Extended review, updated prices, added tip using painter’s tape. Every year as winter arrives, search engine visitors find their way to this post about how we used to winterize the single pane, very drafty windows in the 90-year-old house we rented. We had electric baseboard heaters, which meant our electric bill doubled to quadrupled in the winter months. On a recommendation by a neighbor, we decided to install some simple plastic shrinkwrap insulation. You can find kits in hardware stores and online for only a few dollars per window. The film creates an insulating air pocket that keeps your heat (and thus $$$) from flowing outside.

Installation preview. Here’s how nearly all of these kits work:

1. Measure your windows and cut the plastic sheet to the size of the wooden frame you’ll be sticking it too, being sure to leave a 1″ extra buffer on all sides.
2. Apply one side of the double-sided tape to your window frame (indoors).
3. Carefully apply your plastic film to the tape. Do it slowly from top border, then sides, then bottom border. It doesn’t have to be perfect but try to keep things taut.
4. Use the hot air from a hair dryer to “shrink” the plastic and remove all the wrinkles.
5. Trim away excess plastic film.

The result: you can still see out your windows, but it reduces drafts and you have an insulative air pocket. Here are some quick pictures of my handiwork:

  
(click to enlarge)

The first one is after I put up the plastic and took out the wrinkles, and the second one is after I removed the excess plastic. I was a bit skeptical of the product beforehand, but it turned out pretty good. The wrinkles all came out, and the tape seems to be pretty airtight, at least for now. I can even tell where cold air came in by seeing where it fogs up the plastic. You can tell there is plastic sheeting there if you look closely or hit the glare just right, but overall it’s pretty unnoticeable especially if you use blinds or drapes.

Cost. Here are some prices along with average review ratings as of December 2015.

• Frost King Brand, 9 sheets for $13.98. 4.0/5 star average review.
• 3M Brand, 5 sheets for $11.73. 4.2/5 star average review.
• Duck Brand, 10 sheets for $17.80. 4.3/5 star average review.

The 3M kits tend to be the most expensive amongst the popular brands. Some reviews state that the 3M brand is worth the extra cost as they stick to the windows longer and with cleaner removal (3M = Scotch tape brand). I was happy with the cheaper Frost King brand, but I didn’t try the 3M brand so I can’t offer a direct comparison myself.

Quick buying tip. Measure your windows first, and then compare it with the kit before purchase. Some kits come in separate sheets, while others come in a big roll. If you have odd size windows like myself, the single sheets may not fit your windows.

Use painter’s tape for easier removal? A few people had questions about the sticky tape removing paint from windows and/or leaving a residue. I just happened to get a good tip regarding this via e-mail from reader Ron:

If one uses “painters tape” before applying the two sided sticky tape, before applying the plastic film, there is NO problem removing in the Spring! I just wish I can eventually find a “clear” painters tape! THAT would be great! Are you listening 3M??!![…]

So, it goes like this… a layer of the painters tape, neatly trimmed…. the sticky tape on that, then the plastic film on top of the sticky tape. […]

I can’t believe the utter savings I enjoyed as a benefit! A 2/3rd savings over the previous year! It was nice not hearing my furnace come on very often.

I had concerns that the painter’s tape would come loose, but Ron assured me it stayed up for him. Other readers have indeed reported that the double-sided tape came loose from the painter’s tape, so you may want to do a test run with one window first.

Summary. I did the all big windows in our house for a total cost of under $25 plus a few hours of weekend labor. I don’t have exact numbers, but over the course of the season, this added insulation definitely paid for itself in heating bills. If I owned the house as opposed to renting, I might have tried to justify new double-pane windows, but otherwise this was a quick way to save on heating bills.

Consumer Reports recently released the results from their 2015 Annual Auto Reliability Survey of over 740,000 vehicles owned by its subscribers. Below are the complete rankings from Consumer Reports, including the change from last year. Taken from this CNBC article. Lexus and Toyota remain on top. In terms of big movers, Honda went down 4 spots, while Kia moved up 4 spots.

