The casino will take its share, nothing you can do about that. Dealers need to make a living so I don’t advise you cut their tips, else you will end up with incompetent dealers who make mistakes and that could cost you a big pot.

So we covered the two most obvious expenses to a poker player, the house rake and tips. What other expenses are there?

How about losing a hand. Does that not cost you money? Of course it does. Being a skillful player will increase the chances of your hands winning. But the average joe with average skill needs a trick up his sleeve too.

One trick to cutting expenses and increasing profits is in starting hand selection. This one tip alone will increase your bankroll like crazy. Most players play way too many hands. The more hands you play, the more hands you will lose and thus, up goes your expenses.

As an example, let’s say you throw every hand away. What is your expense? Only the blinds. Sometimes your blind doesn’t get raised and you get to play for free. Win one of these every couple of times and it will cover the expense of the blinds.

Now that is an extreme and even though you cut expenses, you still need to generate some revenue. You must play some hands to generate profits. I recommend you stick to the top 20 premium hands. These are the hands with the highest chance of being winners.

More winning hands and less losing hands equals more revenue and fewer expenses. Playing low percentage hands in hopes of winning a big pot only equates to more expenses, which in turn dilutes the profits you make on the high percentage hands.

You can find the list of top 20 Hold ‘Em hands by visiting: http://www.pokertools.com/rules.php