Obviously one of the tricks to debt relief and lower mortgage payments is to cut your expenses.

One way to cut your living expenses is to substitute cheaper products for the ones you are buying now.

Amanda has a fantastic blog and a great post on cutting out brand names and saving money:

One of the most difficult things for me to do when I started living on my own was get over some grocery store brands that I grew up with and go generic on certain items. For me, when I got my first place, I found psychological comfort in having similar things to my parents home - it just felt cozier, and more welcoming, that way. However, as I started to take an interest in being frugal and saving money, I felt I needed to reassess why I bought certain products - especially at the grocery store - when generic was just as good.

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I've done the calculations a number of times and this method most definitely saves me money at the store. Also, I am one of the most sensitive people when it comes to taste (I'm not a picky eater, I'll eat anything, but I can taste the difference between two similar items - e.g., Coke and Pepsi - easily), and I've never really noticed a difference  between the generic and the brand food items above. However, that being said, there are SOME things that I can't go generic on - the taste of the brand item is just too good to pass up:

Go over there and read her list. It's a great post. Thanks Amanda! I've deleted the paragraphs where she has the substitutions she makes. I want you to read her blog. And I am going to give you my thoughts on this.

There are a lot of what I call "money leaks" that you can plug pretty easily. With little or no sacrifice.

If you go to a warehouse store and buy your paper towel, you can save some money. If you buy the Costco branded towels you'll save a bit more. Laundry and dishwasher detergent is much much cheaper at Costco than it is in the supermarket.

But these are obvious money leaks. Let's look at some others.

If you have a phone land line you can easily get rid of it. Use Skype to make calls when your cellphone minutes cost too much, during peak times. This can save $40 or $60 per month, quite a money leak.

You can cancel all your magazines and newspaper if you still get one. Use the web instead.

Why not reprice your auto insurance? Maybe you can get a better rate from another company. Or change coverages. Sometimes we have coverage we no longer need. Like, I was paying for replacement insurance on my Blackberry. Fine when it was new. But it's two years later and it is quite worthless, really, so why am I paying out $4 per month for this stupid insurance? A $50/year money leak.

Cable television can cost $70 to $140 per month. What a money leak. Kill it. Watch Netflix instead, for $20 per month. Or just basic cable which is usually quite cheap.

I encourage you to take Amanda's idea and find money leaks and plug them.