17
Aug 2009

No TV

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At our old house, it was only $4/month to add basic cable TV to our internet service.  So we did.  We had a handful of channels – I have no idea how many, because the only thing I ever watched was “Ice Road Truckers” (my husband picked that one…) and “The Office” (that was my choice, and I consider it an essential part of my life).  My husband liked to watch “The Daily Show” in the mornings while he drank his coffee, and there were a few other times when we would flip on the TV and watch random stuff here and there.  Overall, it was worth $4/month.

At our new house, it’s $30/month to add TV to our internet service.  We both agreed that TV wasn’t worth anywhere near that amount to us.  So we are TV-free.  We actually packed our 400 pound, 1995 era TV into storage back in April and stashed it in an empty house that my parents own.  It’s still sitting there, along with a few other things that we need to go pick up.  So I guess we’ve actually been TV-free since April, but we still got TV programming (and could record it using Windows Media Center on our computers) until we moved.

Now, all we have is internet.  But that means we have Hulu, and we can still watch DVDs on our laptops.  So far, we’ve been so busy since we moved that we haven’t been to Hulu at all, or rented/borrowed a single movie.  I’m thinking that once winter comes, we might have a little more couch time, but I think we’ll be just fine without TV.  We didn’t want our son to be exposed to TV during his first few years, and now it’s easy to make sure that is the case.  In our living room we have a couple of big floor pillows and lots of toddler toys in the spot where one might expect to find a TV.  We’re both very happy with this arrangement, and the $30 a month that we’re saving is a nice bonus.

How expensive would TV have to be for you to decide that it’s not worth it?

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  • http://gibbs5.com Anne

    We gave up TV last fall. We’d been paying $65 a month for satellite, and we realized that most of the shows we liked to watch were available on the internet for free. Getting rid of satellite took a little bravery on our part but we haven’t looked back. Between Hulu and our Netflix subscription, we’re fine. Our little boy hasn’t missed it much either.

  • http://www.wilnregina.com Regina

    We’ve never owned a TV or had TV service in the 1.5 yrs of our married life. I think it’s about $30/month for cable and it simply isn’t worth it. If it were $10/month, maybe it would be worth it, but no more than that. Besides we spend more time on the internet than we ought to, so why add the time spent vegging in front of the TV to that?

  • http://www.familyandfinances.com Becky@FamilyandFinances

    My response is almost an echo of Regina’s!

    We have a tv, but have no tv service and can’t even get local channels to come in. We would probably get cable if it was $10/month so that my husband could watch basketball games and we could have family over to watch football, but it’s not worth more than $10/month to us. Instead, my hubby watches his basketball highlights on espn.com and I spend too much time reading blogs ;)

    We rent a movie from Redbox about once every month or two.

  • http://www.grovesfamilyhappenings.blogspot.com/ Kelly

    Ugh! Sometimes we are such slaves to our tv around my house. I especially hate it in the summer while we just veg in front of-re-runs. And we pay way too much for it as well. I have sort of adopted this new mantra or motto or whatever you want to call it…”A luxury, once sampled, becomes a necessity.” Which is so true for us and TV. I would love to get rid of our TV altogether, but I think we would have quite an adjustment period. And now that football season is right around the corner, I don’t think there is any way my husband would even humor a conversation on the topic.
    And I never intended for my daughter to watch TV, but PBS is great every now and then so I can actually take a shower in peace. Of course, now she has learned how to turn the TV on, so….

  • H

    We use old rabbit ear antennas that we bought years ago for about $10. We have to adjust every time we watch TV but we don’t watch very often. It’s nice to occasionally be able to watch the news or the late night comedy shows together though.

    Otherwise we’d have to pay about $40 per month for a basic cable package and that’s just not worth it to us. I’d maybe pay $10 per month.