One of the trends they note is that fancy infotainment systems and complex transmissions (including CVT, 8+ speeds, and dual clutch) are a growing source of complaints. Many brands, including Acura, were significantly hurt in their rankings due to issues in these areas.

Here’s another view that takes into account the range of scores taken from individual models (the brands are ranked by averages). Taken from the public version of the Consumer Reports page.

Jaguar, Land Rover, Mitsubishi, Scion, Smart, and Tesla were excluded due to a lack of data on two or more of their models. However, Tesla’s Model S was individually given a reliability rating of “below average”.

“Subscriptions are forgettable by design.”

That is the opening line for the app description of SubscriptMe, a free iPhone/iOS app that help you track your recurring expenses.

How true. All the behavioral psychology-based personal finance tips out there have been used by advertisers forever. Automate your savings? The newspaper and telephone company has been automating the spending of your parents and grandparents for decades. Giving them the ability to automatically charge your credit card is icing on the cake.

Have you added up much your Netflix, Amazon Prime, Spotify, and Dropbox subscriptions are costing you every year? Subscript.me can scan your phone for apps as well as your emails if you let them. They then present you with a pretty list of your subscriptions, letting you set alerts for upcoming bills if you like. The only paid subscription that I have that it found was my $99 annual fee for Amazon Prime. (I have the free versions of Dropbox and Evernote.) Some screenshots:

Ideally, if you are constantly reminded of what you’re paying for, you’ll only keep what you really want. Of course, the free app is paid for by showing you other new services that would like your money.

My main concern is that even if you let it rummage through your e-mails (which already makes me uncomfortable), the app still doesn’t do a good job of finding traditional monthly bills like telephone, cellular, cable, DSL, electricity, gas, trash, etc. It found none of mine. More screenshots:

A neat concept, possible useful for those with a lot of these hip new monthly services like Dollar Shave Club, Blue Apron, or Birchbox. However, since I don’t have many subscriptions, it feels a little niche.

I usually don’t upgrade my iPhone to the latest OS right away, as you know there is going to be 9.0.1 and 9.0.2 and so on in the upcoming weeks. But since the Discover Apple Pay promo required it, I upgraded immediately this time.

One of the new features of iOS 9 is something called WiFi Assist. Previously, your iPhone would try to cling onto that WiFi signal as long as it could before finally giving up and switching to cellular data. Sometimes it would interrupt your Netflix or Spotify streaming. If you found that annoying, the good news is that WiFi Assist will now seamlessly transfer you earlier onto cellular 3G or 4G data.

However, I liked the old way. If I have weak WiFi and my ESPN3 video won’t stream, I don’t want it to seamlessly switch to my cell data. I want it to cut off and let me know. Video streaming at high-definition can use up 1-2 gigabytes per hour. That’s $15 to $30 an hour at my overage rates. Some folks argue an early handoff won’t cause a “massive” overage, but I want the choice of either moving to improve the WiFi signal or turning it off. (With WiFi Assist on, your only indicator will be a greyed-out WiFi icon, if it is even visible)

WiFi Assist is turned on by default in iOS 9. You might like this feature, or you might not. If you also manage your cell data somewhat carefully, you may decide to turn off this feature off. Here’s how:

• Open Settings.
• Tap on Cellular.
• Scroll down to the bottom.
• Turn Wi-Fi Assist off.

More: Ting Blog, Houston Chronicle

While standing in line at the Costco pharmacy, I found myself in a discussion with another Costco member who apparently saves over a thousand dollars a year on her meds by buying them there instead of her neighborhood CVS. (I also got an earful about the Medicare Part D “donut hole“.) I’m fortunate enough that I am currently not on any prescription medications, but OECD health statistics have Americans spending $1,000 a year per capita on pharmaceuticals. A similar survey by Consumer Reports arrived at $768 in average out-of-pocket costs per person.

