Lazy Man and Money

Lessons Learned From Spending $1000+ on Prime Day

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Amazon Prime Day

I always plan any big purchases months and months in advance. I simply shut down when it comes to spending money spontaneously. That’s one of my secrets to my frugality. Spending money can often cause me incredible mental stress. (Yep, I’m not mornal.)

Before Amazon Prime Day, I had resigned myself to take advantage of one deal. I think the Amazon Fire HD 10 is a great deal and I feel that my kids need to have their own space and apps. Remember when everyone loved the $99 HP Touchpad fire sale years and years ago. This is a 10″ full HD tablet for about the same price. By buying two at the same time, it was $90 each.

My planned spending of $180 turned into $1000+. What happened?

Amazon’s ability to sell is amazing… like nothing I’ve ever seen. At the same time, I feel like I worked the system well.

What do you think? Here’s a table of what I bought along with the prices I paid and my best assessment of what the item should cost.

Product NameRetail PriceTypical PricePrice Paid 
USB Micro Cable (5)$7.99$7.99$6.39
USB Type C Cables (3)$8.99$8.99$7.99
IQ Screen Protector (S10)$9.95$9.95$9.95
MKOAWA Clear Cover S10$5.49$5.49$4.39
Samsung S10$900.00$800.00$599.00
Aukey 6-Port USB Charger QC 3.0$33.00$33.00$18.69
Finish Dishwasher Detergent$14.36$14.36$10.75
Kindle Paperwhite 6”$130.00$130.00$63.75
Two Fire 10 HD Tablets$300.00$300.00$180.00
Fire 10 HD Case (ESR Brand)$18.99$18.99$8.55
Fire 10 HD Case (ESR Brand)$18.99$18.99$8.55
Anker 10w Qi Wireless Charger$15.99$15.99$9.67
Pokemon: Let’s Go Eevee$60.00$50.00$30.00
Bose QuietComfort 25$280.00$178.00$89.00
Echo Show 5$90.00$90.00$22.50
Amazon Smart Plug$25.00$25.00$5.00
Fire TV Stick + Echo Dot 3rd Gen$65.00$65.00$12.00
$25 + $5 Amazon Gift Card$30.00$30.00$25.00
Citi Payment Promo $25 off of $75$0.00$0.00-$25.00
Sub-Total$2,013.75$1,801.75$1,086.18
Total (after Prime Card 6% savings)$2,013.75$1,801.75$1,021.0149.30%

The quickest takeaway is that I bought around $2000 “worth” of products for a little over $1000… a savings of nearly 50%. “Worth” needs to be quotes because one could argue that the products aren’t worth what they typically sell for. I’m not sure I buy that argument, but you can buy Amazon products at a discount a few times a year. So maybe that should be the “typical” price? Also, what something is “worth” to me may be different than what it is worth to you.

Let’s break down some of the big items on the list. (We’ll be jumping around a bit)

Buying a New Flagship Phone

I love cheap phones. You can do so much with so little. I still remember how amazing it was to put a modem into a Handspring Visor so that I could get “web-clipped” scores of baseball games. Most phones nowadays do all the same things, but like cars, some do it with a little more luxury. I’m so frugal that this never sunk in.

My wife suggested that I spend more because I tend to put a lot of stress on my phones. I have 4 different email accounts to consolidate. I have different profiles (personal vs. business) to keep separate. It’s not just blogging, but also dog sitting and the freelance work I do. I debated between a LG G8 for $500 or a Samsung S10 for $600 almost forever. I finally pulled the trigger on the Samsung S10.

I don’t think a Samsung S10 review is useful here, so I’ll just say that I went from a very above average phone in 2015 to one of the best phones in 2019. It’s a quantum upgrade. I’d probably say the same thing about the LG G8, though.

Some suggested that I amortize the value of the phone over a number of years. That’s how I always think of phones, because they last me for a few years. Also my old Moto X Pure sells for around $100 on Ebay. So that’s like spending $500 instead of $600, right?

There were other purchases related to this one. I bought a case ($4.39!) that is great. I wasted $10 on a screen protector (IQ Screen Protector) when the S10 comes with one preinstalled (no one told me that). Perhaps I should send that back?

