Yesterday, as I was otherwise occupied (I spent five hours writing a post about programmable thermostats, a post nobody will even like!), the conversation on Donna Freedman’s article got a little cranky. Donna wrote about pinching pennies on some things so that she could splurge on others. In Donna’s case, that meant a trip to England.
Tyler K., who’s always a little cranky, wrote in response:
I’m just waiting for the post where someone’s passion, the thing they’re willing to scrimp on everything else so that they can afford, is a Range Rover. Or anything else but travel, really…It’d be fantastic to see someone write about not going to Europe so they could buy a luxury SUV…
The Other Brian expressed his frustration, too:
I agree with Tyler 100%. I’m pretty sure the person that wrote that post would get absolutely BLASTED in the comment section for their prioritization of Stuff over experiences…
And Jane, who is usually mild-mannered, chimed in:
I would love for someone to actually have the courage to write a reader story or guest post about how they scrimped and went without for a big screen television! Why is that any less valid than saving for a trip to Paris? I’m sure everyone would say that it is just as valid and cite J.D.’s mantra “Do what works for you.” But let’s be honest – there is a pretty obvious privileging on this site and others of certain types of ways to spend your money. Travel is one of the ones that people categorically praise.
First of all, I’m as tired of travel articles as everyone else. Yes, it’s one of my pet topics, but we’ve featured it a lot around here lately. Time for it to take a back seat for a while. Second, I think travel gets praised a lot because people enjoy it. For years, I heard people extolling the virtues of travel, but until I tried it, I didn’t really understand.
That said, Tyler, Jane, and The Other Brian have a valid point. We do talk a lot about Experiences here — but I think that’s because in Real Life, so much attention is heaped upon Stuff.
Stuff isn’t evil (though too much of it can certainly become a burden). Maybe it’s time for a little reality check…
How to Spend Your Money
Jane is right: My gut reaction is to cite my motto: “Do what works for you.” Because that’s what it’s all about. If you’re out of debt and meeting your savings goals, spend your surplus on whatever you want.
- If you want a big-screen television, buy a big-screen television.
- If you want a Range Rover, buy a Range Rover.
- If you want a surfboard, buy a surfboard.
- And if you want to travel, travel.
I don’t care what you spend your money on, and neither should anyone else. Travel isn’t inherently better than television, and I’m not arguing that it is. (For me, travel is better than television, but maybe not for Jane.)
I spend plenty of money on Stuff. In the past two years, I’ve bought a used car, a new bike, some nice furniture, season tickets to the Portland Timbers, and more comic books than a grown man really needs. (Trust me: If I’m buying all these comic books, I’m not about to judge you for buying a television!) I’ve also paid for an expensive gym membership and traveled to nine other countries.
I’m careful to avoid debt and meet my savings goals, but I spend my surplus on Experiences and Stuff. Both have value.
And Donna, who just wrote about eating lunches of cheese and crackers so she can afford to travel the U.K.? Well, Donna’s willing to pay $9 for half a dozen cupcakes. Is that frugal? Of course it is! Well, maybe not frugal, but it’s certainly a reasonable expense. Donna can afford it, and it makes her happy.
There’s no one right way to do this. Donna splurges on cupcakes. I splurge on comic books. Maybe you spend on cable television. So what? If these are conscious decisions and we can afford it, there’s nothing wrong with buying Experiences or Stuff. Or both. (After all, that’s why we scrimp and save.)
What Do YOU Splurge On?
Financial writer Greg Karp recently dropped me a line. “I’m doing a column on what people splurge on,” he said. “Any thoughts?” I wrote back to share my main splurges: travel, travel gear, fitness, and computers.
I did a similar survey of personal-finance bloggers almost three years ago. “What do you splurge on?” I asked. Free Money Finance spends on cycling gear. Trent at The Simple Dollar splurges on videogames. And SVB from The Digerati Life buys stuff for around the house. Most of the people I polled spend on experiences: especially food and travel.