  • http://compoundinginterests.blogspot.com Elizabeth

    We have an antenna, but a HD tv, so we get a handful of basic stations with a really nice picture. We have commented over and over again how much we love having the tv off. If cable were only $10/month, we’d probably do it though. We do plan on ordering cable for football season. We’re both big college fball fans and have a toddler, so no going out to watch games, plus we don’t get ABC on our farmers’ channels.

  • http://sensetosave.com Kacie

    No digital converter box to get over-the-air channels? How come?

    My cable company is forcing me to have TV, basically. Heh. My total cost of internet would be higher without having cable. So I keep the cable to keep my bill lower.

    I just pay for the basic (about $10) but I have more channels than that because the cable guy could only splice my cable with the neighbor’s — and they’re paying for more channels.

    Anyway, TV is worth about $10/month to me during the gloomy months, and maybe $0 during the summers.

  • Lindsay

    We were paying about $110 per month for our TV package. I hate having TV – I swear, it’s worse than drugs sometimes; I get nothing done sometimes if there are enough shows on to distract me! We canceled the TV last spring, and switched the internet provider when our previous packaged-deal-company told us that the internet-only option would be $65 per month. The new company has been great, and we even upgraded to wireless – and it’s still only $35 per month. I haven’t missed the TV package at all, even though at the time we canceled, we had extended+sports package+DVR. I highly recommend killing your TV! :) Best decision ever.

  • http://onpurposeliving.blogspot.com Alissa

    I just want to say that I’m jealous! I would so LOVE to be TV-free but I seriously think my DH would SO draw the line there! He’s been very patient with all of my other changes that I’ve insisted on… but I don’t think this one would fly. Good for you for not exposing your son to tv… that will pay huge dividends in the future when he doesn’t care about tv character stuff!

  • Lissa

    We do have two TVs and cable. I am not a big TV watcher but my DH is and now that football season is coming up he loves having cable. So as much as I wouldl ike no TV he won’t go for it. Like Alissa he is good with all of our other changes.

    We did stop cable for almost a year. After that we revisited the costs of our internet, local phone line and cell phones. But just combining the internet and phone (adding cable and long distance) the price came to be about $10 more. So we went ahead and started it up again.

  • AD

    We just have the free, local channels. We LOVE the PBS cooking and travel shows. Other than that, we only watch a couple of shows (The Office is one of them!). We really use our Netflix subscription, though.

    I don’t know what cable costs because I’ve never had it. My guess would be $30-40 per month? Not worth it to us at all. I used to think we’d like the food/cooking channels until I was at someone’s house and saw some of the shows. Many are reality shows or all about the chef’s bloated ego. No thanks. I’ll stick with Jacques, Julia, Lidia Bastianich, Ming, and the rest.

    I wouldn’t want to expose any hypothetical future children of mine to TV, except for PBS. I still love me some Sesame Street, even though they make Cookie Monster say that “cookies are a sometimes food.” Boo. Let my Cookie Monster eat cookies!!

    And one last thing–when I was a kid, I hated that my dad refused to pay for cable because all of my friends had it and they’d talk about shows that I couldn’t watch without it. Dad would say I should read a book or go play outside, which was really frustrating. Now I’m a grown woman, and I choose not to have cable TV, and I’m really grateful for the hours I spent as a kid climbing trees and building forts instead.

  • scantee

    Our computer monitor doubles as our tv. We have high-speed internet and basic cable (by basic I mean really basic, we don’t get any extra channels, just better reception) which costs less than it would be to just get high-speed internet. I can’t ever imagine getting cable ever again. Like you, we watch Hulu a lot and we also have the Netflix package that is around $9 a month. We rarely get DVDs from them but we stream movies and tv from them quite a bit.

    We haven’t had cable in about five years and I never miss it. Whenever I’m visiting someone’s home who has cable I find myself sucked into the stupidest of shows. I really think it is better for our family not to have that temptation right at hand.

