<p>I totally agree with moonchild- it’s all about what is important to you. I guess we are pretty cheap. We drive cars that are 8 and 23 years old. Our vacations consist mostly of camping. We don’t go out to dinner more than twice a month; no Starbucks, ever. I don’t get manicures and I dye my own hair. We do splurge on cable, only because my husband loves English soccer and I figure he works hard enough to be able to watch it. We also do spend money on our kids sports. While our kids have newer computers, ours is 8 years old; a bit slow but works fine! I buy a lot of used furniture and refinish and re-upholster it myself. We do all of our own work around the house.</p>
<p>We would never have considered private high school as we made the decision to spend the money on good colleges, and didn’t want the debt. We do live in an area with some good high schools, so perhaps if that were not the case I would feel differently. We did choose to transfer our kids out of district to the next town as we felt they had a more rigorous academic program.</p>
<p>We do spend a lot of time together hiking and climbing. We have a lot of family get-togethers and do beach camping with friends. On the plus side, 2 of our kids are thru college, one with her Masters, a third is 1/2 thru, and we have one more; we have no outstanding loans of any kind except a first mortgage (the kids don’t have any either). We have a lot of equity in our house, and we have a large retirement account. One of my biggest fears would be saddling our children with expenses to care for us as we age, and with what we have saved, that is unlikely. Yes there are times I look at other families who have more and think it would be nice. Our children complained that we were cheap a lot when they were growing up. What is funny is that now our 26 year old and her husband sold one of their cars to save money. They have bought their first house (in So. Calif.- no minor feat!!!) and are maybe even cheaper than we are. Our son lives on the bare minimum so he can put money in savings. So while they did complain, our cheapness apparently rubbed off on them. Our lifestyle is definitely not for everyone and I don’t judge others who want more- I do too sometimes! But it is nice to be able to sleep at night and not worry about debt!</p>
<p>We adhere to the motto ‘live for today,but keep an eye on tomorrow’…we have friends in their mid50’s who are so focused on retirement,putting off things today for something 5-10 years from now…there is no guarantee that A) your money/investments will be greater B)you’ll be healthy enough to enjoy your frugality of years gone by…If you dismiss the 'investment pro’s belief that you’ll be sipping a Pinot noir in a winery at retirement,and realize life is indeed cheaper at retirement,you might come to enjoy life NOW…</p>
<p>BC - you need to take over my tv, internet, cell phone contracts! Tell me how you are able to do this so well? Those are the fees that bother me the most. They are continuous, they will rise, and they are taking a ridiculous chunk out of my income. We have HD cable, internet with phone company, and a family plan for our cell phones (and we all own basic cell phones). </p>
<p>I with others who may be frugal on many items but feel travel with family is worth every penny.</p>
<p>We don’t have cable tv. We have an antenna in the attic. My wife watches some TV but we rely on the internet for tv/movie entertainment.</p>
<p>Cell phones are AT&T/Verizon pay-as-you-go for $100/year or $8.33 per phone per month. Home phone and DSL is a bit over $32/month - I threatened to change carriers and this is the deal that they gave me. I have to do the negotiations again in a few months. The company is in bankruptcy or just recently came out and losing customers is not a good way to recover.</p>
<p>While it is smart to be frugal,remember every time you ‘negotiate’ a better deal,someone is likely not going to receive a salary increase,or worse,lose their job…it is a downward spiral,cut back on something,company has less revenue,cuts costs/lays off employees,those newly unemployed cut corners,spend less, which leads companies to less revenue,etc etc</p>
<p>Oh yea, forgot about our tech money wasters. We do have a family cell plan that I’m thinking to end when it is over this August. Neither H nor S can bring their phones into their offices anyway, so we may go with BCEagle’s pre-paid plan. I got one for our non-profit and am trying it out to see if it will work for all of us. H has used it for many years now. He pays about $100 every few years and $10/year to keep his minutes rolling over (he gets 1000 minutes for those $100). Our family plan is now about $100/month for the two kids & me.</p>
<p>We pay about $56/month for high speed DSL & home phone (landline). Our cable bill is about $15 (only catches the most basic stations but that’s about all we need or watch).</p>
<p>In August (when our current cell family plan contract ends), we will probably end up with just getting D her own phone with an individual plan and the rest of us pre-paid phones and see how that goes. That should be MUCH cheaper, I think. Tired of being nickeled & dimed by the cell phone companies & my kids hardly talk on any phone anyway!</p>
<p>We do buy stuff to keep upgrading our aging computers but haven’t had to pay for a new one in since we bought D one when she went away to school in Jan 2009 (when it broke, they refunded the money which we rolled over into another computer & pocketed the difference).</p>