What about you? How do you spend your money? Assuming you have some sort of surplus after saving, do you focus on Experiences or Stuff? Do any of these purchases ever make you feel guilty? Or do you see this spending as a reward for making smart financial choices? (I used to feel guilty, but now I see spending as a reward for doing the other things right.) Chime in with your comments.
And, hey — if you want to write a reader story about how you saved for a boat or a television or a Range Rover, please send it in!
This article is about Advanced, Choices, Consumerism, Frugality
Books. And knitting/crochet supplies (although my yarn habit is quite frugal for a yarn habit, I am experiencing lifestyle inflation, and I do insist on good quality needles/hooks). Arguably, these count as both Stuff and Experience. A book or yarn is Stuff, but I get hours of joy from it, particularly if I re-read a book or knit something complicated with the yarn.
I initially reacted with “I don’t spend much on travel”, but now I’m not so sure. I’m going skiing soon – at a reasonable price, but I have deliberately chosen to pay extra for nicer accommodation and skis. But most of my travel expenses are travelling to see friends and family. I still don’t do this as much as I’d like, but it’s worth every penny for the joy I get out of it.
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Children. We have 5 of them. My husband and I always wanted a life with a large family and planned accordingly. We are not flush with cash, but we’ve met all of our children’s needs and many of their wants. Too many PF sites seem to dismiss a life like ours as “ordinary”, somehow less, but we’re living our dream, and our life is rich, edifying even.
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For me, the goal of being frugal and having my money in control is then being able to use that money to make my life more enjoyable. Yes…for me that partially means travel. However, it also means spending money to build a nice screened in porch and deck extension on our house. My husband has both a Wii and an Xbox with Kinect because he likes playing video games with our kids. I am slowly (as I have the extra money) buying new dishes because I hate our old stuff and the growing collection of Fiesta Ware in the china cabinet makes me smile just looking at it (all the colors! And not a single one with a chip in it!). For someone on the outside looking at us they probably just see that we have spent a lot of money on this stuff in the past few years. They don’t see though that I meal plan, clip coupons, drive a 6 year old car that I don’t have any plans to replace, have a mostly empty closet because I don’t buy clothes that often, my kids wear primarily hand me downs and my furniture consists mostly of pieces that my parents gave us when they retired and downsized (15 years ago!). Would I like new furniture? Sure. But I wanted the deck more…
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We splurged on a big screen TV. We use it for movies and th Wii that we received as a gift. We don’t even have TV programming. No Antenna, No Satellite, No Cable! It was going to be a Xmas 2010 purchase so we could reap the big deals. Walking around in July ’10, we came across a deal we couldn’t refuse. Basically 50% off similar models and it met my specifications. But the only reason we have it is becuase we saved, and had the money available (Opportunity $). Buying in July instead of Dec was total impulse, but we never saw a deal that good during the Holiday Sales. So it worked out.
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I’ve never posted here before, but I feel now is the time. I’m 24 yrs old, brazilian, public servant. Since my last vacation in Sep 2010 I’m saving to go on a sabbatical for 6 mths to 3 yrs. I intend to live in my parents apartment, where I won’t pay rent (just the condo fees), eat at my grandmother’s who lives 3 floors below, and watch tv (I’ll buy the big LED 3D), play videogames (Already have the Xbox 360 and I’ll buy Kinect), read and surf until I get bored. I’ve already let my parents know I’ll probably need my allowance back. They’re not happy about this, but I’m sure they won’t let me starve.
As my finances go, I have no money in my savings account because everything is invested. I’m getting between 2% and 3% and intend to fix up an office space I have so I can rent it.
I could take the money to go to Europe, or even Disney (I like it), buy a new car or open a new business, but I prefer to do nothing for a while and I need stuff to entertain myself.
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We’ve done almost no traveling for the last few years in order to “splurge” on being able to do work we enjoy for a living.
