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Look into T- mobile: you can have $3 per month contribution and pay as you go $0.10 per min for each incoming and outgoing minute.
If you don’t use any minutes- they are gone: once you put $10 - it is good for 3 month, and I think they will keep your number for additional 90 days without any money- if you don’t pay at the end of 90 day period after your money expired- you lose you number.
Technically it is less than $3 per month counting 90 day courtesy period.
I learned that from volunteers at shelters.
It's not worth the trouble of changing carriers to save $4 per month.
If I don't use my Tracfone minutes they just sit there forever, as long as I keep paying the $7/month for the "Service Protection Plan." I use about 5 minutes a year.
I make free calls and texts online via Skype and Google voice.
You missed the point. Those are NOT things that poor people would even dream of doing. But you are definitely my kind of well-off person.
I did and still do, many of the things I listed due to being poor.
Some were jokes, sure, I admit
I suppose poor is relative but compared to most, I am not even considered middle class to my knowledge.
At least not here in our State. We are just above the poverty line. Went hungry many times in my life
Building inspector is coming tomorrow, our future plans of self sufficiency and an under $100 a month property tax payment could be derailed bigtime. We may be so screwed and we weren't able to even sell it to break even so decided to live there illegally. We'll see what happens
I do my own manicures and pedicures. I color my own hair using 1/2 the kit at a time. I mend and alter my own clothes and darn socks, patch rips in sheets and work clothes. Drive old vehicles until they die and do our own maintenance on them. Do all our house maintenance and lawn care ourselves and upkeep on the house.
I do not buy junk I don't really need. And still...we are content!
I wouldn’t call it “poor person things”, more like ‘smart person things’, but shopping at Goodwill and other thrift stores can result in huge cost savings. We also limit eating out to 2 or 3 times a month, and none of those places are very costly. We might go someplace really nice once or twice a year...maybe. Both my wife and I are very good cooks so why pay someone so much money when we can make it ourselves for much less?
I try to repair things myself at home where I can, and when I have to call in a pro, it’s only after I have checked references.
Many of the things I read here are what responsible people do, being rich or poor is not in the equation.
My sister and law and her daughter make less combined than my wife makes in a year. I make double what my wife makes.
My sister and law and her daughter have very little. They work at jobs that pay very little. Her daughter has worked at McDonald's since High School. My SIL works in a Thrift Store. No car, very little in the way of material things.
Lifestyle.
1. Nails and Hair. They always have nice nails and hair. Some would say the nails are extravagant.
2. Eat out a lot right after pay day. Just this weekend my 13 year old daughter asked us to go to her cousins because they were going to take her out to eat with them. Caveat: By asking our daughter we felt obligated to give them a ride.
3. Fail to plan or save between checks. Usually within a few days of getting paid both are out of money and seem to spend time at our home. They know that we will invite them to stay for dinner.
4. Use the word greedy a lot when it comes to people that they know that have more than them. I seem to hear more people with less use this word more than anyone else.
We have offered to help both of them get another higher paying job. Both have said that they can't take the time off from work to look for another job, because they will lose money. No thought that they are losing money by staying in low paying jobs though.
I see poor people doing things that I would not consider doing because the cost does not seem worth it to me, and I make over $100,000 a year. For eating out, what i see as an occasional treat, many poor see as a necessity. We also watch what we do around our home. All of us including the kids, turn off things that we are not using. Lights are off when we are not in a room. Even in the living room the lights are off when the TV is on. We do have some night lights that come on in the dark. I do what I can to keep my electric bill low. Not because it is a poor thing. I don't want to spend money I don't have to spend.
A warning for all of you shopping at thrift stores and Goodwill: bring plastic bags to take clothes home. Put them in the plastic bags before they go into your car. Immediately wash and dry them on the highest heat cycle. Make sure to do this with all blankets, shoes, and other cloth items as well. Believe me, you do NOT want a bedbug infestation. You may even want to do this with clothing you get in a department store. It only takes one person with bedbugs trying on a shirt to create an infestation at a department store that may not get noticed for months.
If you are buying any kind of furniture, bring it home on a sunny day and check it over thoroughly before bringing it near your house and I do mean thoroughly. Every crack and crevice. And I wouldn't bring home any electronics unless you can take them apart and peer into their insides. Roaches and bedbugs love warm, dark places to live. Same with any games or anything in boxes.
I know thrift stores take a lot of pride in making sure their items are OK for resale, but it only takes a couple bedbugs to get past an overworked employee, and then you've got a problem.
Many articles of clothing that I see in thrift stores are from Old Navy, Walmart, or Target. The prices that they charge for them at thrift stores is often only slightly cheaper than buying them new (on sale).
We have offered to help both of them get another higher paying job. Both have said that they can't take the time off from work to look for another job, because they will lose money. No thought that they are losing money by staying in low paying jobs though.
Just to let you know, it's very possible that both people can't look for a job during regular working hours because they could be fired for calling out or taking time off work. Low paying jobs are the worst for doing that. It's also the reason many people can't work a second job, because if you're called in to cover a shift and you can't because you're working your second job, you'll get told to choose which one you want to keep. Plus, a day's wages are a day's wages. It might seem like chump change to you, but it might be the difference in paying the rent or not that month.
It might be a no-brainer that getting a better paying job is the best thing to do, but you also have to figure in clothing, commute, and the cost of getting to another job if it's further away. I know if I got a job tomorrow, I'd need to spend at least a couple hundred on shoes, clothing, and makeup. I priced shoes last night. It's unbelievable how expensive they are! If all you own is a pair of jeans and a couple T-shirts, clothing to work a nice job is going to cost.
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