Welcome to A Dollar A Day, where every day we'll dish out creative and quirky ways to save on your living expenses.
Daily deal sites like Groupon and Living Social prey on your strongest impulses. They entice you with pretty pictures of snowy cabins in Vermont and beachside resorts in Mexico. Their exciting subject lines convince you that it's thrifty to buy "right now!"
Don't you sometimes wish you could return those impulse buys? Good news: you can.
Sites like DealsGoRound and CoupRecoup allow users to actually make money back on unwanted deals. The sites connect regretful buyers with hopeful shoppers who may have missed out on a daily deal they wanted to buy.
If you often regret buying deals on flash-sale sites, you're not alone. According to Boston.com:
Estimates, and one small study, put redemption rates between 70 and 90 percent. Yael Gavish, a cofounder of San Francisco-based Lifesta, estimates 20 percent of coupons aren’t redeemed. A survey of 100 retailers by Yipit, a site that aggregates deals from Groupon and 360 other companies (yes, there are that many), found redemption rates between 80 and 90 percent.
DealsGoRound isn't a free service: The site takes a 10 percent transaction fee when a deal is sold. CoupRecoup, on the other hand, won't cost you a dime. Of course, you can also take the old-fashioned route and try Craigslist. We're curious to know which way has worked best for you.
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