DW works in Social Work, and I quit my job to run a business that at the time was making about 50% less than my salary. (Now it makes more, but there was absolutely no guarantee that would ever happen. And we’d have been perfectly happy if it never did.)
And we do splurge on some Stuff. DW is passionate about cooking, so we probably have more high-end kitchen tools than most.
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I’m sick of hearing about people who travel all over to world just to collect the experience and be able to say “I’ve been there.” Amassing countless travel experience is the same as hoarding physical stuff in my opinion. Personally I enjoyed the reader story about splurging to see a shuttle launch, because that was the fulfillment of a lifelong dream.
The alternative to splurging on travel isn’t buying more stuff. There are a million reasons people could be saving their money to spend it here at home. Come talk to me about how your travel experiences were so worth it when you’re working into your 70′s to avoid draining your retirement fund. Mine is well stocked.
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Books definitely. I will gladly scrimp in other areas to buy more books. They are a pain to move (and lately I’ve been moving around once a year), but I don’t care. I love reading and I love my collection; someday my house will look like a library, and that makes me happy.
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Hey JD,
I’d love to write a post for you about how I consciously spend about $6,000 per year on golf! I’m thick skinned as well, so not afraid to face the commenters.
I agree with the commenters from yesterday though, would love to see more posts from the “other side” where people value things other than travel.
I like the theme of this post, it gets back to the true GRS tone, which has been missing for awhile, in my opinion.
Regards,
Bogey
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Short term my only splurge is travel. Sorry if it’s repetative but it’s really the only non-essential we have in our spending plan.
Long term my “splurge” if you can call it that is retiring early at 55. I figure that counts since we consciously cut our spending to ~55% of our take home so that we can contribute to our retirement funds and pay off the mortgage ASAP.
Yes we could retire even earlier if we didn’t travel, but we also want to enjoy the present and there’s always the chance that if we put off all travel until we retire, we won’t be physically able to do some of the trips we take now. When we travel now we do the multiple country always on the move type, which may not be nearly as appealing for us when we’re in our 60′s and beyond.
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Well OK, here I go. I live in a small apartment with a low utility bill, drive a 12-year-old car, cook my own food or share with friends, don’t buy electronics or cable TV, and I don’t splurge on clothing or accessories, so that I can “have” a job that’s low-stress although low-paid …
… and that enables me to volunteer for causes I care about. I serve on citizen boards in my city, give blood a few times a year, and I mentor a 7-year-old girl who is at risk because of her home of origin.
I guess that’s what I’m “buying” with my thrift.
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Wow, I guess I was a little cranky yesterday:). But thanks for responding. I guess at some level it’s also a stages of life thing. Ten years ago, I would have cringed to see myself today with my nice television and love of my DVR. But travel once you have children is less of reality, so I guess I find other ways to amuse myself. I certainly have done my fair share of travel and even lived abroad for two years. I was just playing the devil’s advocate last night. Like you said, I think there are lots of people who save for material possessions who are just afraid to write a guest post.
I never have thought you sent the message that possessions are wrong, but you can’t control the comments (or you could, but it wouldn’t be good either). And there’s definitely a privileging of experience over things. But what I fail to understand is how people don’t recognize that things create experiences.
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Yes, it’s very easy to point fingers at people for being wasteful or for liking stupid things. But at the end of the day, all we are drawn to can also be viewed as wasteful and stupid in numerous ways as well. There are infinite ways of interpreting experiences and things, and the things we like have personal meaning to us for numerous reasons. I think it’s more important to focus on your own wants while filtering out other people’s wants. Yes, you can’t totally ignore other people’s wants, but getting all indignant about other people’s wants is just wasted energy.
What do I splurge on? Well, I try to by organic and natural things, which tends to cost a bit more. I should splurge on a gym membership, but my living situation is uncertain for now, and I’ll wait until it stabilizes, as I don’t want to deal with the possible hassles of trying to cancel a membership. I think health is my most important asset, so I’m more lenient when it comes to spending money on things that are good for my health.
