Definitely pay the fees and get out of the contract. It'll save you tons in the long run!

I have voip ooma internet phone. Works great.
Bought a $100 antenna (wanted the best) so now there is no cable. I get about 56 channels

Verizon triple play contract had expired so it was not difficult to cut the cord. I now pay the 79 per month. It used to be over 200.

Thinking of getting TiVo. Already have roku

I wonder if we could port our numbers to google voice and go with tmobile then bring our google voice numbers to tmobile? Thats the hangup on the new tmobile promo, you have to give up your number

T-Mobile Will Now Pay Your Early Termination Fee If You Leave Your Current Provider

http://www.yahoo.com/tech/t-mobile-announces-it-will-pay-your-early-termination-72694409783.html

I hadnt looked at it from that point. Getting out of contracts will save us in the long run.

Looks like i know what i will be doing with some of our tax refund!

Our lease isnt up until september but our TH now is way too big for what we need. Hopefully we can find a smaller 3 bedroom TH in N Arlington/FC for closer to 2000 and save more there.

The early termination fee is $350.

The cost for one year of contracted service is $950.

If you terminated early, you will save $610 for the year.

I find your post interesting. When DH is outside of the US, is he earning any extra money (x $/day for food or x $/day for lodging)? If so, he could try eating less or staying in cheaper lodging to pock the difference.

As for Verizon, just cancel everything. You may be out of pocket up front, but how quickly will you make that up? If it is less than a year then you are ahead. Get the cheapest phone and internet you can and skip cable all together. Maybe you could try no internet for a while and just use the library for free.

Have you told Verizon you plan to cancel everything unless they give you lower rates for the next 6 or 12 months?

Honestly, saving 100/ mo on your phone bill isn't that big of a difference. Your rent is what could make a real difference. Any chance of moving to a cheaper rental for a few years? You could save 500 a month doing that.

I spent 2 hours on the phone with them to make sure the auto pay was off of there since I never signed up! Its off now. They are ridiculous.

I would cancel auto pay. Verizon is known for doing unscrupulous things. I too am trying to get rid of them as well. They screw my account too and my plan.

We have committed to getting out of debt and are researching which method works best for our lifestyle. Still in the planning phases as some things are soon to change (Mortgage debt is on a house currently rented to a tenant who is planning to purchase this summer, I am currently a SAHM but interviewing for FT gigs).
Another issue is that DH's job currently has him working in another country where some (housing/utilities) things are employer covered but things like internet/food are not. So we are managing two households or 1 and a half on one income which leaves us with less leftover monthly than we'd like. We are new to the area and hope to find a cheaper rental once our lease is up as the one we found was pricier than we'd wanted.

Debt
Mortgage: 200,000 (will be wiped out by sale)
Student Loans: 60,000 (75% are currently in deferment so we are not focusing on them at the moment)

Main focus of debt repayment:
Credit Cards: 22,000
Car: 20,000

I've been working to cut down wherever we can on the monthly bills to use those savings toward paying down the credit card debt first. We'd like to trade our car in to save some on the monthly payment but would like to build up better credit scores first.

The issue I am running into is that we are IN CONTRACT until 2015 with Verizon for both cell phones and TV/Internet.
We have the cheapest smartphone plan which runs us about $80/mo because DH's is usually suspended when he isn't in the US. We could have cheaper on prepaid plans but we're in contract. 350 early termination fees
We have tv/internet for about 130/mo. I wanted to get rid of cable and just have the basic internet but VZ won't let us out of the double play contract. They offered to do basic cable (20 channels) with the lowest internet but that only saves us $15 a month. about 200 in ETF if we left the contract.
Has anyone found a way to negotiate with them? I was told that if we drop TV all together we'd have to pay 200 and internet alone would be 79 a month plus taxes.

Monthly Income: $7000
Monthly Leftover: $600 (usually less after accounting for medical bills, car maintenance, etc)
Monthly Budget:
Rent- 2500
Mortgage- 150
Utilities
(Cells, cable, internet)- 250
(electric, water)- 200
Debt bills (CC, Student Loans)- 1200
Groceries- 300
Car, Ins, Gas- 450
PreK- 1000 (I wish we could drop this but in all honesty I know NOBODY here for a break/backup care and am on my own for months at a time with the kids. We also don't want to lose the FT slot in this reasonably priced program for when I do land a job)
DH food/internet(basic package)-350

We don't eat out, buy store brand and have squeezed as much out of every other payment we had wiggle room with. The only ones I see any hope for are the cell/cable ones but Verizon doesn't seem to budge at all. They did screw up and over billed (enrolled me in autopay without asking) last month so I don't know if that could get us out of the residential contract. I am grateful we are able to meet our minimum payments each month but want to be able to do more than that. I've been unsuccessful in finding work from home to offset needing daycare in addition to PreK. It is extremely frustrating to STILL be paying off 20,000 in medical bills (credit cards) from 4 years ago!

Am I missing anywhere we can save in the immediate future? Or do I need to hold off until our lease is up and until our credit is in a good range to trade our car in to really see some larger savings?