Besides the case and the screen protector, I also spent $8 on (3) USB Type C cables. I would have needed to upgrade at some point. The phone moved that along. The $9.67 Anker 10w Qi charger is top-rated from all the experts, so saving $6 on the Prime Day deal seemed like a win. I have a couple Qi chargers from my old Nexus 5. They aren’t 10w and would charge slower than the Anker one. I’ve put one of those Nexus ones on my bedside stand, because there’s no rush while I’m charging overnight.

Kids Learning Tablets

Did you see how I stuck the word “learning” in there? I’m okay with the kids having fun with their tablets, but I’ve steered them towards ABC Mouse, Duolingo, and Chess Kid. So far it has worked out well. For $180, both of them will finally have their own tablet and I’ll have mine. That’s helpful because signing in and out of Duolingo profiles is tough. They could work together, but that has lead to fights. This way they can go at their own pace on things.

Along with the tablets, I bought two cases for around $17. Normally they would have been $38, so I’m happy with that.

Kindle Paperwhite

I haven’t had an e-ink Kindle in a long time. I was curious to see how the technology advanced. With the Amazon Prime Credit card offering 25% cash back, the $85 Prime Day sale price became effectively $63.75. It’s small, but it’s waterproof, which is especially nice since we live near the beach.

I’ve played with the Paperwhite a little bit, but I’m not very impressed. I wonder if I can sell it extremely lightly used for $90+ which is more than the Prime Day price, but cheaper than you can get it now.

Pokemon Go! Let’s Go Eevee

The kids really want a Nintendo Switch, so it will be coming soon. We know they want it just to play Pokemon games. This is a rare 50% discount on a popular game.

Echo Show 5

There was a deal that if you send in an old echo device you get 25% off a new one. The Echo Show retails at $90, so I traded a second generation Echo Dot for $5 and $22.50 in credit. The Echo Show 5 was at a sale price of $50, making it $27.50 after the 25% coupon, and $22.50 after applying the $5 from the trade-in.

The Echo Show is a nice upgrade for the bedroom. It may sound crazy, but it’s good to have more clocks around the house. I was able to move our old alarm clock to the kids’ room. They can use a clock because they are still working on getting ready on time for things.

Bose QuietComfort 25

This $280 retail device was lowered to $99 on a lightning deal. I saw a deal for $10 of credit when ordering $100+ through an app. The $4 phone case up above was perfect for putting me over the top. For simplicity, I applied the $10 to the final price on this.

The reviews of this weren’t very good, but I thought it was one of Bose’s marquee products. I know that everyone is on the new Bluetooth version, but there weren’t discounts on that one.

Amazon Smart Plug

Normally $25, this was $5 if you ordered it through Alexa. I already have one smart plug and I don’t know what I’d do with another. They seem to sell for $20 on Ebay, I figure this is like a free $15.

Fire TV Stick + Echo Dot 3rd Gen

This was an extremely popular deal that didn’t last long. It’s pretty amazing to get both for $12. The Fire TV stick with voice remote will go on Ebay, where it should get $30 or more. So Amazon is likely going to pay me $18 to take a 3rd generation Echo Dot. That made it easier to the trade for the Echo Show 5 above.

Selling Other Stuff

I should be able to sell my cell phone and an old tablet (replaced by the Fire 10 HD) for a little less than $200. By selling the smart plug and the Fire TV stick, it should all add up to at least $225. Does that count as bringing my cost down to around $800?

Lessons Learned from Amazon Prime Day

1. A lot of things that I found were from watching deal sites. If you are in a tight money situation, it’s best to avoid these sites. I’m okay with spending money as along as it makes sense to do so (brings me good value).

2. Most of the items I bought qualified as bringing good value. The others were simply mistakes (the screen protector that I didn’t know I didn’t need) or items that can actually generate a profit through resale. There’s some questionable value with the Amazon Show. I have to figure out what cool things I can do with the screen (any tips? Leave them in the comments).

3. It can be helpful to batch tech purchases to the nearest “Super Sale” date. That can be Black Friday/Cyber Monday, but I think Prime Day counts now. Even if you are not an Amazon Prime member, a lot of other stores joined in the party.

4. I probably wouldn’t have nearly as much if I hadn’t been doing so well with the dog sitting this month. In some ways, it feels like Amazon might as well be in the dog sitting business and I’m just a useless middleman. There’s certainly a feeling of lifestyle inflation going on.