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Maybe people could splurge on charitable giving? Sure, I love books, good food and groceries, travel, but it is a great feeling to give away a chunk of change to a worthy group. Village Health Works and Partners in Health also do a great job of letting you see what your money is doing.
I sometimes worry when I see news stories of “charity” executives with bloated salaries, but not these two. It’s worth double checking the organizations you favor, but it feels great to write that check–really, better than a steak for dinner.
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My money is used to buy time. Time to spend at home with my wife and newly born child and then doing a little work in my free time.
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As I suspect many people on here do, we generally live frugally to free more money to spend how we would like to spend it — splurging on luxuries rather than general survival. For example, cheap (but tasty) food most of the times means we can eat out at fancy restaurants a few times a month.
My splurges are a blend of stuff and experiences — eating at good restaurants, crafts (materials & training courses) and books (most are bought second-hand but we still buy a *lot* of them).
I guess I do see it as a reward for good behaviour and I do believe treats are essential to staying on course – but I still feel a bit wasteful sometimes. I’ve recently started doing a “save as much as you spend” thing — totalling up how much I’ve spent on luxury items in a month then putting the equivalent amount into my savings — as a guilt offset plan.
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Here you go: my car. I drive a Mazda RX-8 that cost more to purchase, has higher maintenance costs, worse fuel economy, and generally worse reliability than a typical econo-box. I love it though. Driving to and from work are sometimes the highlights of my day.
I don’t deride travel though. I’ve been all over the US, Canada, the UK, and lived in South Africa on an extended work assignment. It’s not just about “collecting” memories they way people horde stuff. Seeing how others live can profoundly change your view on what’s necessary and what you truly value. To link it back to my car as a splurge I’m OK with, after months of driving my little econo-box all over South Africa, the first thing I wanted to do when I got home was jump into my (then different) sports car and floor the gas pedal. That made me realize that my car is a material thing that I place true value on.
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This is a great topic, I’m glad to see the other side of the argument getting some much-needed attention.
My wife and I splurged on our house. We’re mid-30′s, have no kids (and absolutely no intention for any). It’s just the two of us, plus 2 cats. We live in a 2600 sq. ft., 4 bedroom, 2.5 bath McMansion in suburbia. We even paid extra for the corner lot, and 9′ ceilings in the basement. Central air, upgraded finishes, cherry hardwood throughout the entire first floor (including the kitchen), granite countertops, 2-car garage (even though we just have one car, an ’05 Mazda 3 with 235,000 km on it). There are rooms in my house I literally haven’t been in in months. It’s absolutely more than we need. And I love it.
We’re frugal in a lot of other areas. We bring our lunches to work, cook our own meals at home, I rarely buy new clothes (I only own 2 pairs of jeans that actually fit), I brew my own beer, my wife makes her own wine, we carpool to work in our lone, economical car, we have basic cell phones on a bare-bones, shared family plan, and so on. We have no debt except for the mortgage, which we’re paying double on every month.
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Like I’ve said before, I’m pretty sick of travel since I do it for work. (This year I seriously cut back– only going to LA and Boston!). I would love more vacation time, but right now time is way more precious than seeing exotic new locales. Our personal travel consists of visiting family in the rural midwest.
Since we’ve found our “enough” (which is a pretty high enough, but just over half what we bring in), any large purchases don’t really need to be saved for. If I want $2000 in trees (which bring happiness when I look out the window, and will hopefully lower the water bill and lessen the threat of HOA certified letters… also, one day fruit…), then we just don’t prepay the mortgage that month. That’s not very exciting.
DH, OTOH, had an allowance that he saves up to buy things. He’s been making his own coffee and bagging lunch every day because of the Aeron chair he bought. But it’s still pretty predictable. He gets the same amount of “fun” money each week and 10X that at his birthday and Christmas.
