[jcsaxx]

My wife and I have decided to buy a water filter and fill our own water bottles, instead of buying water. I figure that we spend at least $5 a week on 24 bottles of water. That would save us about $260 a year. Of course, the filters cost money, as does the main thingy that hooks to the faucet. We spent $20 on the faucet connector device, and the filters are probably around $8 a piece. The filters should last 100 gallons or around 3 months, so 4 filters a year should be what we need. Total expense based on my math and guesses on price of filters is, $44. So my true savings would be around $215 a year. Now if we could just save money on soda.

[QueenAngie]

Great tip!

I have read on the net, where after a while,
the plastic bottles will start affecting the water and not be so healthy, if used for a long, long time.

[MissyChrissy]

Awesome! I was lucky & came across a free distiller years ago-a HUGE one that can do up to 4 gallons at a time. Of course, we don't use that much in a day, and it's not worth keeping any longer than that. But if you even can find one, I highly recommend it.

[cgabear03]

Hi, in response to your soda inquiry: My sister and I both purchased a Soda Club machine at the state fair this past fall. It's a home soda machine that uses a small CO2 bottle and carbonates water in 1L batches. You then add the flavored syrup and the soda tastes delicious. You also control the carbonation amount and can just use the Soda Club sans syrup to make yourself seltzer. The marketer claims that you cut costs down to around 0.50 cents a 2L serving.
There is a large start up costs to buy the carbonator, syrups etc but if you buy it at the fair you end up getting so much more in free syrups etc than you do by buying it at a vendor. In the long run, you save money on redemption value costs, don't have leftover soda that goes flat in a 2L bottle and you are saving the environment (gas for grocery run and by using the reusable plastic 1L bottles). The Soda Club is gaining momentum here and is already widely used through the boating community and is HUGE in Europe.

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[etali]

Do those Soda makers require a lot of maintainance? I'm terrible when it comes to convenience devices like juice makers / coffee makers - I hate cleaning those things! (Yet I'm happy to let everything take longer by doing it the old fashioned way).

I am intrigued by those Soda makers though - cheaper than buying soda, AND lower in sugar too, AND no aspartame? It sounds too good to be true...

[ShannonGB]

Great tip, with numbers to boot even! Never been a big fan of bottled water. I've been to a product seminar once where they tested bottled water for purity. It turns out that "mineral water" is even dirtier (particle count) than regular drinking water. We really don't need "mineral water" because our bodies need minerals in trace amounts and we can already get that from the food we eat. Some say a good substitute would be ionized or alkaline water, but I haven't looked into that yet.

[Dan484]

Not only are you saving money, but you are saving resources from bottling water and transporting it. We switched to a Brita filter a long time ago and it saves us around what you quoted.
I agree with cutting out soda. Cut out alcohol and you'll save a ton too. It is healthier for you to drink more water because even fruit juice has 120 calories a serving and tons of suger... and of course, filtered water from your tap is cheap...

[mcmama]

Filters are something I have been looking into here, since the water is salty and I have blood pressure issues.

As for soda, I just bought diet coke on sale at cvs 3/$11. I used a $1 coupon from My Coke Rewards. I also used a buy 1 get 1 free coupon from My coke rewards (I have TONS of MCR points from my own purchases and dumpster diving) Then I paid the rest with CVS Extra Care Bucks.

On the same trip I got a meter for my diabetes (free with coupon) and cat litter. I paid for the cat litter with extra care bucks.

After sales tax, I paid 7 cents for more than $30 worth of items. I've added 30 MCR points to my total of over 6000, and of course the non coupon amount of the purchase went toward quarterly ECB reward.

That's how you save on soda.