The Best Prime Day Android Phone Deals

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Yesterday, I wrote about a number of Prime Day deals, many of them are still running today (7/16). However, today I’d like to focus on just the Android deals as I researched exactly what upgrade was right for me.

One of the biggest problems was that there were so many deals and so many choices. With everything 30-40% off, these are the cheapest these phones have been – perhaps by $200 or more in some cases.

Since I don’t know you, I can’t really say which is the right phone for you. However, there’s a phone at almost any budget, so if you are a Prime member with an old Android phone it’s probably the best time to upgrade.

The best phones have gone up in price, but the cheaper phones above have gotten more and more capable at low prices. The bargain hunter in me wants to go with a cheap phone, because I’m a no-frills kind of guy. That’s one of the things that helps me b so frugal. However, since so many use their phones so often it makes sense to spend more for a better experience.

Without further ado…

The Best Prime Day Android Phone Deals

Starter Android Phone – Moto G6 ($110 – save $130)

If I were buying a first phone for my kids or maybe a senior citizen. My wife does so well with the previous generation of this phone (that she paid over $220 for) that she doesn’t feel the need to upgrade. So certainly this phone is useful for the Average Jane as well.

I compared my current phone’s processor, a 2015 Moto X Pure and found it to be about the same as the Moto G6. My phone also has almost the same 3GB of RAM as this G6. Of course, I’m looking to upgrade my phone, but certainly $110 phone can do a lot.

Best Overall Deal – Moto G7 ($200 – save $90)

The Moto G7 is probably the phone I should get. It is a faster processor and has 4GB of RAM. It’s essentially what you’d expect from a phone that’s a generation newer. It would be a noticeable upgrade for me. The camera won’t win any Instagram awards, but I think smartphone cameras have been amazing for years. Of course, I remember digital cameras that took floppy disks.

Best High-End Deal – LG V35 ThinQ ($400 – save $500)

This was going to be the Samsung S9 at $350, but it appears to be sold out. It may come back in stock, so give that link a check. Update: It’s back in stock! Last year’s $800-ish flagship phone at a $350 is often a good deal. You can still get a S9+ for around $450, but I feel that’s a different price point than what I wanted for this.

Instead, we’ll go with the LG V35 for $400. It has last year’s fastest processor (SnapDragon 845) and plenty of RAM (6 GB+). CNET’s review calls it a “worthy Galaxy S9 Plus competitor doesn’t quite get there”. That’s appropriate, because the price is slotted right between the expired S9 and the still available S9+.

Best Gaming Phone – Razer Phone 2

It has the best processor that was available last year and 8GB of RAM, but the display is what sets this apart. With a 120Hz refresh rate, it’s supposed to be the best for fast-pace gaming. I only catch Pokemon and match gems, so this phone isn’t for me.

Best Flagship Prime Day Android Phone – Samsung S10 ($600) or LG G8 ($500)

I’m against spending $1000 a phone/mobile computer. (I want to stress the mobile computer part, because few people judge devices based on their ability to make phone calls.) Fortunately, this is a relatively recent phenomenon. You got my attention if it’s possible to a phone that’s nearly a thousand dollar value for $500-$600. That’s what Prime Day has.

I put two phones as winners because they are almost the same phones. Both have the best processor available, abundant memory (6GB or more), superb cameras, and extras like wireless charging and water proofing. The LG has some military-grade shock protection and Qualcomm’s QC 3.0. The Samsung S10 has a third camera, 8GM of RAM, and can charge other devices wirelessly.

In a lot of ways you could flip a coin between the two. However, review after review favored the Samsung S10. The LG G8 just wasn’t reviewed as much and most of the reviews said it was a great phone, but the gimmicky extras didn’t add much. Also most of the phones were looking at it as a $850 phone instead of a $500 phone. I tossed and turned for quite a long time on which phone I should go for.

This video comparison of the two phones helped:

Finally, I felt that the Samsung S10 would retain its resale or trade-in value better. In a few years, I should be able to still sell it for something and use that money to upgrade to the S13 (or whatever it is called then.) While writing this up and seeing that the S9 was sold out, I jumped on the S10 before it sold out too.

