is not doing so well).

Why am I even writing about this? Well it is just show how much of a tight squeeze it is in this day in age and that even though I may go on a lot about ways of making money it won’t mean a thing if you don’t pay close attention to all your expenses. Even those who are fortunate enough to still have a job are looking for extra income because for a number of people, it is becoming more difficult to ‘live’. Doing the things that we should be doing reasonably well such as budgeting, paying off debts (if you have any) and saving become difficult tasks that just give you a headache.

I am tired of living like this and I am going to do all that I can to me and my family out of this situation. Budgeting, paying off debts and the likes are things that we are already trying to do. We may have gotten to it a little late but I am determined to get OUT!!!