In terms of why travel… it’s not just that after a certain point most Stuff is comparatively less expensive than exotic travel and dull to save up for. I think there’s also possibly that most people don’t travel enough and have too much Stuff. So their marginal utility of each additional piece of stuff is negative or 0, and the marginal utility of travel is positive. Travel fatigue can also set in, bringing the marginal utility of travel to 0 or negative.
p.s. I love that you no longer drink weak hot chocolate!
p.p.s. The programmable thermostat article may not get a lot of comments, but it will help form the backbone of searchable articles whenever someone has a finance-related question. Not so controversial, but very important. Sort of the broccoli of the site rather than the cupcakes.
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My family splurges on local food. We have two small children and don’t get out much to restaurants or on fancy vacations just yet. Instead we spend on local, organic food whenever possible and are teaching our kids how to cook so that they’ll have what I consider to be a valuable life skill in their toolbox for later. We’re also trying to teach our kids the importance of being conscious consumers–including considering the origin of what we buy. And yes, we do scrimp on some food items. Nearly everything is made from scratch; we buy dried beans; and we eat mostly vegetarian staples like legumes and whole grains.
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I do travel and love it but I “do frugal” so I can eat out, paying for my hosts while I stay with them. I also skip cable and internet at home so I can rent space at a pottery studio. I have just started spending some money on taking book binding classes and will continue to do that as a “treat”. Yup, learning is a great way to spend money on something one one can take away from you.
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Hannah: I completely agree with you about the collection/hoarding of travel experiences.
I had a “ten places to visit before I died” list until I realised that it was just consumerism in a slightly different shape. Sure, I might have some experiences there but the way I’d have to do it at the moment (very short stays) would be very surface, not full immersion in another culture — very much just ticking it off a list. To have rather than to be.
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My extra money seems to be going to the dogs the past year – literally! We have three that I spend money on – not toys but obedience training, CGC classes, etc. Now that I have found their calling (for the two coonhound/wirehair mix at least) it has been getting more expensive as they and I all train for search & rescue. They love it, I love it, and some day soon we will make a difference in other people’s lives. That’s money well spent in my book.
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Didn’t we hear grumbling from the GRS community as you were blogging about saving for your Mini Cooper? How is that different from a Range Rover? Now there’s grumbling because the discussion has turned to experiences.
There are a lot, A LOT of families who don’t have the time or resources to blog that could write a guest post about their “splurge” to take their family to a restaurant, movie, or some other family activity once a month. Yes, someone could write about those choices, but that would be less inspiring and little to real for much of the population.
Consider yourself fortunate if your decision this year is Range Rover or Europe. Especially in this economy.
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Books
And gear for Roller Derby!
Both of these things are Stuff-Experiences. As SF_UK said, books are an experience – I get hours and hours of joy out of each one. And as for Roller Derby gear? Well, having a £20 mouthguard makes the hours of skating much more comfortable (and safer – since I’m not hauling it out every time I talk!)
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My splurge areas tend to be food, craft supplies, DVDs, music, technology, and occasional travel.
I also tend to categorize my material purchases into Things and Stuff. DVDs that I can watch and get enjoyment from, high quality yarn, and other things that I actually put to use (and especially that I thought about before I bought) I categorize as Things. Impulse buys that end up collecting dust I categorize as Stuff. I think a lot of people are afraid of splurging on material possessions due to Things turning into Stuff, or maybe being viewed as materialistic. (The 30-day rule helps a lot with that!)
I see no problem buying Things over experiences if people actually get use out of their possessions. Stuff that will end up collecting dust in the closet? Might be worth rethinking.
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We splurge on paying off our house. Most people would think we were crazy but it will be paid off before DH’s 35th birthday. Then I feel like we’ll be able to splurge on whatever we want for the rest of our lives. And we have a list a mile long, luxury cars, huge vacation to celebrate the payoff, orthodontics, DH’s dream yacht when he retires from the military and an awesome lake home. We will travel too at some point but when the girls are older so they can remember their experiences.
