Customer Reviews

Free Money Free Stuff: The Select Guide to Public and Private Deals, Steals, and Giveaways

5 star:		(2)
4 star:		(2)
3 star:		(3)
2 star:		(1)
1 star:		(0)

 

 

I am single and therefore I gave this book only 4 stars. Many of the chapters I could not use the information because they were aimed at seniors or school aged children, etc. However there are many great ideas in the book. I would recommend this book for families more than individuals.

The first thing to keep in mind with this book is that it was published in early 2008 - meaning it was actually written in 2007 - and many of the pages they provide are from much older information. So if you are reading this book in 2011 or later, you are reading about things that are at least four years old. It's sort of like reading a four year old book about the latest medical research. In some areas timeliness really does matter.

The basics, of course, are sound. Buy used if possible. Reuse and repair what you have. Comparison shop. Cut coupons. These are all things that we know already and they don't involve "free stuff" news.

So what are the actual 'free money and free stuff' the book helps you learn about? Sign up for food stamps. Get free information from websites (wait, like instead of buying this book?) Use Skype for free conversations (although of course you have to pay for the internet connection so technically that's not quite free). For $28, get a flag that's been flown on the capitol. Wait, that's not free. Get discount eyeglass frames by going to a discount eyeglass frame website. Again, not free, and this is starting to sound like advertising for certain websites.

A *lot* of the advice is "go to website X and sign up for their coupons" and "go to website Y and sign up for their coupons." That's not really valuable advice, the websites can go out of date fairly quickly,

It seems at least half the book is "go to this website and read it for free" or "go to that website and play their online games for free". I really don't need a book to tell me this sort of thing. The remaining pages are filled with discount websites. There's very little actual free stuff listed.

And then they have tips like: If you live in Garrett County, Maryland, you could be eligible for a scholarship. That's lovely. I imagine high schoolers in Garrett County, Maryland are already told about that by their guidance counselors.

Yes there are some legitimately free items. Go to your doctor and ask him for some free samples. Get free floss from your dentist. But again, buying this large book and weeding through everything else to hear those tidbits is just a bit much.

I recommend you do some web searching instead of buying the book. You'll get far better ideas, and they'll apply directly to what you're interested in.

An excellent book for today's senior citizens who want to accomplish things but are short on money to do so. I bought this book on the advice of my aunt as a good fathers day present for my dad. He is reading it now and this will help both my parents with navigating their lives without a steady paycheck.

This book is only helpful in certain states on certain things. If you don't live in those states then you dont benefit from it. Other than that the book is pretty useful.

I was a bit leery of ordering this since I already have the Lesko book, which is tremendous and outdated. So, I took a chance on this one. Well, I paid very little in aneffort to reduce my losses if it was as nearly useless as the Lesko one. I can tell you, this was NOT a waste of money! This book is much better than the others. All the info, in a smaller book, with less garbage to wade through and a lot less outdated junk. Buy this book, and no matter what you spend or spent, it is a great investment! Even if only one section will help you, it is well worth it! Half an hour of exploring this book showed me how much I can save JUST on household stuff.

It is okay, but does not really give addresses to send for free items. It was not what I thought it would be.

While I enjoyed reading through this book, I was disappointed that it didn't contain much new information that would be useful or relevant to me. It was o.k., but I probably wouldn't buy it again if given the choice.

I recieved my order in a very timely manner. The product was recieved in very good condition. I would not hesitate to order from the same source again.