Every Sunday, The Simple Dollar reviews a personal finance or other book of interest. Also available is a complete list of the hundreds of book reviews that have appeared on The Simple Dollar over the years.

So, let’s be clear right off the bat. When I picked up this book, I had no idea who Elisabeth Leamy was. She is apparently the “consumer correspondent” on Good Morning America, ABC’s morning television program.

I’ll be honest: I haven’t seen Good Morning America since I was in junior high and it was on television in the morning as I waited for the school bus to arrive.

The idea behind the book is that the most efficient way to save is to focus on the biggest areas of spending in your life and make giant cuts in those areas. Leamy identifies five areas: housing, automobiles, credit, groceries, and health care.

The book is organized much like a magazine. The material is broken down into short sections with lots of little “bubble” sidebars (sometimes multiple sidebars per page). It’s one of those that you can read for a minute or an hour. Of course, at the same time, it also means that no issue is covered in intense depth.

Houses: Home of Savings
Leamy is a big advocate of buying a home as quickly as possible, even with a tiny down payment. Her argument mostly revolves around the fact that there are many more ways to save money and get return value out of a house than there is out of a rental situation, particularly when interest rates are this low.

The rest of the section focuses on ways to do just that and squeeze more value out of your home purchase. She suggests things like having your home re-appraised for tax purposes, being diligent about closing costs, paying down your mortgage early, and selling your home yourself when it comes time to sell.

Cars: The Cheaper Road
Leamy’s advice on cars is similarly straightforward. Start off by buying a car you can easily afford and pay it off as soon as you can. Of course, here the road diverges a bit. A big part of that car purchase, in her eyes, involves buying a car that is reliable and following that up by keeping the maintenance package up on the car.

The idea here is to make sure the car has a long life span for you so that you buy cars less frequently and have longer periods without required car payments. If you do that, then you can get away with just banking a little bit each month for your next car and be just fine.

Credit: Loans for Less
The advice Leamy offers on credit is pretty straightforward. One of the best things you can do for yourself is have a good credit score – and not so that you have easy access to credit. A good credit score lowers your insurance rates and makes you appear more reputable during various background checks.

How do you get there? Pay off your debts, particularly your high interest ones, and avoid racking up new ones. Make sure your credit report is clean and doesn’t have any false information on it. These tactics will put you in a better place.

Groceries: Guerilla Grocery Shopping
Most families have significant food and household costs, and some simple techniques for cutting them go a long way. I can certainly say that reducing food costs was a big part of our financial turnaround.

Again, Leamy sticks with the big tactics that work. Stockpiling (and buying in bulk). Being clever with coupons (in other words, only using coupons for stuff you already use). Using price-matching to your advantage. Identifying stores with lower prices and shopping there. Buying real foods, not processed foods. All of these tactics work for shaving dollars from your food bill.

Healthcare: Curing High Costs
The impact of health care on a person’s budget varies a lot from situation to situation. Some people have only a small health care cost, while others see it eating a significant chunk of their income. Because of the variable nature of it, Leamy’s advice is often conditional. Some ideas work in some situations, while others work in other situations.

For example, if you’re an infrequent health care user, your best bet is to simply raise your deductible, which will drop the premiums you pay on your insurance. If you’re a frequent user, there are a plethora of tactics available to you, the biggest of which is simple negotiation. Negotiate with your doctor. Negotiate with hospitals.

Is Save Big Worth Reading?
This book pretty much delivers exactly what it promises. Leamy sticks to the biggest personal finance matters and really focuses on how to cut them.

This book is great for someone who is a beginner at thinking about personal finance issues and is mostly only interested in shaving a bit of money from their current lifestyle. Leamy hits that area like a hammer.

However, if you’re looking for novel tactics or a completely new approach, you won’t find it here.

Check out additional reviews and notes of Save Big on Amazon.com.

A few weeks ago, I put out a call on Twitter and on Facebook for detailed posts that people would like to see. I got enough great responses that I’m going to fill the entire month of July – one post per day – addressing these ideas.

On Facebook, Elisabeth asked for information on “appealing health insurance denials of coverage.”

Health insurance companies don’t make money by paying for people’s medical bills (even though that’s why we hire them), so whenever there’s a case where they can see an easy way to deny it, they’ll do so. It makes sense for them as a business, even if it’s frustrating for us as people who need health care.