<p>Is it really up to us to help companies keep their prices, services and value competitive? There is often “bloat” at the top, where the execs make many times the salary of the folks us ordinary folk actually deal with. We don’t get to vote or choose who gets what of the money we spend at companies–whether the underpaid guys on the bottom or perhaps overpaid guys on the top. I’d think it most likely that more goes to the top than the bottom of the food chain.</p>
<p>Oh yea, I agree that it’s totally worth it to our family to spend money on experiences–the road trip after graduation, flying to see family & close friends, a few memorable meals at great places. </p>
<p>Our kids were relieved that we told them we do not expect to need them to help us at all in retirement but couldn’t promise we could help THEM. They said they’re grateful for the education we paid for them and will just be happy not to worry about helping subsidize us. Somehow, we managed to pay for our kids’ total of 7 years at private HS, as well as all their higher education–no regrets here (other than wishing their college were a bit less expensive). ;)</p>
<p>Private HS was a great & worthwhile investment for us as it did prepare the kids very well for college and did allow them to make a very nice circle of friends, many of whom attended the same college. D says these are the friends she expects she will have for the rest of her life. Both kids really benefitted from not being self-conscious about the words they use (in public school, they became quieter & more reserved because peers and teachers would not understand their word choice due to a sophisticated vocabulary the kids used automatically). Our public schools are not nearly as academic as the privates (less than 50% attending 4-year college compared to 98%).</p>
<p>That gets us into a discussion of inflation, monetary policy, the
stability of our currency. We had a period of unsustainable borrowing
and businesses expanded to meet those unsustainable levels. The
downturn is moving us to a new normal of demand. It’s pretty easy to
argue that the costs of rapid expansion, borne by shareholders,
bondholders and consumers shouldn’t have been there in the first place.
We’re currently inflating like mad to try to counteract this but it is
unclear as to whether this will ultimately be successful.</p>
<p>If businesses didn’t expand that fast and we didn’t have as many kids
and immigrants, the jobs picture might not be so bad today.</p>
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<p>This is why I went the negotiating route. Our DSL + Phone was $44 per
month. The phone company raised it to $56 per month. That’s when I
began negotiations. They offered me $32.xx to stay and I stayed.
I’m sure that they are making money off of my account, even at this
price. I assume that they were making higher margins with the $44 price
and were looking at the $56 profits to try to dig out of bankruptcy.</p>
<p>I am not saying one shouldn’t be prudent in life’s expenses,but the people who lose in the cutbacks we may take, are the people who can afford it the least,the lower rung employees,not the fat cat at the top…</p>
<p>The current policy of ‘inflating our way out of this mess’ is a big recipe for disaster</p>
<p>No one has mentioned one of our biggest expenses - insurance! We are structural engineers, so we spend a ridiculous amount of money on professional liability insurance (in case we make a mistake and a building collapses or has other problems). We also pay for health insurance, auto insurance, life insurance, umbrella insurance, disability insurance, and renter’s insurance. It’s awful! And then, even though our health insurance premiums are over $1,000/month, it’s a high-deductible policy. We spent over $20,000 last year on insurance and out-of-pocket medical costs. I don’t see how we can keep this up much longer.</p>
<p>Whom do you negotiate with? It doesn’t seem like the phone answering folks have any authority to do anything off their script. Thanks for sharing whatever you can.</p>
<p>We tried with an antenna, but live in a valley so can’t get ANYTHING but snow without cable.</p>
<p>Insurance IS a huge issue and one of the reasons I am not sure how much our non-profit will continue if the legislature takes all the money from us non-profits to fill the gaping holes in our state budget. It costs over $4K for our small non-profit to stay insured. Didn’t even get a quote on attorney malpractice insurance but am sure it’s quite astronomical as well. Auto insurance is another must. EEEK!</p>
<p>We are glad that H has insurance becuase I’m uninsurable (except possibly under some group or work policy) with all my pre-existing health issues & our kids are only insurerable with work. Because he has a good policy, our out of pocket expenses are limited and thanks to healthcare reform, the kids are back under his policy until they turn 26. WHEW!</p>
<p>I believe it is necessary to balance enjoying the here and now vs. planning for the time when you will not have income from a job. Here’s our rule of thumb: as long as we are saving a good portion of our income (we are) and we have no other debt except for the 40% we owe on our mortgage (we don’t), the rest is ours to enjoy (and we do). </p>