Prime Day: What I’m Buying

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Since I’m likely to be updating this article throughout the day, if you are reading this in your email, you might want to click on the live web version with the updates. The deals in this article apply to Amazon Prime members.

Amazon Prime Day

There are going to be approximately 1.34 billion articles written about Amazon Prime Day (today). One reason is that there really are some great deals. Another reason is that Amazon pays a referral fee, so writing about it can make a writer a few dollars if you decide to buy. (It doesn’t get more full disclosure than that, does it?)

I’m usually not one for the hype, but I’ve had my eye on some things for awhile. If I’m going to buy something anyway, I might as well take advantage of a sale, right?

What I’m Buying on Amazon Prime Day

A Gift Certificate to Myself

Amazon is offering a free $5 in promotional credit when you buy a $25 gift certificate. This deal probably won’t last long since it is essentially a free $5.

Let’s Go Eevee for the Nintendo Switch

I don’t have a Switch, but the kids love Pokemon and a Switch is likely in the mix for Christmas. They’ll need a game and Let’s Go Eevee is $30 – a 50% savings.

Upgrading an Echo Dot (2nd generation) to the new Echo Show 5 for under $25

The Echo Show 5 is Amazon’s latest attempt to perfect the Alexa alarm clock. It has a 5″ screen for video and better audio than a normal Echo Dot. Normally it is $90, but for Prime Day it’s on sale for $50. However, when you trade in another Echo device (such as the 2nd generation Echo Dot that I have lying around), you get 25% off a future Echo device. Amazon does that off the top, so it’s a $22.50 promotional credit. You also get $5 for the Echo Dot itself, but the real value is that promotional credit.

You have to take a little leap of faith in trading in the device for the promotional credit, but a number of people on Slickdeals, including myself, are making it work without a problem.

The math looks like:
$90 – original price
-$40 – Prime Day discount
-$22.50 – the 25% promo for the trade-in
-$5 – Credit for the 2nd generation Echo Dot
Total = $22.50

Sold Out A FireTV and Echo Dot for $12

Normally this bundle would cost you $75 or so, but it’s just $12 (probably a pricing mistake) with a discount that appears at checkout. Click here to buy. It will sell out quickly, so just buy if at all interested.

I think one could easily resell them on Ebay in a few weeks to make $30 or so.

Amazon Fire HD 10

I’ve long said, You Should Consider Buying an Amazon Fire HD 10, because when it’s $100 (the lowest it usually ever gets), it is the best computing bargain around. Even at full price it is a very good value. It’s almost impossible to find a 10″ full high-definition tablet for under $200. Of course one of the reasons why it is so cheap is so that Amazon can sell you stuff.

On Prime Day, the Fire HD 10 will be back to it’s lowest price of $100 (buy it now at that price. However, you can also buy 2 for $180 or $90 each (just add them to the cart). That’s the deal that I’m looking at. With two kids, our tablet is getting a lot of use. The kids tend to want to play at the same time (monkey see, monkey do). That means someone is stuck with our 5-year old Nexus 7. That was a good enough tablet for the time, but it’s noticeably slow nowadays. It seem like people on Ebay on are still willing to pay $75 for it, so to get half our money back (and nearly the price of a bigger, newer Kindle Fire) after all this time is a big win.

Some could (correctly) argue that the Fire HD 10 is nearly 2 years old and that it runs an even older version of Android. I’m sure that Amazon will update it a couple of months after I buy these. It seems like technology is always like that.

While I’m worried about the kids getting glued to the tablet too much, I feel it is somewhat inevitable. At least so far, they’ve been using our existing tablet for learning apps like ScratchJr, DuoLingo, and ABC Mouse. You’d think that maybe one tablet would be best so that they’d each have one. However, I’ve been customizing ours with the Google Play Store and I’m looking forward to having my own set of apps like Gmail and WordPress.

I’ll be shopping with my Amazon Prime card for another 6% back.

A New Cell Phone

My Moto X Pure is old 2015 technology and getting really slow. So slow that even my wife says that I shouldn’t “cheap out” and get something really good. I think the most I should spend on a cell phone is around $300.

