Suburban Homesteading – Frugal Living

Bills are part of owning a home, there’s no getting around much of it. Sure, there are things you can do to minimize the expense. using electricity in non-peak hours, taking shorter showers and doing full loads of dishes and laundry to save on utility bills. But, one of the most overlooked bills you can reduce may be sitting at your curb.

I’m talking about the trash bill. That monthly payment we turn over to have some guy haul away our debris. However, if you are a homesteader who buys in bulk, cans their own food and composts vegetable scrapes or feeds them to the chickens then your trash can may be fairly empty each week, like mine.

When I got tired of paying $40 a month to dump a can with a few plastic grocery bags of trash I called my trash company and explained my situation. I didn’t need weekly trash service, really. Once every few weeks was enough, but that’s not how it works. It’s weekly or nothing.

The man on the phone sympathized with my situation and explained that I could request a “Super Recycler” program. Essentially, my yard waste and recycling trash cans remain about the same size, but my “trash” trash can is half the size. It is also half the cost! Perfect.

In one phone call I cut my trash bill in half, saving myself almost $300 a year!