With the new year right around the corner a lot of the personal finance websites are rolling out their annual “ways to save money in the New Year” articles. Since it’s going to be 2010, ten seems the be the magic number. For example, you can read SmartMoney’s 10 Ways to Save Money in 2010.

But I’m inclined to focus on one thing at a time and one easy way to cut spending every month is to pare down your monthly phone bill. I am a big fan voice-over-IP telephony, which uses your existing Internet connection to place and receive calls using standard phones. The biggest player in this space is Vonage (which I use and love) and at about $32 a month saves me a nice stack of cash. But I’ve been intrigued by a new player in this space, a company called Ooma, which promises even greater savings.

Ooma has hit the market with a big radio ad campaign, but how does the offering measure up?

Like Vonage, Ooma lets you make free U.S. calls over the Internet, with your existing home phone. You get free U.S. calls, 911 service, caller ID, voicemail, call waiting, and low cost international calls. The big difference is that with Ooma, there are no monthly fees. How is this possible? The service requires that you buy a special device, the Ooma Telo, which is how the company makes money and how you can connect your phone to the net. The cost for the unit is about $250.

So were I to switch to Ooma, I would break even in eight to nine months and after that all my domestic calls would be 100% free. Seems like a no-brainer, right? It would, except for the fact that many of the features that I currently enjoy with Vonage are only available with Ooma Premier which costs $9.99 a month.

Ooma Premier offers features like three-way calling, call screening, call rejection, call forwarding and priority support. One big upside is that this would also allow me to port my existing phone number, a $40 value. Signing up for Ooma Premier would push my break-even point to two years down the road, and I’m not sure that Ooma will be around that long. Vonage has had major legal troubles and was on shaky ground it seemed for a while. But if they went under, I would not have lost a $250 investment.

If you call overseas a lot, Ooma offers an international plan. You can call overseas for $4.99 a month and for that receive 500 minutes of calling per month to 70 countries worldwide.

I’m still interested in Ooma, but would like to see it gain more traction before I consider swtiching. Anyone out there using Ooma? Let us know what you think.