It looks like there are going to be some deals on Pixels and Nokias, but from what I’ve seen it’s nothing too amazing. Since I’m writing this before the deals go live, I’m speculating on news leaks, but I think the sources are trustworthy. I’m not sure if I want to pull the trigger on a Pixel 3, when the Pixel 4 will be released in a couple of months – making the Pixel 3 likely much cheaper.

If I find a cell phone that’s worth pulling the trigger on, I’ll update this article.

Update:

Now that the smart phone deals are out, I’m more impressed than I thought I’d be. There are some excellent Samsung, Motorola, and this very tempting top of the line LG G8. I didn’t think I wanted a LG phone and $500 is more than I wanted to spend, but in the world of $1000 flagships, a $500 one seems like a good deal. I am heavily leaning towards this phone due to the latest SnapDragon 855 chipset and 6GB of RAM. It should future-proof me for a few years.

The Samsung S9 and S10 are both on sale. The S9 is $349 while the the S10 is $599. One could make the argument that I should spend another $100 to get the S10, but the LG G8 seems to be close to the same quality from all the reviews I’ve read.

A Moto G7 for $199 is extremely tempting too. The G7 would be an upgrade in every way, at $100 under my budget.

It looks like there’s a very good phone for almost any budget… $200 (Moto G7, $350 (Samsung S9), $500 (LG G8), $600 (Samsung S10).

What would you choose?

Something Else?

I’ll be going through my wishlist (which mostly includes STEM games for my kids) to see if there are any big bargains. If I find anything that’s particularly good, I’ll update this article. If you are reading this in the morning, you might want to give it a refresh in the evening.

One thing that I’m considering is waterproof Paperwhite for $85. It’s perfect for the lazy river at the Aruba Marriott and lowest price it has ever been. I just get the feeling that my wife would get more use out of it than I would. I’m a slow reader and don’t have a couple of months to read a book. I’ll probably jump on this as well since there is a 25% cash back when using an Amazon’s Prime Credit Card. For around $60, it seems worth the plunge.

Coffee Talk: A Big (Personal Finance) Whoop

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Last week, while on vacation at the beach, I looked through my Twitter. (I’m the worst.) This lead to an interesting short conversation with my wife:

Wife: Anything interesting?
Me: People are upset about coffee spending.
Wife: Didn’t they address that like 20 years ago?
Me: Yep.

In fact, almost 5 years ago, I was late to the game with an article covering the costs of Brewing Coffee at Home vs. Buying at a Coffee Shop. It’s very detailed with a cost average of 3 coffee shops (Starbucks, Dunkin’ Donuts*, and McDonalds).

Million Dollar Coffee Talk

I followed that article up with a cost analysis of Single-Serve Coffee (K-Cups) at Home.

Then I combined both articles into an analysis of how much your coffee is costing you. I used an awesome latte factor calculator and realized that it could cost me 1/3 of a million dollars if I spend the coffee shop average of $1.75 each day for the rest of my (expected) life. Perhaps the most important thing I did was give you the tools to calculate your coffee costs yourself.

(Interestingly all this was inspired by a Vanguard article and video that seems to have been pulled mentioned in my first article. Maybe it was pulled because of this coffee spending “controversy.”)

One of the best quotes came from the comments that last article:

Seriously. People no longer want to talk about the coffee factor or want to talk about it only as a metaphor. But seriously, a quarter of a million dollars is as real as it gets

However, it’s 2019 so here we are… arguing about coffee spending.

It’s possible you missed the latest round of arguments. If so, let me catch you up.

Coffee is “Peeing $1 Million down the Drain”

CNBC quoted Suze Orman saying this:

There’s (at least) five things going on here that we need to unpack.

  1. People are protective about their coffee.
  2. CNBC and Suze are marketing a clickbait phrase to get attention. Who wants $1 million dollars?!?! Just stop peeing it away!
  3. There’s a whole Suze Orman scam movie that includes her debit card scam and a bunch of other stuff. She has a lot of good information, but in my opinion, every media appearance should be prefaced with the equivalent of the Surgeon General’s cigarette warning.
  4. There’s some shoddy assumptions made to get to the clickbait $1 million dollar number.
  5. People are upset about something bigger
  6. The idea has real merit, hence my article above covering it.

Let’s take them in order.