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I spent my money on a boat. And everything boat related. Its all true what they say about it being a hole in the water into which you throw money, but I wouldn’t do it any differently if I had the choice.
A boat is stuff that lets you travel.
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JD – I for one can’t wait to see your article about programmable thermostats. I’m an Electrical Engineer and I love reading about energy efficiency. If you can put it in terms of initial investment versus payback period I would think it would make an especially interesting article.
I would love to see some more articles about energy efficiency and renewable energy options that can help people save money. I think it is important to emphasize payback so that people know what they are getting into with those improvements.
Also, my wife and I rarely travel out of state for vacation and typically spend our vacations staying with family. We spend most of our disposable income on electronics and video games. We pack lunches, we don’t have cable television, and we don’t even have very fancy televisions. We do have very nice computers with steam accounts full of video games. I’d write an article about it, but it would really be similar to any of the travel articles. I think they all follow the same theme of, “I don’t spend money on X, so I can spend money on Y because Y makes me happy and X really isn’t that important to me.” I’d rather hear about how you are saving money on X, then why you pay more for Y.
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Some people just like to complain.
I just reread yesterday’s post and I thought Donna was clear as a bell on the idea that she saves in some areas so she can spend in others.
I don’t think it should take much imagination or intelligence to understand that the “spend on” area could be anything – travel, range rovers, comics etc.
My splurge is the same as Kelley – all the extra money goes into the mortgage which will be gone sometime next year.
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Everyone who comes to this site is looking for ways to have a happy and fulfilling life. And we all recognize managing our money is a piece of that.
I think Donna’s post served two purposes and is more valid than a similar article about sacrificing in some ways to afford other “stuff” instead of experiences.
1) Who needs another article telling you to buy an SUV or tv? We get those all day long. If J.D. wants a successful blog, he’ll post surprising info, not commercials.
2) It is true that people get more long term joy from experiences from stuff. Look up the term “hedonic adaptation.” It’s the term that describes how we get used to having things and start to take them for granted. It can happen in travel too. If you stay at the Plaza every time, soon you won’t think of comfy, expensive sheets as a joy. They’ll just be routine.
But traveling on the cheap brings lots of ever-changing experiences–experiences proven to have a greater affect on people’s long term happiness than a car or device.
So I’d argue that Donna’s article did say something countercultural and surprising. And yes, travel is better than stuff.
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Interesting points. I know that studies have shown that experiences make us happier in the long run than “stuff”, but you don’t have to go far or spend a whole lot to get experiences. The idea that you’re “not really living” unless you’re travelling to far flung destinations is as much marketing speak as the idea you have to have more and more stuff.
I honestly think people need to cut through the bull and do what genuinely makes them happy. For some people, that’s travel. For others, it may be a car or a TV that they enjoy and creates a different kind of experience (like having people over to watch the big game or taking a road trip). Personally, I love to learn so I scrimped and saved and went to back to school.
I think Donna’s mantra is a good one. As long as it’s in the budget, I think people should pursue what makes them happy.
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Kitchen equipment. I love to cook (the career that got away) and have bought a Kitchenaid mixer, a coffee maker, steamer and more in the last six months. In fact, if I ever decide to build a robot I’d probably just have to tape together the contents of the kitchen cupboards and turn on some plugs!
That said, they’ve all been bought at the best price (sometimes with a huge discount) and I’m not a snob (although I like quality). So my £150/$225 mixer sits next to the £3/$4.5 food processor from the 70s that my mother in law found in a charity shop!
Friends and family find it very amusing that we spend (relatively) large sums of money on food and its preparation. What those same friends don’t think about so much is that while they have a 42″ LCD TV that can read their mind we have a 32″ TV from several years ago that only starts on the third attempt.
As with all things, do what you love and keep some perspective
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Totally agreed with #23 Mike. That is what I was thinking as I was reading about all the complainers. Sometimes I think people don’t actually read the post to get the lessons from it, they just skim it and then complain about it. The title of Donna’s post says it all.