There’s a simple maxim to always follow when dealing with insurance companies, though: “the squeaky wheel gets the grease.” If it’s clear to them that you’re involved and have some idea of what you’re doing, you’re much more likely to get a resolution that you want.

Step 1: Know Your Situation
The first step is always to get all of your facts straight. You need to know some of the ins and outs of your health insurance plan as well as have thorough documentation of the care you received. Here are some questions to help you along that path.

+ What exactly is covered in your plan? What part of your plan matches up with the care you received?
+ Do you need a referral from your primary care physician for the type of care you received? Did you have that referral?
+ Is it required that the doctor you received care from be a member of the provider network covered by your policy?
+ Does your plan require prior authorization for the type of service you received? Did you get prior authorization from your insurance company (or did your doctor get it)?

Document all of these things with dates and as much information as you can gather. Have your facts straight before you even begin chasing down an appeal.

Step 2: Use Denials as a Clue, Not as a Stop Sign
If you’re denied, look for the reason for which the denial was issued. Your task is to cover that reason as clearly as possible – and you should acquire the needed information before you appeal. Depending on the reason for the denial, here are some steps you might want to take.

+ Ensure that your physician agrees that the procedure you were denied for was medically necessary, and get that in writing if at all possible.
+ If the insurer calls your procedure experimental, gather as much evidence in favor of it as you can.
+ If the insurer says that the procedure wasn’t explicitly covered, find evidence of similar procedures that are covered in your plan and ask your doctor for assistance in demonstrating the need for the procedure you had.

Step 3: Your Doctor Is Your Ally
A big theme you’ll see in the first two steps is that you’ll probably need some help from your doctor in this process, often in the form of documentation. Your doctor is going to be your ally here and you must keep that in mind through this process.

Be patient with your doctor. Don’t get angry with the doctor or the doctor’s staff. Do what you can to make it as easy as possible for them to help you with what you need. Honey works much better than vinegar in cases like this, so don’t give into your frustration and don’t get angry with your number one helper in this process (even if they seem uncooperative at times). The staff of many doctor’s offices are overburdened with requests, and one sure way to get your request overlooked is to act angry and self-righteous.

Step 4: Make an Appeal
Medical insurance companies have a formal appeals process which should be covered in your insurance documentation. Read through the documentation and understand it. It will be dry reading, I know, but the more you know about the process, the more likely it is that you’ll find success.

When you write your appeal, make all of the important details clear. Cover your health problems, particularly your full recent history with the problem in question. Discuss alternatives you’ve tried and exhausted. Mention what your physician recommended, particularly comments that counterbalance the reason your claim was denied. Outline why you were an ideal candidate for this procedure (which will probably take some research into the procedure). Discuss what will happen without the treatment.

You should also have supporting evidence. This is where research and time will come in handy. Quotes from your medical records are valuable. Direct quotes from your doctor are also valuable. Quotes from the insurance plan are incredibly valuable if they clearly support your case.

Provide as much documentation as you can for all of this evidence. Dates. Page numbers. Photocopies. You’re far better providing too much detail than not enough detail.

You should also keep a detailed log of all contact with the insurance company. Note what number you called, when you called it, who you spoke with, and what was discussed. You should also record all documentation you sent and when you sent it, as well as all mail you received from them. This may come in handy at a later time.

Most important, keep a full copy of every single piece of documentation that you send to the insurance company. Keep photocopies of the forms, of the records you sent them, and of every bit of your appeal. You may need these later on in the process. In fact, you should only be sending them copies of records and you should keep the originals for yourself.

Step 5: Get Free Assistance
Many states offer excellent help for people handling medical insurance denials through their state Department of Insurance. To find your state’s Department of Insurance, just use Google and type in “Department of Insurance” followed by your state.

Many states have a hotline you can call for assistance during this appeals process. Depending on the state, the information might be basic (providing simply information about the approximate timeline of the process) or it might be extensive (actually helping you with the appeal). They’re also equipped to handle any specific issues due to the state in which you reside.

In either case, it’s an assistance worth looking into if you find yourself in an appeal situation.

Another useful resource for insurance appeals is the Patient Advocate Foundation, which is another great resource for free assistance with medical appeals. You can simply fill out this form and assistance will contact you.

Step 6: Is a Lawyer Appropriate?
If your appeal is denied but you feel you’ve made a truly strong case, you may want to get legal help involved, particularly if the costs of the denial far outweigh the legal costs. Have a lawyer with experience in medical appeals review all of the documentation you’ve collected and determine if you have a case.

