If you have been following along with my recent sale and purchase of my personal home, you know I was faced with lots of decisions. One of the decisions I made prior to moving, was to ditch cable – I was cutting the cable cord! No more boxes, wires everywhere and monthly rental bills. I mean, why do they charge a monthly fee to “rent” the cable box, when you are already paying for the cable? After all, you can’t watch the cable shows without the cable box, so it’s kind of like double dipping when they charge you both!
The only decision left, was what would my tv viewing options be? I initially decided on my lineup:
- Sling Blue (it offers the most options that my mother likes)
- HBO Now
- CBS All Access Pass
- and of course, Netflix and Amazon Prime
Since I already had Netflix and Amazon Prime, I didn’t factor them into my cable cutting budget – then I would be double dipping! I decided to budget $75/month, a significant decrease from my current $200+ cable bill (and that did not include any premium channels). My actual cost would be $46/month. The only problem was, I still didn’t have local channels. I purchased an attic antenna, but it didn’t work! But I soon learned about Playstation Vue, and quickly signed up for their trial. Local channels, no antenna! After a few days of trial and error, I eliminated Sling Blue in favor of Playstation Vue, which increased my monthly cost to $70.99 – under budget!
UPDATE: Oct 31, 2019 – Sony has decided to discontinue Playstation Vue. So I have had to select another option. I am currently exploring FuboTV and will keep you posted.
I am still navigating this cable cutting option.
Pros:
- Cost savings
- Increased channel options (of what I actually watch)
- No more cable box rentals
Cons
- Channel surfing is a little more difficult
- Monitoring usage (internet data usage is not unlimited – so this could be costly)
Considering cutting the cord? Here is a spreadsheet of channels available in our area on streaming services.