One topic I would like a post about is how to negotiate priorities with a partner. I know Donna is making choices for herself and it seems that J.D. and Kris make a lot of independent decisions, but what do you do when you and your spouse have totally different ideas of what is important, yet are sharing the same funds to accomplish those things with? (Example, my husband wants to keep 2 cars for himself and I want him to sell one so we can have money for a house.)
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Well, I clip coupons and turn down the thermostat so I can have a cleaning lady in twice a week. It embarasses me even to type that. But it makes me a happier and therefore better person.
Travel has no appeal to me, both (as Jane said in #10) because we have kids, but also because I like being around familiar, comfortable things. Travelling once our kids are grown might be a once in a while fun thing for us, but ultimately too stressful to ever become an actual hobby.
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For us it’s travel. Hubby and I love nearly everything about it- including the airports! In fact, we’ve been known to go on cheap dates to the airport- buy a coffee and sit by the windows and just watch the planes taxiing back and forth.
That said, our travel priorities have begun to change. Rather than rying ot stretch it out as long as possible (trying to stay in europe for 3 months, for example), we’ve really started to value the ability to take shorter trips. They might be more expensive on a per-day basis, but it also allows us to spend more time with our newly arrived niece and nephew, who seem to grow up so fast when you miss chunks of milestones…
Maybe that’s all to say that priorities change. And that’s okay.
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I’m splurging on a single family house. Not a traditional “splurge” item, but I really don’t need it.
I don’t need the space (I own a townhouse now and have rooms I never use). I don’t need to be near good schools (single, no kids). I am 100% buying this because I don’t like hearing noise through common walls, I want to have room for a garden, and I want to be able to let my dog go for a pee without having to get bundled up for a walk in the Canadian winter.
For the past three years I have put myself on an extremly lean budget (only retirement savings went unchanged) and scrimped and saved everywhere I could to get enough cash to upgrade from a townhouse to a small single family house – without increasing my mortgate by a dime.
I love to travel, and buy big screen TV’s and other techie toys, but I’d rather have something that makes my everyday life simpler and better than something that gives me a short burst of pleasure.
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I spend money on makeup and skin care. I’m using a serum right now that costs $95 a bottle. I’ll drop $50 on foundation. I like playing with different eyeliners and eyeshadows. I also splurge on pedicures, and I’m starting to really enjoying getting facials. Yes, I brown bag my lunch, check out books from the library, and all that frugal stuff to be able to spend some of my money that way.
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I just bought a $60 Coach keychain.
It was a crazy spluge for me, but the blue elastic band that I took off a head of brocolli three years ago to use as my keychain was starting to fray.
I figured I was due.
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My wife and I scrimp on everything and live like students so that we can make movies, which are expensive and time-consuming to make, even with video. If we spent like everybody else we’d have to have 2 jobs and we would have little time for this (we have friends in that situation), but as it is we make do with one part-time check and a little bit of freelancing. The equipment has been bought with grants and with reinvested income from the freelancing, plus the part-time job provides free access to some extra gear (a perk that makes the low pay tolerable). The time to work on things, which is the other side of the equation, has been bought by keeping the thermostat low, our diet simple, our mileage low and our wardrobe minimalist– plus many other feats of contortion too numerous to describe (we’ve lost interest in restaurants, we travel only to festivals that pay for our travel, we have no real living room, etc., etc.).
As it happens we did buy a big plasma TV–not huge but huge for our budget. The thing is that it was a business purchase: it works as a computer/video editing monitor during the day, but we watched the World Cup on it last summer and we watch movies and TV on it every day– something we love to do. Oh, and the business pays for our Netflix subscription (we don’t get cable). Since our business coincides with our passion, we can afford the stuff we really care about– in almost every other front we would appear to the average American like we are living in deprivation.
Sure, we expect to make real money from this some day, but that’s not the motivation– it’s that to live doing something else would make life intolerable.
