The Cost of Cutting the Cord

People talk about “cutting the cord” a.k.a canceling their Cable or Satellite service and opting for internet-based services. One thing that doesn’t seem to get a whole lot of coverage, in my opinion, is the cost of cutting the cord.

While this might be a bit biased because of circumstances, I wanted to compare what I’m paying every month for Comcast and how much it would cost to cut it out and switch to online services.

So here’s the breakdown. When it comes to single-purchase items, we’ll divide it up over 12 months.

Comcast Xfinity Double Play: $125/month (after taxes/fees)

Subtract Internet Serivce: x 50%

Cable Price: $62.50

So we have $62.50 to work with. Let’s start:

Netflix: $9

Hulu+: $9

SlingTV (plus add ons to match): $20 + $5 + $5 + $5 + $5

HBONow: $15

HD Antenna (for locals): $40/12 = $3.33

Total: $76.33

Adding the cost for subscribing the same speed Internet package as a standalone service will add as much as $40/month on top of the Internet half of the above $125. All in all, we’re looking at $176.33 to match what I already have. That doesn’t seem like much of a good deal.

Let me be clear about a couple things: I aimed high on purpose. Not everyone would need everything and maybe if you only watch a few channels, you’d be able to save some money. However, Internet-only packages are expensive and unless you’re okay with the bare minimum speed from your provider, you’re going to end up paying quite a bit which really doesn’t make it worth it, in my opinion.

I also need to say that I watch a lot of variety of television programming in addition to the simple stuff that’s easy to access via one of the above services.

Perhaps at some point when Internet-only prices come down, this might make sense, but adding an extra $50 to “cut the cord” that I still use for Internet doesn’t make sense.