Our Public Libraries - Unlimited DVDs Rentals for $20.60 per year

It is a open secret that our public libraries are a economical source of knowledge, entertainment and resources. Reading can be both a pleasurable activity as well as financially rewarding as one learns new information, skills and hobbies that can turn into a future career. Since public libaries are funded by taxpayers and provided free-of-charge to residents, why not take advantage of this public resource to save money on entertainment.

Magazines and Periodicals
The library stocks many of the periodicals that one finds on the newstand. Instead of paying that $5.00 or $6.00 for that FHM or HERWORLD magazine, why not borrow these from the library using your NRIC (if you are already a registered library member)? Granted, the latest magazines would likely be borrowed but you can get hold of the last couple of months. Periodicals such as Fortune, Time, Newsweek are all available from NLB libraries.

CDs, DVDs and Movies
The library@Esplanade provides DVDs that we can borrow relating to drama serials, movies and science-fiction series. Boxed set of Star Trek, Cheers, Seinfeld and even Space 1999 can be found at this library. There is a catch of course! The borrowing period is 1 week and you need to be a Premier library member and pay an additional $20.60 per year, or only $0.06 cents a day to enjoy this privilege. Compared to paying $3-5 per rental for 2-3 days from VideoEZY or your neighbourhood video rental shop, this is a bargain. I particularly enjoyed following the first 2 seasons of Deep Space Nine (Star Trek spin-off) which was not shown on Singapore TV and hence it was good to be able to watch such series.

Novels
The fiction section of the library stocks most of the popular fiction e.g. Tom Clancy, David Eddings, Nadine Godimer, James Michener, Charles Dickens, JK Rowling etc. If you are really desperate to reserve one of the popular fiction books that were just released, you can pay $1.55 to make a reservation online through NLB's website and request to collect the book from the public library nearest your home. Talk about convenience!

So for those who like me love to read and watch DVDs, make use of our public resource -- The Library and save your hard earned money for investments that will advance your goal of achieving financial freedom!

Be well and prosper.