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People want to LIVE their life instead of constantly trying to scrimp and save every penny they make. I love my Starbucks coffee every morning and I like to go out and eat a few times a week; it isn't like this spending is cutting into anything important. These little luxuries make life worth living, I could never be one to stay at home all the time and not go out and enjoy myself.
$30 for a meal is nothing, my bill at an average priced restaurant with my girlfriend usually over the $40 mark. Figure two meals for $15/ each and add 2 drinks each at about $4/ drink and you're already at $46 plus another $9-$10 for a tip and you're around $55 for the evening. It's just something I enjoy doing and $55 for an enjoyable evening is worth it to me. You only live once.
Well, part of the problems is that you're measuring your life by the coffee you drink and the meal you have. And who says that you have to live life like a hermit?
However, since you're single and in your 20s, you haven't learned how life has a way of giving you the sucker punch when you least expect it. Take half of all that money you blow eating out and stick it away, and you'll find that you hadn't missed the experience one bit.
Being out of work, savings and income at the same time is not considered a remote possibility by some folks. Others worry about it a lot. Either is an extreme.
I never had enough spare bucks to live like speedyAZ.
I eat out a lot with my husband (I'm a really bad cook and he's ... well, a guy!) so when I'm at work, I bring my food or get something cheap like a side salad at the cafeteria at work.
I get Starbuck's on weekends when I'm studying so during the week I either bring drinks from home to work or get $1 sweet tea at McDonald's (which I've been schooled that it really costs $2!).
In the end, do what makes you happy but if you're barely making ends meet, it's time to rethink $20 lunches 5X/week!
We took the kids to the movies yesterday. $20 for 4 tickets ($5 matinee), $1 for popcorn (we bought the huge buckets for $7.99 each last time, now it's 50 cent refills for a year), and snuck in cans of soda and bottles of water in my purse.
You can enjoy life, but be smart about it. We eat out on "Kids eat free" nights and never order alcohol in a restaurant. We go to the movies about once every other month, always a matinee(occassionally dh and ds go a second time, depending on what's out). As I'm not a movie buff, I usually send the kids with dh. It saves a few bucks, and I get a couple hours alone.
I get $5 gift cards from Starbucks from people all the time as thank yous, so I usually get to go about 1-2x a month free, I pay the other 2-3x (I go once a week in the winter). I buy the cold bottles in a 4-pack for when I get a bad craving.
I do tons of other little things to cut our expenses and to stretch our dollars, but I do it so that we can fully enjoy the things we all love. I only shop sales for clothes (mostly online and with an additional promo code in hand) and school supplies (and stock up on "essentials" during annual sales) and use coupons for almost everything we buy. I shop Craigslist and ebay first when I "need" something specific.
Kroger has a gift card promo now... buy a gift card in a certain amount, get an extra 10% loaded on it. Since I mainly shop "loss leaders", sales and items with coupons and farmer's markets, we save significantly. As the gift cards never expire, it's a great deal.
I still can not get over how much typical middle class people will spend on things and not bat an eyeball.
Have you noticed how almost everyone at the Movie Theatre needs to each get a huge large popcorn and 32 oz drink along with their $11 ticket?
People spend $9.00 for a single beer at the football game
I have friends who go to a coffee bar and spend $7.00 for a fancy Coffee in the morning and in the evening also.
Others go out to lunch and spend $30 at simple places like Ruby Tuesday.
What happened to the middle class lifestyle?
I wonder about the same things myself and we have a lot of savings, a couple of houses and no mortgage and still don't spent money on all that stuff. But everybody is different and I don't know how much debt they have and I know I don't have any debt and feel very good about it.
Long ago friends (good jobs and grrat salary) of my told me that when they go some place they only order what they can't take from home...For example bying coffee or hot chocolate or a frappoccino and bringing a can of coke...since that saves a lot of money and it made sense to me. But I will never pay $ 4.- for a cup of coffee and complain about $ 4.- for a gallon of gas....how much would that be for a gallon of coffee!!!
The prices on things got shielded from concern because people thought only of how much a month they had to outlay in credit card payments. I think the bravado of conspicuous consumption is being re-evaluated as a Madison Avenue ploy all along.
BINGO!!! I think it will be a BIG problem about December. Cards maxed-out, can not get new ones. Then spending drops big time, no Christmas rush. Stores start to close, more jobs gone.
All because most just could not live within their means.
BINGO!!! I think it will be a BIG problem about December. Cards maxed-out, can not get new ones. Then spending drops big time, no Christmas rush. Stores start to close, more jobs gone.
All because most just could not live within their means.
Just yesterday, I beheld a lovely sight: Two separate credit card statements in my mail box. Both had Zero balances.
With the use of a credit card to make the payment, the cost becomes abstract - this was the idea behind the Diners Club Card. I pay with cash for most items as you are limited to the amount in your wallet not your credit limit.
About a month ago I made a purchase at a large home center and tried to pay with cash and was told that cash was not accepted at this register. As I did not want to wait in another line, I used my credit card. I went back to make another purchase at the same store and used the "cash" register line to check out and was told that no one pays with cash and they did not have much change. I was able to count out the correct amount and left.
The point? No one uses cash anymore because it limits your purchase to your cash on hand. It has reached the point to where even the large stores are not afraid of alienating the cash customer because he represents such a small percentage of total sales.
The point? No one uses cash anymore because it limits your purchase to your cash on hand. It has reached the point to where even the large stores are not afraid of alienating the cash customer because he represents such a small percentage of total sales.
That's a great point you make. I think a read an article somewhere this past year that said credit sales surprised cash sales for the first time in '07. Something like that anyway.
Absolutely amazing!
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