It is important to note that we all see our own situation through rose-colored glasses. A good lawyer will want to defend your rights and help you get the money you deserve, but if your case is weak, a good lawyer will say so. Remember, they’re financially ahead if they take on your case (particularly if they win), so if they’re telling you it’s not a good case, it probably isn’t.

A few weeks ago, I put out a call on Twitter and on Facebook for detailed posts that people would like to see. I got enough great responses that I’m going to fill the entire month of July – one post per day – addressing these ideas.

On Facebook, Silver requested a post on the topic of “Investing in precious metals – worth it?”

This is a question that doesn’t really have a straightforward “yes” or “no” answer. It has to do with a lot of other factors, risk tolerance being a big piece of it. Let’s walk through the whole picture.

How One Invests in Precious Metals
Usually, when people discuss investing in precious metals, they’re talking about buying and selling gold, silver, and/or platinum.

This investment takes two forms. Sometimes, people will buy the physical metal and store it somewhere privately. For example, people will often purchase gold and/or silver coins and keep them in their safe or in their safe deposit box at their bank. One person I know has several pounds in old gold coins sitting in their safe.

Another option is to buy a precious metal ETF. Essentially, this means you’re buying a stock whose price is tied to the current value of that precious metal, usually meaning that the ETF represents ownership of some small amount of that metal. If the value of the metal goes up, the value of the ETF goes up.

There are also ETFs that represent precious metal interests, such as ownership of silver or gold mines or refiners. These often track roughly with the rise and fall in value of precious metals, but not perfectly (they tend to be a bit less volatile, in my experience).

The Upside
There are several big pluses to investing in precious metals that many people point to.

One, it’s a physical commodity. If you own gold, you actually own a piece of that precious metal. This is opposed to things like a share of stock, which only exists on paper (as the company it’s a share of only exists on paper, in the end).

Two, it’s a limited commodity. There’s not an overabundance of any precious metal in the world. Yes, there is more mined all the time, but the total quantity isn’t growing at a very rapid rate.

Three, the price of precious metals often runs in the opposite direction of the United States and other Western economies. The recent enormous increase in the value of gold has come during a period of great weakness in the United States economy. The last big run-up in gold prices came during another period of great weakness in the economy. Many people once argued that the value run-up was a response to high inflation, but this most recent run-up has come during a period of very low inflation. The repeating pattern mostly seems to be a weak United States economy.

This means that people often move into gold when the United States economy looks weak (driving up the price) and they move out of gold when the United States economy looks economically strong (causing the price to drop). This is an extremely rough approximation.

Obviously, right now, people point to the tremendous recent jump in value in gold and silver as an example of how strong an investment in precious metals is. This is both a good and a bad.

It demonstrates that, yes, there are huge value jumps in precious metals that you can get rich off of. If you had bought gold at $300, you’d be rich now.

The Downside
In the short term, however, the big run-up in value in precious metals has already happened. If you’re looking to get rich quickly in precious metals, that ship has sailed. There may still be value increases, but the rocket ship ride that occurred in precious metals happened already over the past few years, and if you didn’t own precious metals during that period, you missed the rocket ship.

The huge upwards jump and the many recent rollercoaster-esque rises and dips in the values of precious metals demonstrates clearly the biggest flaw in investing in precious metals: they’re incredibly volatile investments. Jumps of 50% in value in a single year aren’t unusual over the history of precious metals, nor are drops of 50% in value.

In other words, right now we’re (at the very least) sitting fairly far up along the run-up in value of an extremely volatile commodity. This is not a place I want to be unless I’m truly hedging against something disastrous, and the only situation in which I’m doing that is if I’m convinced that other investments are going to lose the majority of their value in the very near future.

Thus, often, gold is sold alongside a healthy dose of paranoia. Much of the recent popularity in precious metals has come with gold sellers advertising on apocalyptic talk radio shows. Those shows spend a lot of time convincing people that the American economy is about to collapse and other apocalyptic facts so that the sales job for gold becomes much easier – which is exactly why gold sellers are happy to pay good money for these apocalyptic radio hosts to do the gold sales pitch for them. They both make money and the listener who buys in is left holding a very volatile investment near the top of its value.

(An aside: you would be shocked how often gold sellers want me to pitch their products to you. Often, they’re offering good money to do so.)

