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by thorwasdfasdf 2320 days ago
There's two kinds of spending: 1) Assets - these make money and make you richer 2) Liabilities - these cost money and make you poorer

I spent at least 60% or more on Assets. And keep liability spening to an absolute minimum:

- almost never ever buy new clothes

- xmas gifts - we don't play this game. we spend time with each other and make our own gifts, or buy them super cheap at yard library book sales, etc.

- always buy used cars, at least 5 years old and keep them for at least 10 or 15 years.

- absolutely no subscriptions (monthly payments) except utilities (just electricity, water, internet, cell phone, HOA, insurance). if you have more subs than fingers then you've got problems.

- minimize car maintenance (there's these big myths that doing lots of extra maintenance will make your car last longer, not necessarily true)

- no frivolous spending - I never buy stuff, unless I absolutely need it.

- rarely eat out, here in CA. eating out is way too expensive around here. and you never know what they put in it.

- never buy stuff you can get for free. why buy tea, when there's a lavendar plant in the yard? Rosemary bush yields are enormous. if you know a neighbor that has one, they'll glad you give you all the rosemary you want. etc...

1 comments

I feel like some of this begins to cross the line from frugal to cheap. Hunting down a neighbor with a rosemary bush (aside from not actually providing the prepared leaves of camellia sinensis) instead of spending a few bucks on a box of tea seems absurd--it assumes your time and effort have no value at all.

By all means, don't waste money. But before even that, don't waste your time. You can always earn more money, but you'll never earn back time.

every dollar you earn is time wasted. paying for that 5$ rosemary at the store will cost will cost you 10 minutes of work time, if you earn 30$/hr after taxes ~ 90K/year.

And, I think 10 minutes spent getting to know the neighbors or hanging out with family to pick their rosemary bush is a much better use of time than yet another 10m working.