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The best money-saving websites
By Emma Lunn
We're now used to picking up bargains on eBay and Amazon, choosing weekend breaks on Lastminute.com, and checking costs on price-comparison websites. However, there are still plenty of less well-known sites that can save you a fortune. Here's our guide to some of the best:
Kayak.co.uk
Launching in the UK in January 2007, Kayak is a travel search engine from the US. Unlike online travel agencies such as Lastminute.com and Expedia.com, there's no booking fee for customers. Instead, after listing flights, hotels or car hires, users click through to the provider's site and book directly.
It ambitiously boasts its intention to list every hotel on earth and has a section where customers and hoteliers can add hotels directly to Kayak's database. It also lists around 500 possible flights for each route, so users can find the cheapest site to book their seat.
Unlike other travel sites, where product providers have to pay to be listed, Kayak aims to be completely unbiased and so lists every provider.
You can save anything from 10% to 50% on flights. The site also lets you search different dates, meaning you could opt to fly on a cheaper day or time or to a different city in the same country.
Eswapnow.com
For a generation raised on Noel Edmonds' Multi-Coloured Swap Shop, Eswapnow.com is the modern-day internet equivalent.
Based on a similar model to eBay, Eswapnow is built up by its members, and, once on board, you can access a library of thousands of CDs, books, games and DVDs.
After you join, you can upload as many items as you want to swap. When someone wants one of your items you'll receive a notification. As soon as you've accepted the 'swap request' and have confirmed that the item has been posted to the other user, you'll receive a credit point. With this point you can request any item from any other user.
Like eBay, members can build up a feedback rating and post their comments about other swappers. There is also a forum where members can discuss their experiences.
Eswapnow is especially good for kids nagging their parents for the latest Playstation games. For example, eswapper james123 wants to swap Need for Speed Underground. This game retails at anything between £19.99 and £39.99, but eswapnow members can simply swap a game - or any other item - they don't want any more. Depending on the items you swap, savings can run into hundreds of pounds.
Thelittlehousecompany.co.uk
Estate agents can charge thousands to market and sell your house. But Thelittlehousecompany allows you to sell online from just £89, or £135 if you want your property to be marketed on other websites.
For £89, you get a full-page listing with photographs, a hits counter, an online guide to selling privately and a telephone helpline. Buyer enquiries are automatically forwarded to you and you deal with them yourself from then on.
For an extra £46, your property is listed on some of the leading property portals such as Fish4Homes, HotProperty and Homes and Property.
You can advertise your home without it affecting a sole agency contract with an estate agent. But if you sell your house this way you will have to do all the other things estate agents normally do, such as hosting viewings, negotiating with buyers and informing solicitors of the your buyer's details.
Estate agents will typically charge 1.5% commission of the sale price of a property, so if you sold a house for £200,000, you would pay the estate agent £3,000 plus VAT. If you compare this to a fee of just £89 (or £135), the advantages are clear.
Zopa.com
Zopa is the world's first person-to-person 'borrowing and lending marketplace' - effectively eBay for money.
It enables people to borrow and lend money by cutting out the banks. This means those borrowing can get better rates than they will find from banks and those lending can get better returns than they would from the average bank or savings account.
Zopa vets and underwrites borrowers and spreads a lender's money across at least 50 borrowers, keeping risk to an absolute minimum.
All lenders and borrowers enter into a legally-binding contract with their respective borrowers and lenders. Zopa manages the collection of monthly repayments, and if any of that money is not paid on time, it uses exactly the same sort of recovery processes that the high-street banks use.
Zopa earns money by charging lenders and borrowers a 0.5% fee, and if borrowers take out repayment protection insurance on their loan, Zopa receives commission from its provider.
Zopa lenders have benefited from an average return on their lending of 6.8% - much higher than most savings accounts. Meanwhile, Zopa's lending rates often see them featuring in the best-buy tables for personal loans. For example, at the time of writing, Zopa offered the best rate for borrowing £3,000 over three years. At a rate of 5.1% (subject to credit score), repayments would be £89.98 a month, compared to the next best rate - 5.6% from Moneyback Bank - where repayments would be £90.72 a month.
Dialaphone.co.uk
Dialaphone is one of a raft of internet mobile phone retailers that offer mobile-phone tariffs at reduced prices. Others include Onestopphoneshop.co.uk and Mobileshop.com. These companies buy airtime in bulk and pass on the discounts to consumers.
Discounts are normally in the form of reduced or free line rental for a certain period of time. You pay your bill as usual but fill in a form to claim cash back at certain points in your contract. But, if you don't remember to claim the cash back at the right time, you won't get it, so always make a note of the date. Some offers even include a free gift, such as an iPod, satellite navigation system or Xbox.
Savings depend on your mobile phone usage and which deal you choose. If you opt for a Samsung D900 on O2's 600 tariff at Dialaphone you can get half-price line rental for 14 months. This means you get 600 any-network, anytime minutes and 100 texts each month for £17.50 for 12 months, and then for £35 a month for the remaining four months of the 18-month contract. So over 18 months you would pay £350, saving £280 on the regular O2 price.
More websites
Moneybackmortgages.com Become your own mortgage broker, and after sourcing your mortgage from 133 lenders, receive half the commission the site receives, typically £200.
Iammoving.com Tell multiple organisations that you're moving home via electronic notification from iammoving.com.
Envirofone.com Recycle your old mobile phone in return for cash.
Flycheapo.com Choose a city and flycheapo will tell you which budget airline flies there.
Liftshare.org Pairs up drivers and passengers to share travel costs.
Couchsurfing.com Don't pay a penny for a room when you backpack, Couchsurfing will track down a local to put you up for the night.
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