Another factor is that in a limited market like this, speculators run rampant. Every significant commodity market has speculators – people who are more interested in turning a short-term buck than earning money on a lasting investment. I don’t see anything wrong with speculation, but in order to compete with speculators, you have to really know what you’re doing in that market and very few individual investors do.

So, When Should One Invest?
I think that if you have a large portfolio of investments that includes a lot of other asset classes – domestic and foreign stocks, bonds, cash, foreign currency, real estate, and so on – precious metals might be another element you might want to include. Obviously, this element would be a very volatile piece of your investment picture, but you can balance that with other stable investments.

I would not buy precious metals unless I already had a significant amount of investments to counterbalance the volatility. If you don’t already have a lot of investments, buying precious metals means that you’re making the sum total of your investments incredibly volatile. You might wake up in three months to find that your life’s savings has lost 50% of its value.

I would absolutely not try to “play the gold market” (or the silver or the platinum market) unless I knew exactly what I was doing. In other words, if I had studied the markets extensively for years and had experience in short-term investing, I might try it. This excludes the vast majority of investors out there and most likely excludes you.

Each week, I highlight ten things each week that inspired me to greater financial, personal, and professional success. Hopefully, they will inspire you as well.

1. Thoreau on the purpose of actions
Having enough time seems to be a concern of most people today.

It’s not enough to be busy, so are the ants. The question is, what are we busy about? – Henry David Thoreau

Do you have time for what’s important? Or do you leave it behind for whatever shiny thing is capturing your attention at the moment? Make time for the things that really matter and a pretty good life will follow.

2. Village of Frugality, by Matthew Hunt
This is apparently a real sign in Cambria County, Pennsylvania.

At some point in the future, I need to get my picture taken near this sign.

3. BugMeNot
I dislike websites that have some piece of really great content I want to read but demand that I log in first. I understand it for sites with privacy concerns, and it’s not so much the logging in that I mind – it’s the hassle of having to set up an account, check my email to retrieve the password and so on that makes the effort far more than the article is worth.

BugMeNot solves that problem. It just lists generic usernames and passwords for such sites so you can log in, read your article, and get on with your life. Really useful for voracious readers like me. In fact, I’ve often actually signed up for accounts on sites that I’ve discovered are actually useful.

4. Emerson on growth and friends
Very few of us retain a complete set of friends from early childhood to today. Sure, we retain a few people, but that group changes. But is that group always changing for the better?

A man’s growth is seen in the successive choirs of his friends. – Ralph Waldo Emerson

Are you surrounded today by at least as good of a group of people as you were ten years ago? I think I am.

5. The Scream (1893), by Edvard Munch
This is a very familiar painting that, for some reason, I saw in a completely different light this week. Look carefully at it.

What if that person is shouting for joy? They’re stunned by the beauty of the sunset or by something else in their life?

The assumption for me has always been that he’s shouting in fear or some other negative emotion. The whole thing feels different if you take it as a positive emotion.

6. Dan Carlin’s podcasts
Dan Carlin is the host of two excellent podcasts, both of which I’ve been fervently listening to over the last month.

Common Sense is his current events and politics podcast. While I don’t agree with all of his stances (there are times when I feel like I disagree with most of them), he explains and argues his points well enough that they’re either going to make you consider his ideas carefully or rethink your own ideas.

The best one (in my eyes), though, is Hardcore History, which takes a deep look at various historical events from the perspective of how they affected the day-to-day lives of people who lived through them. He’s a powerful storyteller and the material just comes to life in his hands.

7. The Great Performers
This is a YouTube channel full of great classical musical performances of all stripes. The curator of this channel does a great job of selecting for quality rather than quantity, so it’s worth exploring.

A sample – Alexis Weissenberg playing Robert Schumann’s Arabesque:

8. Post-Graduate, by Dorothy Parker
A very short poem.

“Hope it was that tutored me,
And Love that taught me more;
And now I learn at Sorrow’s knee
The self-same lore.”

A great one, though. We learn something in both the ups and downs of life.

9. Jim Rohn on what creates success
Success is a natural outgrowth of pushing yourself.

Success is not to be pursued; it is to be attracted by the person you become. – Jim Rohn

If you want to be a successful person, start by acting the part. Pay attention to what successful people actually do, not what the media portrays them as doing.