1. People Protect Their Coffee

Coffee, with its caffeine, is arguable is arguably an addictive substance. There’s any number of marketing t-shirts and mugs etc. that are about pitching coffee as the most important thing.

I don’t need to waste any more words on this except to point out that I don’t have a horse in this race. I decided that coffee wasn’t for me and substituted a Diet Coke addiction instead. While that clearly backfired, it allows me to talk about coffee unbiased, the same way most people talk about cantaloupe.

You could substitute ice cream. A couple of scoops in a cone will run you $3-4, which is far less than the home price. And, of course, ice cream is objectively better ;-).

If we substituted saving $100 a month by cutting cable television, there’s almost no controversy.

2. Media and Clickbait

We find ourselves in a world of clicks. Even this website makes money from your clicks. Science shows the best way to get those clicks is with outrageous, shocking claims. I could try to make more money with those claims, but I’m hoping over the long run, you’ll trust the value of the content itself, and reject sources that use clickbait techniques.

3. Suze Orman’s Scams

I’ll let the above YouTube video that I linked to stand on it’s own. I don’t need Suze sending her lawyers after me for my opinion.

4. Million Dollar Coffee Math

Suze Orman assumes spending $3.33 ($100 a month) on coffee, where my math said the average is about half that ($1.75). Sure it can get to $3 or $4 with some types of coffee in some areas. As someone who doesn’t drink coffee, I can only go by the numbers I found and cited. I can give Orman a bit of a pass on this because I chose to use plain coffee.

Let’s keep in mind that this $3.33 coffee is paying someone else to make the coffee and the overhead with all that. It’s not just for the coffee, just like the ice cream isn’t only about the ice cream above.

Suze Orman also assumes that you are going to invest the money (not 100% guaranteed) and that you’ll make 12% return over 40 years (so unlikely, that I’d say it borders virtually impossible).

It’s been challenged by MarketWatch who gives you the real math of coffee and your retirement. This is very similar analysis to what I did in my articles listed at top of this one. A coffee habit can be as little as $20,000 over a long lifetime.

(If that seems like a lot, stick around and we’ll get to cheaper ways for you to get your caffeine fix.)

5. People Are Really Upset About Something Bigger

Personal finance has changed a lot in the 13 years I’ve been blogging. Around 2006, there wasn’t nearly as much attention on health care and college costs. Those have really started to spiral out of control. It makes sense for people to be upset about these things. I’m with you. Let’s fix healthcare. College is too expensive.

These systemetic problems, and others (stagnant wages for example), are certainly worth having conversations about. Those conversations are happening as they seem to be at the center at every political debate.

Those problems have become part of this million dollar coffee (or avocado toast) conversation. There’s certainly a lot of logic behind being upset that you can’t enjoy coffee because of a systemic problem that you had no control over.

However, my opinion is that these problems give you more reason to be mindful over the spending you can control. I think it’s a mistake to wrap up all the world’s financial problems and expect coffee spending to be hero. That doesn’t mean it can’t be part of the fix.

6. Small Habits Compound Exponentially Over Time

A lot of the time, coffee is brought up as an example or a metaphor of small daily expendatures. This has real merit.

A far less controversial topic is bringing your lunch to work each day. There’s no sane reason why it’s less controversial other than it doesn’t involve sacred coffee. The math can often add up to even more money.

I don’t think anyone is suggesting that you can never buy your lunch or coffee. I think the message is that you should look at these small, everyday money leaks as well. It doesn’t have to be a million dollars to add up to something significant.

If I was a real marketer, I’d combine the lunch and coffee spending to be $12 a day and tell you that it ends up being 4.2 million dollars using the same poor assumptions (investing 12% over 40 years). However, even at 7% over 30 years it still comes to $445,000. At 5% over 20 years, it is $150,000. That’s still a lot of money, right?

Above, I had mentioned that I had a Diet Coke addiction. At a dollar for 2-liters it isn’t exactly breaking the bank. I do drink more than I should, so it does add up. (The health costs will probably be the big thing, but let’s put that aside for now.) I’ve started to look into things like saving money with Sodastream (using much cheaper flavorings). At a cost of just a few cents per 2-liter, it might save only a dollar a day.

Unfortunately, one thing missing from Sodastream is the caffeine. However, caffeine can be extraordinarily cheap, adding as little as a couple of pennies to the overall cost.