<p>We spent $100,00 plus for son’s K-12 private school education and it was worth every penny. We live in a state where education at even the ‘best’ public schools is subpar. We had enough saved to comfortably send him to an expensive private college but he ended up in the honors program at our flagship and is thriving quite nicely. Because his college expenses were less than we anticipated, we plan to fund grad school as well and maybe help him with a down-payment on his first house. Maybe.</p>
<p>IMHO, it’s all about priorities. We don’t drive expensive cars (I drive a Ford) and we drive them for 10 years at a minimum but we do travel extensively because that has been important to us. Waiting until retirement to travel is a risky proposition because of health and mobility issues. Traveling in foreign countries can be strenuous and that is the reason older people often end up having to travel via tour groups or cruises. Nothing wrong with that, we’ve done both but we also enjoy traveling on our own and we wanted son to see the world before he left home.</p>
<p>I think it’s fine to spend your money anyway you want. What concerns me is when people have to take on consumer debt to maintain a certain lifestyle. If you don’t have the cash for the 42" TV, then don’t buy it. Save your money and then buy it. If you can afford to sip lattes at Starbucks every day, don’t have debt and have enough saved for retirement, then enjoy it. If not, then Starbucks is a luxury you cannot afford. It’s that simple.</p>
<p>It’s interesting to note that it wasn’t until the 70s that people started routinely buying things on credit. It was at that point that we as a society decided to buy into the concept that we ‘deserve’ to have something even though we don’t have the cash on hand to buy it. This has led to a much higher standard of living than many countries and I think this recession has shown that it was mostly house of cards that has come tumbling down on us.</p>
<p>I own a bunch of companies and I like companies that treat their
employees and customers well and also make a lot of money. More often
than not, these tend to be technology companies. Sometimes commodity
companies too.</p>
<p>That said, we live in a marketplace. At the moment, the effects of
low-wage workers in Asian countries are creating a deflationary effect
in labor costs. One could say that you should strictly buy American
if you want to be consistent in your perspective. The problem is that
this is very hard to do today.</p>
<p>I told my wife that I’m dropping the $250,000 life insurance policy
that I took out 23 years ago. I have twice as much life insurance at
work that costs far less (life expectancies have gone up quite a bit
since I took out the old policy) and we have far more in cash than
that policy.</p>
<p>We don’t have a homeowner’s policy though I’m thinking of getting one.
The last time we had one was in the early 1990s I think.</p>
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<p>The 1970s were a time of massive inflation where cash became trash
and buying things or services wasn’t a bad idea to enjoy the cash
while it had value. Today, we have low inflation where cash is dear.
This provides the motivation for savings.</p>
<p>In general, the Federal Reserve wants some inflation so that the
strong savings mentality doesn’t slow the economy to a crawl, hence
their efforts to inflate like mad.</p>
<p>Verizon and AT&T offer prepaid plans at $100/year per phone. There are many other companies that offer prepaid plans too and I think that there are several that are even cheaper. You get 400 minutes for you $100 dollars and that’s more than what we use.</p>
<p>Yea, for folks who really use few minutes, you can get 1000 minutes on Tmobile that last a year for $100, plus the price of the phone & any activation. You can roll those minutes ovre for only $10! That has been my hubby’s plan now for several years & S will soon join him & get a similar plan, I think. I may as well, depending on reception–have already moved my non-profits phone line over to that.</p>
<p>We’re pretty lucky in that none of my kids had their licenses in high school. We saved gobs of money on insurance, buying a car for their use and maintenance on that car. I did buy gas cards for her friends who would pick her up when they went to do things.</p>
<p>Our cel phone bill is $270. per month…yikes. Four phones all with data. None provided by employers as we are self employed. I won’t even talk about our insurance costs. Just changed DH’s life insurance policy because the term was up and the premium was skyrocketing. Can’t go without it for now as I can’t make enough to pay the mortgage on our property off and don’t want to lose our primary asset. When mortgage is paid off I will probably drop life insurance. Liability insurance for business, worker’s comp, health insurance, auto insurance both commercial and personal, umbrella insurance, etc.
Saved a little this year by signing an exclusion for our 22 year old adult son who does not live at home and has no vehicle. What a hassle they made me go through to do that!
I will stop ranting now as I don’t want to get political and I already went a little bit there on the “unemployed and loving it” thread.</p>
Somehow, we managed to pay for our kids’ total of 7 years at private HS, as well as all their higher education–no regrets here (other than wishing their college were a bit less expensive). ;)</p>
Didn’t even get a quote on attorney malpractice insurance but am sure it’s quite astronomical as well. Auto insurance is another must. EEEK!</p>