  • http://spillingbuckets.com Leslie@spillingbuckets

    I have to agree with most of the other comments. We got free basic cable included in our rent when we were in an apartment. With that we would watch PBS mostly occasionally other stuff. When we moved to our house it would be $19.99 for basic cable, which is only 19 channels – and for the one channel we watched (PBS) it wasn’t worth it for us. We got rabbit ears and now get a few over the air waves, but not much. Honestly, we only use the TV to watch movies and now we use Hulu if we do want to watch a show.

    If it were $4 like you paid we would probably get it, but in all honesty I am not sure even at that low price… I haven’t missed television at all.

  • Dawn

    I am getting to the point that I miss it. For the last 3.5 years we had one or two channels and that was ok. Since June we have had none and watch way too many dvd’s and videos. It is one more cycle in the are we in control or are we addicted to the TV. I have to admit I’m not likely to pay much for it but I would like something other than the same videos/ dvds. Even when we get a new one it becomes “old” very quickly. Our kids are growing up with Dukes of Hazard and Love Comes Softly- not too bad considering. Maybe once the baby is born we will get out a little more often. My husband and I have discussed that it is our flesh wanting tv.

  • http://radioventriloquist.blogspot.com GC

    I’ve gotten by without it for 5 years–because nothing could replace the time, opportunity, and experiences it denied me when I was addicted to it. It could be free, I don’t need it.
    But now I’m getting married and hubby to be wants not only the tv he has now, but a flat screen as well plus lots of cable. Hopefully we can compromise.

  • Sam

    About 5(?) years ago the basic cable here rose from $12+tax to 19.95+tax. That’s when I canceled it. TV is not a priority to me and that’s “infected” my kid now too.
    The air stations turned off in June/july & while I miss Desperate Housewives, I don’t miss it enough to hook another gadget up in my living room(converter box). The local PBS stations turned off their air waves back in February (at the original cut off date) and while we miss some of those programs we’ve adapted& gotten used to it.

    We have movie night on Fri & sometimes will put in a DVD of cartoon episodes but for the most part it’s just a big black thing that collects dust.

    Life is better actually lived then watching other peoples lives & stories on a tube.

  • Des

    FYI…if you sign up for their text message thing, Redbox sends you a code for a free rental the first Monday of every month. Obviously, not worth getting text messaging if you don’t already have it, but its a nice little treat. That plus the Library satisfies our media fix.

  • http://twokidsagear-headandme.blogspot.com Claire in CA, USA

    We gave up network & cable years ago. I honestly can’t remember how long ago, actually. We have a dvd/vcr and a tv, so we still rent movies and some t.v. programs. I also watch shows on Hulu occasionally. I love that we watch shows on our schedule instead of the networks.

    We decided having tv wasn’t worth paying for after our favorite shows (Boston Legal being one of them) got sleazier and sleazier with each season. We haven’t missed it, at all.

  • http://forestonfinance.com Forest

    We’re giving up TV when we get married and move in together. She doesn’t have a tv now and I barely watch the one I have (roommates). I’m actually looking forward to it! We will probably eventually get one to watch DVDs but we probably won’t get cable.

  • http://www.xanga.com/mrs_lefevour Pamela

    7 years ago we bought a brand new house that needed window coverings, a backyard and lots of things that cost money. Though there were cable hookups in every room, cable was not pulled to the house by the cable company. We decided that until we had everything we needed and wanted, we were not going to spend the money.

    We have never looked back. TV free and lovin’ it. Yes we watch videos, yes we watch HULU and abc.com but only when we purpose to do it. It’s never a fall back. The best part is being commercial free!

  • http://cat804.blogspot.com/ Cat

    With Hulu and antenna channels, I wouldn’t pay more than $5 for basic cable. I have an 11 month old, so my only time to watch TV is after he goes to bed, and even then I usually have something to read. We live with my mom right now though, and to her TV is worth paying $100 a month for cable, premium channels, and HD, so I definitely do some viewing because of that.

  • http://notesfromthefrugaltrenches.com Frugal Trenches

    Great post! It becomes especially true when you add it up over a year, is it worth $360.

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