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What’s better than saving some money? Saving money without really noticing that you’re saving money. How do you do this? Take a look at some of the less important things in your life and see if you can cut back. Or, take a look at some of the things you take for granted and cut back. Or, just trim something you don’t even use much anymore but still pay for… all these things can be removed to save you a little bit of money without you noticing one bit.

1. Cancel that Netflix Account.

How many movies do you really watch? Cancel that Netflix ^[3] account and instead go with something like Redbox where you pay $1 a night (often times free with a promotional code) and save yourself that $20-$30 a month you’re paying now. I know I’ve been at my friends’ places and seen the same Netflix envelopes month after month.

2. Drink more water.

Get a water bottle, fill it up and drink from it during the day. Get used to drinking water and you won’t drink more expensive stuff like soda and coffee. Get used to drinking water and you’ll likely eat less, cutting out those expensive snacks. Get used to drinking water and improve your health, which means less in health care costs down the road that will be difficult to quantify. As a corollary, when you go out to eat, ask for water instead of your beverage of choice. This is a directly quantifiable savings because do you really want a $2 soda?

3. Visit the library.

Books are expensive and I’ve done a scientific experiment that has definitively proven that the only reason why you would ever buy a book is so that you can put it on your bookshelf to prove how educated you are. Seriously, I have done such an experiment because I know that after I read through a book once, there is a 99.99999% chance that I will never open it again and thus the only logical reason to ever buy a book is to show off. Okay, I’m being facetious but let the library be your bookcase and not only will you save money, you’ll save space, and even some trees. DVDs are available at the library too… so you can scratch off #1 too if you just do #3.

4. Switch to CFL.

Switching to compact fluorescent light bulbs will save you huge on your electricity bills since the bulbs use about a quarter of the electricity of their regular light bulb equivalents. Now, the bulbs will be more expensive but the lowered electricity bill plus the longer lifespan overcomes the initial price hit without minimal cost to you.

5. Reduce phone, TV, internet or just threaten to cancel.

Do you really need 23094820394238 minutes on your cell package? How about 290384029 channels? Heck no, I have like 500 channels and all I watch are ESPN, The History Channel, and maybe Oxygen (okay, not really Oxygen); but if you don’t want to give up all those options, consider just calling up your cable company and demanding a better rate. Verizon is coming into the neighborhood soon so I think I’ll be calling up Comcast and asking them to reduce my rate or I’m jumping ship. Either way, paying less for the same service is certainly an invisible way to save money!