I have been making excuses lately to make regular rounds to the shopping mall, and I did find something that would be perfect for the occasion, but the price tag kinda threw me away from buying it. My cousin suggested this afternoon to go shopping online. She suggested it is going to be inexpensive, and be of much value. I can find something local, so no shipping charges or scams should be expected.

I did my much needed research and found some resources that seemed genuine and people on these sites seem real. Some of these have postings for used and new stuff. So, after purchasing and shipping that expensive gift for my friend, I am off to selling those unused items lying around in my house.

I have been lurking around at craigslist classifieds, Used Ottawa and ebay. I am not sure if I find something locally at eBay, I still would need to get it shipped or the item can be pickled up.

Anyways, what do you suggest I do? Is shopping online a good idea?

Looking and hearing about the current economic situation today, seems like it’s going down south, and pretty rapidly. We are just waiting for the federal government to declare recession officially. Hearing about the government plan, situation looks like loose loose for a regular household in America.

In such a situation, there are some changes that you can make in your day to day life to make it easy on you, financially.

• Stop using the credit cards. Keep cash with you. If you are used to credit cards, this sounds daunting, and impossible to do, but try it a few days in the beginning. You will feel pretty comfortable using the cash, and find yourself saving some green in the long run.
• Try using “pay-as-you-go” plan on your cell phone. This will keep you from making lots of long distance calling, and keep you on your toes.
• Avoid driving. Take the public transportation services, or walk or bicycle. This will help you physically and financially.
• Do not wear brand name clothes, shoes or any other accessories. Quality does not mean buying expensive clothes. Even if you wish to buy brand names, look out for sales and discounts regularly. Check out local brochures and fliers.
• When going grocery shopping, make a list. Buy everything all at once, instead of making multiple rounds to the grocery stores, in case you forget to buy something.
• If you do not watch lot of TV, but have cable, get it disconnected. If you like watching movies once in a while, you can visit blockbuster videos or Netflix to get the movies delivered.
• Shop online, buy used stuff if you just have to beautify your place, or something that you won’t be using for long time. Check out your local classifieds, like craigslist.com or khrido.com

These are some of the very few things that you can do to save in the long term. If you make these habits, you will find yourself at a good place, physically, mentally and financially.

Craigslist was founded in March, 1995 by Craig Newmark as an email list in San Francisco and Bay Area. It is a free local community based classifieds website that is most popular in San Francisco and other US cities. You can find tons of categories to choose from. They also have a popular forum where you can find varied discussions on different subjects. According to the latest reports, as of January 2008, they reported 26.7 million unique visitors in the US. Worldwide, they have some 27.8 million unique visitors.

Kijiji (pronounced as kee-gee-gee) was founded in March 2005. It was launched in US in 2007.Kijiji, is also a free local community based classifieds website that is more popular outside of US. Although, it is catching up fast in the States also. As of January 2008, they had 2.3 million US visitors and 21.6 million worldwide. Seems like they are closing the gap fast with Craigslist.

Craigslist or Kijiji – Which One is Perfect?

What Craigslist lacks - Kijiji is available in different languages in other countries. It makes it popular internationally. Whereas Craigslist is English only website. Other advantage of Kijiji is the colorful theme of the website. Craigslist has not changed much in the last 10 or more years. They have not been making any major changes or maybe they are but not noticeable.

What Kijiji lacks – Kijiji technical support is very hard to reach. If you have been having any problems, you have to post your issues in the discussion forums. There too you cannot find the accurate answers. Blocking criteria that Kijiji uses makes it hard for genuine users to post their ads. If the genuine posters are blocked or their ads removed, there is possibly no way to find out what happened and how they can fix their ads. They just keep you guessing as to what may have happened. Very painful experience.

Who wins, finally - you ask?

It’s the consumers, you and me. The more competition between these online giants, the better services we get.

Who do you think is better - Craigslist or Kijiji?

Of course, just like there are plenty of fish, there are plenty of local classifieds websites. Just search for “local <your city> classifieds”.