Be Your Own Expert
“Do it yourself,” a frugal man’s favorite words. If you are anything like me, you might take this to the extreme. I attempt to do most everything myself, whether its home improvement projects or automobile repairs, I’ll give it a try. However, before starting a new project, I’ll be the first to tell you that I have no idea how to do it. My wife coincidentally, will be the second person to say it. Not knowing shouldn’t be a deterrent to saving some money and learning a new trait. It’s a perfect opportunity to educate yourself and add to your expertise – I use expertise lightly.
Manuals and for dummies books are great resources for do it yourselfers, but many times, I find the words just aren’t enough. I need to see somebody in action performing the same tasks I need to in order to make sense of a particular job. For this, I often use http://www.expertvillage.com/ Expert Village is a site full of “experts” explaining in short video clips how to perform a wide variety of not commonly known tasks from proper ways to exercise to how to apply eyeliner. Best of all, its free!
Because I leave the eyeliner wearing to Ben, I get the most use of Expert Village’s automotive section. A couple months ago, I watched a how to video on draining and replenishing your car’s coolant. What turned out to be a pretty simple procedure, ended up saving me around $50. My next project is going to be replacing the break pads on our car. Again, until yesterday I had no idea how to do this, but research in my car’s mechanic manual and some help with Expert Village and most importantly some patience, I should be able to figure it out (I’ll let you know how it goes).
Be your own expert, save some money, and impress yourself by not being intimated by projects, rather look forward to them. $
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[...] Be Your Own Expert. I couldn’t agree more that knowing how to do things yourself is one of the more helpful things in living a frugal life. I am a huge proponent of DIY. [...]