How to Save Money on Your Mobile Phone Contract

A mobile phone is an important gadget and companion that nowadays you can’t leave home without. Mobile phones offer a range of functions beyond phone calls and SMS. We are using our mobile phones to send emails, surf the Internet, play music, takes pictures and capture videos.

It’s important to find a mobile phone contract that meets your needs and fits your budget. Here is a guide on how to save money on your mobile phone contract and some of the important things to look out for.

Compare mobile phone deals

Use mobile phone deals comparison websites to search for the right phone and tariff for you. These websites have comparison tools that allow you to search for deals based on; monthly cost, contract length, network and brand of the mobile phone. Enter your usage details to reveal the cheapest tariff and package available.

Assess your needs and wants

Another important step is to understand how you will use the mobile phone, and what functions you want. Will you be using it for sending and receiving email, surfing the internet, text messaging, taking and sending pictures? Where will you be using your mobile phone?

Do you need the latest smartphone? The amount of savings will depend on your choice of model. Top range popular models such as Apple’s iPhone 6 and Samsung’s Galaxy S5 are likely to cost more than older models. If you’re using a smartphone to surf the internet, take photos and capture video, some older models such as iPhone 4 will be sufficient.

Understand your usage

It’s important to determine what is your usage pattern is, in order to find the cheapest tariff to match it. The easiest way to check is to calculate the average over your last 6 months of bills. Check how many minutes of calls, and number of texts you use. If you use your mobile phone to surf the internet, check the amount of data you use. Do you go over the free minutes and texts every month? Are you overpaying for your package, or are you paying fines for over use?

Shop around and negotiate better deals

When it’s time to renew your contract, many people are talked into renewing their contract with the same provider who offers them a new handset, without checking what else is on offer from competitors. Shop around and you may end up saving money. If you want to stay with the same provider, make sure you negotiate for a better deal, and don’t be afraid to ask.

Check coverage

Before signing up with a provider, check out the signal coverage in the areas that you need service. Most mobile phone providers have a website where you can search by areas where you’ll be using your mobile to find out how good the coverage will be. However, these websites are only guides and they don’t provide an exact report of your expected coverage.

Early termination fees

Early termination fees are charged to prevent you from switching providers before a contract ends. Before signing up, find out whether the termination fees are pro-rated. This means if you cancel the contract at a later date, a lower fee will be charged.

Use mobile phone deal comparison websites to shop for an appropriate service plan. Understanding your needs and usage, and finding out the coverage and potential cost, can prepare you and make sure you get the phone, and contract, that suits you.

House Hunting: How Much We Spent

Just under two years ago, we moved into our first home.

We moved on a rainy December day just after Christmas. We have loved home ownership ever since, even the hard work (yard and property maintenance, re-shingling the roof, and painting not exempt).

We got a great deal on our house as the market was in a funny place when we bought. That being said, we definitely gave our bank account a good run for it’s money when we were going through the motions of home buying.

Here are the costs that we bore from the purchase of our first home:

Inspections

We had a home inspection ($504), an insulation test for asbestos ($300) and an inspection for an oil tank on the property ($100). We also had a WETT test for our wood burning fireplace ($100) and had the chimney cleaned while we were at it ($100).

The total for all of these various tests and inspections was:

$1104

Down Payment

The down payment was a pretty big chunk of change, and hands down the biggest withdrawal from our bank accounts to date. Because we bank with Tangerine (back then it was ING Direct), it was difficult to get the bank draft in time, but by the skin of our teeth we made it by transferring the money into my husbands RBC account.

The total down payment was:

$20,500

Land Transfer Tax

Typically for first time home buyers, Land Transfer Tax is waived. We still had to pay a portion of land transfer tax, though, as we were $5,000 above the maximum, bringing the tax down to:

$1,320

Home Insurance

We, of course, had to go buy home insurance to .. well, insure our new home! Tenants insurance is only $300/year, and we let ours expire a few months prior to moving in, so this was a whole new expense.

We opted for earthquake insurance and the whole shebang (seriously, we’ll have an earthquake sooner rather than later and I’d rather be well insured then screwed over).

The company for which I work gives us a 20% discount on home insurance through an affiliate company, which is very helpful. With earthquake insurance and home insurance, we had to pay:

$1694

Gas

This is worth mentioning, because it did add up to quite a lot of money. We saw dozens of houses before landing on the perfect home, and we had to drive for hours to see them. Then, we’ll have to spend a lot of money on gas to drive back and forth upon moving.

On extra gas, we spend around:

$150

Life Insurance

Life insurance isn’t something we had prior to buying our home simply because we didn’t really need it.

When we bought our house, we got life insurance for the boy because if anything happened to him (God forbid), I would really struggle.

I am already covered through work, so we didn’t bother covering myself.

In total, a yearly premium for life insurance was:

$365

The total amount that we ended up shelling out during the home buying process was:

$25,133

In out-of-pocket, extra cash. Some of these we have to pay for every month (insurance) and some were one-time expenses.

This might give you a good example of how much you’ll have to pay in down payment, closing, and home hunting costs when you go to buy your next house.

Tips on How to Save for a Home Deposit

We bought our house almost two years ago and started saving for a home deposit or down payment a couple of years before that.

Our savings progress started out quite slow, as I wasn’t making nearly as much money at the time as I was when we bought the house, but by the time we went to buy our house we had a substantial chunk of money saved up.

We worked really hard to amass a down payment. Here are a few things that we did that may work for you:

Worked a Side Hustle

Instead of cutting all of our expenses down to nill, and struggling through a couple of years of extreme frugality to save up more money, I decided to take on some extra work.

I picked up a writing gig, began monetizing a blog that I ran and even started babysitting. This helped us save up a lot of money, as all of the extra cash I earned from these side hustles went straight into our high interest savings accounts.

Make Passive Income On Your Savings

We put all of our home deposit savings into a high interest savings account and in mutual funds in our TFSAs. This helped us earn interest on the money that was in there, which compounded and paid us even more.

Assuming you can’t save up for a down payment in a short period of time, investing the money for a couple of years is a great way to make extra on what you’ve already saved. It’s a way of making your money work harder for you.

Make Sure You Know How Much You Need

To reach a goal, you need to know what that goal is. While it may seem too far off to know, it’s a good idea to look into what type of home you want to buy prior to setting your home deposit goal.

This will help put things into perspective, and also give you an idea of what percentage you want to put down.

You can put anywhere from 5% down up to 100% down, and of course the more you put down the better position you’ll be in.

Some mortgaging companies will help you put less down, like Homestart low deposit home loans. Be careful with putting too little down, though, as you often have to pay PMI in North America which can be a hefty sum.

Down payments don’t have to be too difficult to save for, you just have to know what you are doing.

Suburban Finance

Author: Admin