10. 11,000 floating lanterns
During a Polish celebration of the summer solstice, 11,000 floating lanterns were launched into the air, filling the sky with lights that looked almost mystical.

There is a scene in the animated movie Rapunzel that captures this, but there’s something amazing in seeing it really happening.

Each week, I’ll present a low-cost meal (or a meal that demonstrates a lot of options for cutting costs) that my family eats for dinner and enjoys. Many of the recipes will be vegan or vegetarian, with options to add other ingredients for non-vegetarians.

This past weekend, we had several houseguests over for dinner. For these houseguests, we had a very summer-y American meal: we made some potato salad, fired up the grill, and cooked a few things.

The only catch is that my current dietary restrictions keep me from eating meat and dairy products. What can we do to have such a summer meal that I can eat while still pleasing everyone?

Our solution was two-fold: we made a batch of black bean and quinoa burgers for grilling and we made a potato salad that I could easily eat. I’ll talk about both of these today.

What You Need
Our black bean and quinoa burgers are based on a recipe we found in the July-August 2011 issue of Vegetarian Times, modified a bit. We really enjoy the ideas and recipes in this publication because they do a fantastic job of making vegetable-heavy meals really tasty. The potato salad incorporates ideas from all over the place, though there happens to be a somewhat similar potato salad recipe in that same issue of Vegetarian Times.

For eight burgers, you need:
1/2 cup quinoa
2 1/4 cups water
1 small onion, finely chopped
6 sun dried tomatoes
1 1/2 cups cooked black beans
2 garlic cloves
hamburger seasonings, to taste

For the potato salad, you need:
2 lbs. potatoes, diced into 1 inch cubes, and water to boil them in
2/3 cup plain yogurt (we used soy yogurt)
1/2 cup mustard
1 tbsp. olive oil
1 bell pepper, diced (use whatever color you prefer)
2 celery stalks, diced
1 small onion, sliced
2 tsp. salt
1 tsp. cracked black pepper

The Night Before (or Early That Day)
The biggest step you’ll need to take in advance is to cut up all of the vegetables you’ll need and store them appropriately. You’ll also need to cook the black beans (if you’re not using canned beans, which many people do for convenience).

Preparing the Meal
First, let’s talk about the burgers.

Cook the quinoa and salt in 1 1/4 cups of water. Raise the water to a boil, then allow it to simmer for 20 minutes. All of the water should be absorbed by the quinoa.

Put the onion and the tomatoes in a skillet and cook them for four minutes, then add half of the beans, the garlic, the seasoning, and 1 cup water. Simmer this for five minutes or until virtually all of the liquid has evaporated.

Add half of the quinoa to the bean mixture, put all of it in a blender, and puree it until it’s a thick paste. Mix the paste together with the remaining beans and quinoa.

Shape the mixture into eight burger shapes, then cook them in the oven for ten minutes – just long enough so that they hold together well.

After this, you can grill them to your heart’s content. I find that they were pretty good after about 3 minutes on each side over medium heat on a propane grill.

And there you have it! Top the burgers with whatever burger toppings you like and serve them on a bun. I used brown mustard, rice cheese, tomato slices, onions, and a pickle slice on top.

What about that potato salad?

The first step is to boil the cubed potatoes. Cover them in water (with an extra inch or so of water on top) in a pot and boil them for about five minutes so that the potato cubes are tender but not so soft they’re falling apart.

Mix together the mustard, yogurt, salt, pepper, and olive oil into a liquid mixture. This will effectively be the “dressing” for your salad.

Then, mix together your “dressing,” the potatoes, and the remaining vegetables. Toss them so that the vegetables are coated in the dressing, then chill and, when ready, serve.

Optional Ingredients
Whenever you’re grilling, you have a lot of flexibility. Try different seasonings in the burgers. Use hamburger instead of the black beans and quinoa – or mix two parts hamburger with one part black beans and quinoa. Try different toppings on your burgers. No two burgers ever need be the same.

The same goes for the potato salad. Add hard-boiled eggs to the salad for some great texture and flavor. Use mayonnaise as an alternative to the yogurt. Try different herbs and spices. The possibilities are endless.

A few weeks ago, I put out a call on Twitter and on Facebook for detailed posts that people would like to see. I got enough great responses that I’m going to fill the entire month of July – one post per day – addressing these ideas.

On Facebook, Sherri requested a post on the topic of “how to have a food garden for cheap.” I’ll do my best, Sherri!

