Saving Money on Snow Removal - Tips on Snow Removal

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Out of Gas Newsletter - Issue 72 Feb.13, 2010

++ News -
We talked yesterday about saving money on Valentine’s day - if you haven’t had a chance to check that out, do it.
http://www.gasmileageguide.com/gas-savings-blog/save-money-on-valentines-day-last-minute-ideas/saving-money
Links you can use -

The Olympics get started today - you can check out the schedule at NBC or the Vancouver site.
http://www.vancouver2010.com/olympic-schedule-results/
http://www.nbcolympics.com/event-results-schedules/index.html

I actually enjoy hockey and curling… go figure.

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We’ve had a ton of snow recently. When there is a big snow, there can be a tremendous amount of added expense. Below are some ideas for saving you money on Snow Removal etc., during the winter time.

1. Snow Removal - I’ve heard of people from the last storm having to pay as much as $1,000 to get their driveway / sidewalks cleared of snow. Below are some ideas to help you save money on snow removal.

First you should think about how often you have big snows, if it is once every 10 years or so then I would recommend you buy a snow shovel. Become friends with the neighborhood teenagers and hire them at 10 bucks or so an hour to shovel your property.

If you get a big snow (more than 6 or 7 inches) every 3 or 4 years there are a couple of different things you can do. Buy a couple of snow shovels and do what I suggested above. Another thing you can do is to have a neighborhood group of people go in and buy a snow blower. Note it is very important that if you use this arrangement you are good friends and trust your neighbors. You wouldn’t want to do this if you just moved into a neighborhood or don’t ‘know’ your neighbors very well. This arrangement works even better if you hire everyone’s kids to help with the snow removal process.

You can also share things with neighbors like I described above with things like chain saws and generators. One thing about generators. It is extremely important that at least every year you start them and do some general maintenance with them - check the oil, change the oil etc… otherwise when you need it, it won’t work.

2. Buying stuff - you should know that if you buy a snow shovel during a snow storm that you are going to be paying much more than you would in the fall of the year. So here are some things you should purchase so that you are prepared every fall.

Snow shovels
A few bags of salt and sand
If you have kids make sure that they have something to sled on

Have a wonderful weekend and remember no matter what spring is around the corner (no matter what the ground hog says).