Here are some things you may or may not know about the Costco Pharmacy:

• Costco posts their drug price list online for everyone to see. No other pharmacy chain does this. Gee, I wonder why?
• You don’t need a Costco membership to buy things from the pharmacy. You can simply tell the front door greeter/checker your prescription that you are going to the pharmacy.
• Costco has their own “drug discount card”, called the Costco Member Prescription Program (CMPP), which is for people who have no prescription drug insurance or whose insurance does not cover all of their prescription medication. This is for Costco members only. Since you never know what drug will be covered or not, everyone should enroll and save 5% to 40% if/when you ever need it. You must fill out an enrollment form and return it to your Costco pharmacist.
• Costco sells pet medication. The hardest part may be getting your vet to write you a prescription, since many vets fill their own orders as a significant part of their income. The CMPP above also applies to pet meds.

In 2013, Consumer Reports found Costco Pharmacy to offer the lowest prices overall when they compared a basket of popular generic drugs like Lipitor and Singulair. Given the “generic” terminology, I was surprised to learn how much prices can still vary.

Our secret shoppers called more than 200 pharmacies throughout the U.S. to get prices on a month’s supply of five blockbuster drugs that have recently become available as generics: Actos (pioglitazone), for diabetes; Lexapro (escitalopram), an antidepressant; Lipitor (atorvastatin), for high cholesterol; Plavix (clopidogrel), a blood thinner; and Singulair (montelukast), for asthma. The result? A whopping difference of $749, or 447 percent, between the highest- and lowest-priced stores.

Costco was the least expensive overall, and you don’t need to be a member to use its pharmacy. A few independent pharmacies came in even cheaper, though their prices varied widely, as did grocery-store pharmacies. The online retailers Healthwarehouse.com and FamilyMeds.com also had very low prices. On the other end of the spectrum, CVS, Rite Aid, and Target had the highest retail prices.

The basic takeaway appears to be that if any your drug costs are not nearly completely covered by insurance, you should do a price comparison with Costco pharmacy (you can also order meds online using their home delivery option if you don’t have a warehouse nearby). The cost differential can be very significant, especially over time. Adding up your annual savings may convince you to forgo the convenience of that 24/7 drive-thru down the road.

Even if you have prescription insurance, it might still be cheaper to get a 90-day supply from Costco as opposed to paying three co-pays for three 30-day refills. (Watch out if you have Part D though, as paying cash may mean it doesn’t count towards your deductible and thus won’t help you get out of that aforementioned donut hole.)

I think it was Alton Brown’s food show that first told me that all non-stick pans were pretty much disposable and simply weren’t meant to last very long. Therefore, you should just buy the standard fry pan found at your local restaurant supply store (these target commercial kitchens, but usually open to the public). My version was to buy whatever was cheap at Ross’s or TJ Maxx for 15 or 20 bucks and then throw it out when things started to stick. However, right now America’s Test Kitchen is sharing the results of their Nonstick Skillets equipment review to registered members (free, only e-mail required).

Is is actually worth it to spend extra money for a better non-stick pan?

Well, yes and no. ATK tested overall design, cooking quality, and coating durability. They made crepes and fried eggs with no oil or other fat. I’ll leave the details to their free site members, but their free video reveals the top winner as the $40 T-fal Professional 12″ Non-Stick Fry Pan, which actually beat out the $130+ All-Clad 12-Inch Nonstick Skillet on merit alone and not value. (There’s a reason the T-Fal is the #1 selling saute pan on Amazon!) Given that All-Clad is usually considered the “gold standard”, that means you can get a top-quality pan for $40 as compared to my $20 discount store pans. I’ve never owned a T-Fal but this will be my next non-stick pan.

You may note that the All-Clad has a “lifetime replacement guaranty against defects”, which some people suggest makes the All-Clad premium worth it over the long run. This warranty requires you to mail in your pan for inspection, and then All-Clad decides whether or not your damage was due to a defect. From reading through the Amazon reviews, this is hit or miss. Some people got new replacements (happy review!) while others got rejections (angry review!). The overall trend appears to be that chips in the coating alone won’t get you a replacement. Considering I could buy three of the better-rated T-Fals and still be ahead in terms of money spent, I can’t it being worth the hassle of hoping for a replacement. I do still like my classic stainless-steel pans from All-Clad though, as they actually can last a lifetime.

Also see: Best frugal chef’s knife and best frugal cast-iron skillet.