The Deal Specialist is always looking for ways of saving on everyday expenses.  My last endeavor was to to reduce my phone costs.  An obvious target to reduce cost was my home phone since I mostly use my cell phone.  I maybe used my home phone on average of 1-3 times a week and it was costing me about $30 a month, if you do the math that is $360/year or $2.50/call.

However, I was not ready to completely get rid of my home phone completely due to it being a good method for me to make long calls and receive calls.  Did a bit of research and found Ooma.  Buy the equipment and get free phone calls for life.  Sounded too good to be true, but the product had great reviews.

I took the plunge and ordered it from Amazon here.  I received it and I have to say I was impressed.  Once unpacked and briefly looking through the manual, I activated the Ooma device online at the Ooma website.  Setup was a breeze:

• I plugged the Ooma device into my router, phone, and power
• Waited for the Ooma device blue light to come on to indicate a connection
• Set up my voicemail and was good to go

Voice quality was comparable to a land line and was actually better than my office work line which uses VoIP as well.  I found the numerous reviews on Amazon were quite accurate and I am very happy with my purchase and savings.  Overall, thumbs up for Ooma!

• Open a regular non-retirement investment account
• Leave the account open, with your referral money in there, for at least 6 months.
• Fund your account with at least $1,000 within 30 days of opening the account
• Make a minimum of one trade within 180 days of account opening

About 10-20 minutes of work for $50, not bad.  Deal Specialist does use Tradeking for his equity trading, but if you are only interested in the promotion, you can buy one share of penny stock and leave it there (SGRP and TCX are under .50 at the time of this post).

Free Birthday treats

Swissgear Laptop backpacks

Walgreens $5 off $25 coupon valid 7/16 and 7/17

Link to Coupon