Also, the first word of the post by SF_UK reminded me of a quote by Erasmus: “When I get a little money I buy books, if there is any left I buy food and clothes”.
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We splurge on our childrens’ educations. We have three children and use our money to pay for their college educations and keep them out of debt as much as possible, instead of spending our money on travel or big screen tv’s. We also funded our retirement accounts so we won’t be a burden to them in the future. We mainly eat home cooked meals and socialize with friends in low budget ways that involve sharing hospitality and conversation.
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When I splurge, I do it on books. At the moment I am trying to pay off a buttload of debt, so I get my fix via GoodReads and PaperbackSwap. But I’ve noticed that when I’m having a bad day and decide to spend emotionally, I go to the bookstore.
-j
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My passion is guns and shooting, and I happily spend a lot of my disposable income on new firearms that I couldn’t possible justify “needing”. But I like having them. One thing I did when I finished paying off all my debt was set aside a fund specifically to take advantage of good deals that came up, and I’ve used it several times to buy firearms that cost more than my truck is worth.
Hopefully it doesn’t make me like a stereotypical xenophobic creep, but I’m not particularly interested in travel. I’m not against life experience, but I’d rather have tangibles than travel memories. If I’m going to invest in experience, I’d rather do it on something with a more definite useful outcome, like learning to rebuild my own vehicle or getting a HAM radio ticket.
Not to put down travelers – I totally understand the attraction. It just isn’t for me.
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MoneySavingMom had a story last month on saving up for a fancy television:
http://moneysavingmom.com/2011/02/we-paid-cash-laptop-tv.html
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I think that one person’s “stuff” can definitely be another’s “experience.” I am personally not into cars, but for someone who really cares about the driving experience, clearly a luxury car is going to provide a different experience than a budget vehicle. The same thing could be said of a top-of-the line stereo system or large screen television (or projector and screen, in the case of my husband).
The common thread is that it is consciously spent. I don’t think anyone will offer to write about how they “consciously” spent a bunch of money on impulse shopping just to fill an emotional void or “keep up with the Joneses.”
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A big splurge is my dog. I used to work as a pet sitter and got paid good money to watch and play with other people’s dogs. When that became not enough for me emotionally, I made the conscious decision to incur the considerable expense of owning a pet. Now I pay a dog walker to take him out while I’m away at work/commuting for 11 hours a day, but it is so worth it to have him part of my life every day when I come home. He opens up my life to neighbors, new friends, and now we are starting the sport of agility.
So is a pet a Stuff or an Experience?
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I was going to say the P family don’t spend much money on stuff, but in the last 5 years we’ve scrimped & saved to do two major home improvement projects.
First, we saved to hire an interior designer. We were still frugal about the experience. She was young and willing to just give us guidance & buy accessories. She let me paint the walls (normally a designer would hire someone and tack on a % towards her fee) and shop around to get a better deal on the sofa. It was worth every penny, because for 4 years I’ve been *happy* every time I walk in my house.
Once that project was complete, we scrimped & saved so we could pay cash to renovate our kitchen. It is gorgeous, and I was able to get everything that was important to me.
We do spend money on travel too, taking at least one trip per year by plane to visit family and another vacation by car to goof off.
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I splurge on what ever my wife wants. It usually is clothes, jewelry, or some kind of home decor. I would love to spend nothing and let my money accumulate, but my wife is not the same. I have a hard time constantly saying no to her spending habits because i know they give her some kind of fulfilment. I guess I am a sucker but my splurging is letting her splurge.
I could be much better saver if it was not for her. I try to involve her in our expenses but she shows no interest whatsoever. I would be interested in a post on how to deal with oppisite opinions on finances.
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I just splurged on my dream car – a VW Beetle convertible.
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Travel and housing – I live in a very expensive city (Singapore) our apartment is a good deal for what it is, but we could get less comfortable and older accomodations for quite a bit less. I also splurge on practical things that i think are good quality and will last for a long time.
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