Once you have a budget set and you start building up some disposable income, you need to figure out how you’re going to use that money. Sometimes the perception of money management is that you’re on the far end of two spectra. You either live ultra-frugally and conservatively eating cheap canned foods and wearing thrift shop clothes, or you spend lavishly and enjoy all the finer things in life. While there may be a few times when frugality is needed, you don’t have to be like that or be a spendthrift. You can have a little fun too — as long as you think about which things you spend money on also have some lasting value.
Buy Car Mechanic And Household Tools
Acquiring quality tools whether they’re for use on a vehicle or for doing some home handyman work are always a good investment. Many of them that were used 20 years ago are still used today, and if you learn how to use them you might save yourself quite a bit of money later by avoiding calling the repairman. No, you don’t have to buy up the full steel cabinet of tools right away, but acquiring them over time can be a great way to be ready for when you need to use them. Of course, there may be times where you may have an appliance break down that requires an unexpected emergency repair, like a broken furnace. In these cases, you may need to seek professional repair services which can be costly. If you need to pay for an unexpected emergency repair but are short on savings, you might want to research short-term funding options like securing a line of credit online.
Avoid Expensive Cosmetics Brands
While looking good is certainly important for many people, the bank should not be broken on products like shampoo, skin moisturizer, makeup, or expensive razors. Most cheap drug store or retailer alternatives can actually be just as effective, and you might be surprised at how easy it could be to create your own substitutes for some of these products. Besides, imagine how much you might save for when you need to buy important medications later or visit a health clinic.
Avoid High Cost Daycare
If you’re a parent and both you and your spouse work full-time, the costs of sending your children to daycare centers can really be tough on your budget. Depending on your local area, you may have more than one option for it. For example, sometimes churches run daycare programs that while still costing some money will usually be much cheaper than for-profit centers. And if not them, there are sometimes daycare homes that are cheaper still and have a little more flexibility sometimes.
Stop Eating Fast Food
Yes, fast food restaurants can be fun to go to sometimes, and sometimes you get these cravings for that burger or burrito that you just need to have. But getting addicted to fast food can also become expensive quickly, so you probably are better off resisting the temptation to go eat at one. By saving on fast food and making much cheaper meals at home, you can eat healthier, save more money and perhaps save money for a special occasion when you want to take your family or that special someone out to a good quality restaurant. When you do this, eating out can become a very special treat.
In conclusion, there are so many fun but short-lived things we think about buying every day from snazzy looking sunglasses, to those movie theater tickets, music CDs and so many other things that we don’t think about how quickly we’ll move on from. But by avoiding those things, we might be able to spend on things like that new piece of furniture for the living room, or maybe a vacation to that dream destination. Just remember, a little sacrifice in the short-term can mean fun in the long-term.
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Tools! Good tools, quality tools, and the ability to use them will save a lot of money and save you waiting around for someone to show up and use their tools! Luckily we’re in the golden era of used tools. People used to know how to do things and how to fix things! They all had tools! The men of the Depression Era HAD to know how to fell trees, pour cement, lay block, build, wire, weld, repair, paint, garden and work on cars. Their sons who went off to WWII certainly knew how to use tools, they learned from their fathers and they learned in the service. The sons of the WWII men learned from their fathers and in the Army during the Vietnam War. Family’s bought tools and inherited tools. Now the houses of the WWII and Vietnam era folks are being sold and emptied. Those collections of tools are going begging because it’s not fashionable to fix things. Want great hand tools (some of which can be sold to collectors for a tidy sum as a side business) for woodworking, black
smithing, carpentry, masonry, gardening, car repair? Need a good quality router, table saw, planer? Head off to yard and estate sales before you hit Harbor Freight for cheap Chinese tools which don’t last, destroy the environment in their creation and wreck America’s balance of trade. You can learn to use tools via YouTube or if you have a handy neighbor who knows construction, auto repair, gardening. Right now there’s still a lot of old guys around who no longer are physically able to use their tools and they might give or sell you some tools cheap and teach you how to use them. I’m not sexist. Women can use tools too! As a woman who found a round squirrel hole in our peaked wood shake roof in the middle of an ice storm with sleet pouring into the light fixture below the hole, I was perfectly capable on my own of opening a can of pineapple chunks at both ends, dumping the pineapple into a bowl, using tin snips to open the can and a hammer to flatten it. I then dragged an extension ladder to the house, extended it, climbed up and hammered my home made patch over the hole. WITHOUT TOOLS AND THE KNOWLEDGE OF HOW TO USE THEM I’D HAVE BEEN BAILING AND MOPPING FOR TWO DAYS BEFORE I COULD GET ANYONE TO PATCH THAT HOLE. Tools and the ability to use them are handy!