There are lots of ways to save money and pay off your debt. You can take out a loan to consolidate your expenses into one payment a month saving on interest rates. You can sell off assets and use the proceeds to pay your bills to avoid costly interest charges and late fees.  You can get a second job or make things to sell on the side. You’ve got lots of avenues you can explore, but what about starting where you’re sitting….at home!

The best place to start is with your utilities. Much like homeowner’s insurance rates vary from place to place, utility rates vary from state to state. Check into programs that are offered by your provider and consider joining their programs to help you save.

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Outfitting your kids for their various sports activities can be expensive. Sometimes it feels like you need to have a credit card dedicated solely to this type of purchase. Luckily, there are lots of things that you save money on your kids’ sports based extra curricular activities. Here are five of them.

Shop Online

Whether you are buying a baseball bat, a uniform, or other equipment, bargain shopping online is a great way to find great deals on the equipment you need. You can easily shop through a variety of different websites to make sure that you find the best possible prices. To save even more money, do a Google search for coupon codes for your chosen vendor.

Coupons

While coupons for sports equipment aren’t usually in the Proctor and Gamble inserts that get delivered to your house every week, they do still exist. Comb through your local paper to find coupons for the sports stores in your area. Look through the magazines and periodicals that your kids read (or bring home from school) to find coupon codes that you can use online. These deals do exist; you just have to search them out.

Buy Used

Thrift shops are great places to find kids sports equipment for cheaper prices. Bats, balls, hoops, etc—with a little searching you can find great equipment that is in perfect shape (or very close to perfect—the equipment is going to get dinged up eventually anyway, do a couple of extra scratches really matter)? Spend some time combing through your local Goodwill and other thrift and secondhand stores. You’ll be amazed at how much you find.

PRO TIP: Garage sales are another great source of gently used and extremely affordable equipment.
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If you’re considering looking for a way to store season items or items that you simple don’t have the space for you should consider the area that you live in.  Any city with extreme seasonal temperatures can create problems for your stored items.  For example you can find storage units in Chicago, IL to Hawaii but it is important that you hone in on the right type of storage unit for the type of goods you are storing.

The size of the storage unit is just one thing to take into account. More importantly you should also evaluate whether you want climate control or not. It will be a bit more expensive to find a unit that has the climate control, but you may just find that it will be worth it.

Here are some of the benefits of a climate controlled storage unit:

Protection from the Climate

Here are some important factors to consider when deciding if you should use a climate controlled unit or go with a standard unit.

• If you have a lot of delicate wooden items, humidity and heat are guaranteed to ruin them.
• Paintings and works of art can be ruined, and you may find that the wooden furniture and musical instruments you have in storage can be cracked or warped by hot or humid weather.
• Plastic items can become warped and cracked in varying temperatures very quickly. This will cause cracks and splits to the plastic.

With climate control, your stuff will always be at a set temperature and humidity level. Even if you don’t have delicate items, you will find that humidity will make your storage unit attractive bugs, moths, and other creatures that can get into your clothing and personal items causing costly damage.

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