Final Thoughts on Coffee Spending

It seems that coffee spending combines so many separate issues that it’s extremely difficult to discuss. Some of the big things like marketing, scammers, big systemic aren’t going away soon.

I can’t tell you how to spend your money, but I will suggest that you think about it. Weigh what’s important to you. Use the metaphor to explore the math. Use the math to live your best life…

… and definitely do NOT buy that coffee ;-).

* Dunkin’ Donuts, don’t give me that crap that you changed your name.

Five Causes of Overspending

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We’re still in the summer hole where the kids are out of school, but camp hasn’t started. My wife is still working and finishing up the finals on her last class in her pharmaceutical regulation MBA*. She’s spending dozens of hours running a raffle fundraiser for the state’s pharmacists**.

For the last couple of days, it has just been me and the boys. The good news is that we’ve been able to spend some real quality time together. We’ve gone to the beach. We started a pizza company.

One thing that I haven’t done? Thinking or writing about money (other than our virtual pizza customers). That’s a good thing, like the next evolution of money is not worrying about it much.

Today, I wanted to dig into old notes that I had from a online chat with a friend. Again, since I haven’t thought about this much, it may be best to get the ball rolling and have a community effort filling more ideas in the comments.

Because the conversation with the friend was so long ago, I don’t remember the background or context, and my notes are shoddy to say the least. The gyst of the conversation was that there are five reasons why people overspend. (There may be more, but these are the ones that we identified.)

1. Keeping up with the Jones

My friend is excellent at reigning in his spending on “stuff.” I’m just very good. I have a weakness for children’s STEM toys (as you can tell from above). I don’t feel the need to have the biggest house or nicest car. In fact, with the amount of dogs, kids, and beach my car goes through, it’s not worth having a nice car.

Personally, this can be a bit of a trap because our kids go to a private school where most of the people are wealthy. The average “Jones” there has a lot of money to flaunt.

2. Advertising

Robert Palmer sang it best, “you like to think that you’re immune to the stuff, oh yeah.” Yes, I do like to think that advertising doesn’t effect me. I’m pretty analytical with my purchases and planning. However, it would be foolish for me to pretend that I am immune to it.

3. YOLO Mentality

I used to laugh at the Yolo Only Live Once (YOLO) Mentality. It can almost be literally used to justify any action. At the same time, there’s a kernel of truth to that idea.

In fact, in the past we used to say, “You can’t take it with you”, meaning that money isn’t going to do you a lot of good when you die. I personally have a lot of trouble of with this balance. I almost always go with the option that involves not spending money. However, there are a few times when I missed out some really great experiences. For example, Weezer went on a short tour playing only stuff from the blue album and Pinkerton (my favorites) and I cheaped out.

4. Self-Licensing

Self-Licensing is a little like the YOLO mentality above. However, in this case you aren’t spending because “you only live once.” Instead, you are spending because “you deserve it.” For example, you might impress the boss with a great presentation, to celebrate you go out and spend $50 in drinks at a bar.

I’ve been doing a little self-licensing myself lately. When I get through a tough day and it more or less went okay, I’ve been having a Chipwich knock-off ice cream sandwich from Aldi. It’s not very expensive (about $0.75 each), but it isn’t healthy at over 300 calories.

5. Convenience

Spending for convenience may be one of the reasons we can relate to most. Have a tough day and don’t want to make dinner? There’s a Chipotle app for that. Don’t feel like making your own coffee in the morning? There’s a place for that as well.

My big convenience spending comes in home maintenance. I don’t like to do yard work and I’m not very handy with a lot of other stuff. Fortunately, I find it relatively convenient to make some slow cooker meals that can save us from going to restaurants.

Final Thoughts

What are your overspending urges? Can you find any new categories that I missed? Let me know in the comments.

* I think it’s notable that we’ve made healthcare so complicated in the US, that pharmacists like my wife are pushed to get an advanced degree on what seems to amount to man-made political problems. This isn’t my area of expertise and maybe all other countries have this issue.

** You’d think that selling raffle tickets wouldn’t be time consuming. Coordinating the paper trail of people selling (and losing) paper tickets is a mess. I thought that an online system would be easier, but it currently goes against Rhode Island law.

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