My background in gardening is pretty expansive. Growing up, my family always had a large vegetable garden, often multiple ones. Planting, watering, weeding, and harvesting from this garden were consistent parts of the spring, summer, and fall during my childhood.

Today, we have our own vegetable and herb garden behind our house. Here’s a peek at it:

We tend to grow herbs, asparagus, and strawberries in the lower portion and vegetables in the upper portion of the garden.

So, how do you get started with gardening on the cheap?

Land The most essential ingredient for inexpensive gardening is a spot of land upon which to put your garden. You don’t necessarily have to own that land; you simply need to have permission to plant there. For example, if you happen to know a family that has a lawn but doesn’t have a garden, you might ask them if they’d be willing to allow you to garden there while sharing some of the produce with them.

If you don’t have land, you certainly can still garden, but you’ll be relying on a series of pots and other containers in your house and/or on your balcony for your plants. The easiest way to do this is to patiently wait for sales on the containers (the fall is the best time to do this), hold onto them until the spring, and meanwhile look for sources of inexpensive (read: free) dirt to fill the pots with.

Good soil I’m lucky to live in Iowa where the soil is fertile. If you don’t have access to good soil, the easiest way to start building up good soil is through composting. Take your vegetable and fruit scraps and keep them in a lidded bucket until they begin to decompose into rich organic matter. Gentle heat (like a warm day), a bit of moisture, and a few scoops of good soil will help the process along. Stop adding new things to the bucket about three months before you want to use the compost. Turn the compost regularly by mixing it up. In my experience, compost made purely of vegetable and fruit scraps doesn’t stink much at all and often acquires a sweet smell when decomposing, though I certainly haven’t made compost out of everything one might use. You can also put coffee grains and well washed and crumbled egg shells into your compost bin.

Cultivation If you’ve decided to garden outside, cultivation can be another challenge. You’re going to have to turn the soil over using some method. The least expensive method is to do it manually with a hoe, but that is very intense labor. Another option is to borrow (preferably) or rent a small tiller that will churn up the soil for you. Buying a tiller can be a cost-effective idea, but only if you’re going to consistently garden a large section of land for many years.

Basic tools Depending on what you’re planting, you may only need a small handheld shovel and/or a hoe. These are often easily borrowed from other gardeners if you know of any.

Seeds One of the biggest challenges of food today is that almost all of the foods you buy at the store are hybridized, which means that the seeds inside of them are sterile. This means you can’t simply reserve seeds from the plants you wish to grow.

There are a few plants you can grow from the remaining portions from a store purchase. For example, we have grown potatoes by taking a potato with several eyes purchased at the store and leaving it in a warm area for a few weeks before planting it.

For many plants, however, you’re likely going to be stuck acquiring seeds, at least at first. If you plan on doing this over a number of years, your best bet is to look for non-hybridized seed sources like Seed Savers. The seeds from these fruits and vegetables can be saved for future years of growing – and, more importantly, can be traded with other growers of non-hybridized plants. This means that, while you have a startup cost for seeds, you drastically reduce your continuing cost.

Gardening clubs One great method, if you’re a beginning gardener, is to get involved in a local gardening club. Check the library and the community bulletin board at city hall in the town(s) nearest you for information on such organizations. A stop at the local gardening store might also point you in the right direction.

Not only are such clubs a great source of advice and support (and often a great source for socializing and friendship-building as well), many of the members often grow non-hybridized plants of their own and will trade seeds with members and even give some seeds to new members. My first handful of non-hybridized seeds was from a local gardener who just gave them to me.

Education The best tool a gardener has is education. Read everything you can about the vegetables you’re planning to grow. Wikipedia is a great starting point for this, as are many different online gardening sites. Know when to plant them, how to plant them, and how to care for them. Know how to prevent common diseases.

The effort you put into watching the garden, being familiar with the plants, keeping the garden clear of weeds, and taking preventive steps against diseases and pests will pay off tremendously in the quality and quantity of produce you receive at the end of the season.

The truth about gardening is that once you’ve taken care of a few startup costs, it really is a very inexpensive hobby that results in delicious produce. However, there is a cost to be paid, and that cost is time. If you don’t appreciate gardening as a hobby, you’ll find it hard to push yourself to do the things that need to be done to maintain a garden, such as weeding and stopping pests. This will drastically reduce the success you see from the garden and reduce the return on your initial investment in seeds and basic equipment.

Good luck!