photo credit: Darren Hester
It is not very often that my wife and I rent movies. First off, we don’t spend a lot of money on entertainment expenses so that we can balance our monthly budget. Secondly, finding the time to watch movies with two young children can be very difficult as most parents would probably agree. I received a Blockbuster gift card for Christmas from a co-worker, so over the holiday’s my wife and I planned on renting a few movies to enjoy. We decided to pick up a few popular movie rentals including the The Dark Knight
After renting our movies I began thinking about all the other cost-effective means for renting movies. The following list are alternatives that my wife and I have used in the past along with some others we may consider in the the future for renting movies -
- Library – My #1 suggestion to anyone who has a local library that offers movie rentals. You are really missing out on cheap entertainment if you don’t take advantage of your library. Our local library allows you to request a large selection of popular movies online and puts you on an automated waiting list. Once your turn comes up, they give you an automated call and email notifying you that the movie is available for pick up. You then have 3 days to get to the library to pick it up and 7 days to watch it. I will caution that this option requires that you be flexible. If you are planning on watching a particular movie this weekend, then this option wouldn’t really work for you. Most libraries also allow you to request several movies at once which should help to space out when they become available.
- Borrowing – An obvious but sometimes overlooked alternative to movie rentals. Check with your friends and family members who have purchased movies. They would probably be glad to let you borrow them which would save you money! I get so excited when I see that a family member has purchased new movies. They are always willing to let my wife and I borrow them when they have finished watching it for the first time.
- Pay Per View – We don’t do this that often, but we have a satellite package that offers Pay Per View movie rentals for $3.99. Right there you are already saving $1 compared to Blockbuster and you don’t have to worry about any late fees or driving to the movie rental store. While Pay Per View is not as flexible with when you can watch the movie, it is typically a cheaper alternative. People with On Demand options with their satellite or cable packages have even more flexibility.
- DVR – DVR recorders have made it easier and more convenient for people to watch television. I would recommend the extra monthly costs (which doesn’t happen often) of having a DVR to anyone with young children. Having a DVR allows my wife and I to still watch our favorite television shows late at night when the kids are asleep or off at their grandparents. We have used our DVR a few times to record movies when our satellite provider has special previews of the movie channels. We would never subscribe to these movie channels, but when they have the free previews we take advantage.
- redbox – We have never actually used redbox before but plan on checking it out in the coming weeks. You can actually Get a Free Rental from redbox by creating an online account.
- Netflix – Another option is using companies like Netflix where you sign up for a plan and pay a monthly fee. This option is not a really good fit for my wife and I because of our crazy schedule but could work for some families. They have a monthly plan for $4.99 that allows you to rent 2 movies per month and includes 2 hours of online movie access from your PC. Right there, that is half the cost of renting a movie from a Blockbuster store. Blockbuster also has an On Demand option as well that could be cheaper than renting directly from their stores if it fits with your lifestyle.
- eBay – You may be able to purchase a used copy of the movie instead of actually renting it. I have actually never done this but found that there are some older movies that you can pick up for under $4.99 which is cheaper than renting it. I will caution that you probably won’t be able to purchase a new release cheaper than renting it, but you never know what you can find on eBay!
What alternative methods do you use to rent movies and save money?
Related posts:
- How to Kill Your Cable
- Living Frugally By Eliminating Unnecessary Technological Expenses
- Entertainment on a Budget
Related posts brought to you by Yet Another Related Posts Plugin.
{ 5 trackbacks }
{ 6 comments… read them below or add one }
My wife and I started downloading movies with our TiVo. Older movies (not current releases) are only $0.99. Since we are so far behind in our movie watching experience, most of the movies we watch are this cheap. The only bad thing is that the movies take about 9 hours to download. We have to plan ahead if we think we may want to watch something.
There are free movies at the redbox every single monday, on top of the new member codes. Also, the codes work once per card, so if you have multiple credit cards or a credit card and a debit card you can rent more than one movie for free…
Dusty – 9 hours seems like a lot of time but I guess if you plan ahead it wouldn’t be a problem. Thanks for the tip.
Katharine – That is great to know. Thanks for the information.
Very good post. A lot of these ideas are probably not thought of by many, especially the local library. The purchase of movies from a DVR is one that I never thought of until I looked at the cost ($2.99 for most movies not considered ‘new release’).
Money Beagle – Thanks for stopping by. My wife and I take every advantage of the library that we can. Plus, our oldest son loves to read and get books from there.
There is one Pay Per View channel that runs a movie for $1.99. I try to keep an eye on it and grab it whenever it’s a movie in which I am interested.