North Farmington Grad Pens 'Cheapskate' Guide

North Farmington High alum Rick Broida knows a good deal when he sees one. 

"I've always had a bit of a sixth sense when it comes to ferreting out deals," the Commerce Township writer said.

The talent earned him a gig writing "The Cheapskate," a daily blog on the CNET, a techie product review website, and now a book, The Cheapskate Rules: 21 Easy Money-Saving Tech Secrets, available from Amazon.com.

Broida credits an English teacher at North Farmington for heading him in the direction of becoming an English major at Michigan State University. Always "a computer guy", he started his tech writing career right out of college. 

The idea for the book, he said, came from the column, which he has penned for more than six years. Because it attracted many regular readers, he decided to collect his "greatest hits" into a guide for anyone interested in scoring great deals and learning how to use technology to save or even make money.

As an example, Broida said, the book lists five programs that provide a great alternative for Microsoft Office–plus, "they're all free and will get the job done for 95 percent of users."

And then there's the book, which is only available for Kindle. "I think it can pay for itself many, many times over," Broida said. 

Read an excerpt from The Cheapskate Rules on Broida's CNET blog.