Gross inconsistencies concerning money (our thoughts and behaviors)

[EastWest Gal]

We keep thinking we’re spending too much money this year. But my credit card bill comes in well under what it’s been in past years. Despite buying a number of new items for yard care and booking a two week trip to the west coast, staying in several places and flying first class, we’re not spending as much.

Yet I plan shopping around specials to earn “gas points”, save paper napkins and plastic ware.

I don’t like plastic waste. I’ve switched to bar soap, bar shampoo, and will soon try bar conditioner. Been using reusable shopping bags for years. I’ll be bringing a couple in my luggage for our trip.

We’ve been decluttering this past year. In 1995, I inherited MIL’s sewing machine. In the drawers were hundreds of buttons and packages of snaps, plus a lifetime supply of thread. Yesterday I threw out all the buttons. I think in the past 25 years I’ve used 3-4! Most of them were useless anyway-decorative, not matching anything.

We’ll convert the storage box-a roly kit-to storage for hardware, which is stuff we use all the time.

 

[Out of Steam]

I still remember my Grandfather plowing the fields with Mules and straightening out nails to reuse. They lived thru the depression and both ms gamboolgals and I parents were raised in the Depression.

My father was from the era of straightening nails and keeping random screws in a container just in case. I've held on to the second habit only.

 

[Andre1969]

When it comes to those plastic store bags, we're not at the point yet, where we have to pay for them (that I know of, at least), but I still tend to save them. Not out of any sort of cheapness, but sometimes they come in handy. Although, they make them so biodegradable these days that they do tend to fall apart pretty quickly, so they're not as handy as they used to be.

One of my antique cars is stored in a carport, rather than a true garage. Sometimes the birds would get in there, see their reflection in the side view mirrors, and try to pick a fight with themselves. In the process, they'd crap all down the side of the door. So, I started using the bags to tie around the mirrors. Just one of many uses.

I tend to save fast food napkins, and condiment packs as well. I still don't think it's about being cheap, though. It's about not getting rid of something that still might have some use. Now if I do get too many of them piling up, I will start to throw them away, so I haven't gone into full-blown hoard-mode just yet!

 

[jollystomper]

In my FIRE retirement, I prefer to think of being "efficient" in regards those former habits I find hard to break . For example, I buy oranges in boxes from Costco and store them in plastic gallons bags in the refrigerator. I do not see the point of throwing out those bags after one use, they are not teeming with bacteria from the oranges. Just rinse and reuse for a while.

When we get takeout, we will use the napkins and not throw them out. We will save the utensils, particularly if the are sealed. I usually keep a couple of sets in the glove compartments. They are great to take places where you might need utensils and they are not provided.

Even some of my "blow that dough" is efficient n terms of time. For example, in each of our cars I have thing like:
- First aid kit
- tool kit
- PPE kit
- roll of paper towel and toilet paper
- wipes
- compact battery charger with USB ports)
- High power USB hub and 3-4 USB cables
- winter hat, gloves, blanket
- Prescription sunglasses

I do this so that I do not have to deal with moving any of these items back and forth between cars when I use them. For me, that is efficient.

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Five Guys is once of my one-a-month guilty pleasures. I am fine with using there napkins at home. The amount of fries does not send me into Beldar Conehead mode; I can stretch them out for a week. I find sprinkling a little olive oil/vinegar/lime juice mix on them and reheating them in oven (not microwave) makes them still taste great.

I am now remembering that I did not visit them in July... got to plan a trip soon...
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Now back to our regularly scheduled thread...

 

[Aerides]

Really? Ugh! Something about recycled fries - I think they lose a little too much before that second meal.

Five Guys fries reheat very well, particularly in a convection oven, good as fresh.

I would be sure not to pick up too many packets of ketchup and salt next time.
It's not a good mentality to pick up extras "just in case", then throw them away afterwards.

I don't get any - I prefer the low-sugar ketchup, and never add salt. I'm talking places that just stuff a bunch of condiments in the bag before handing it to you. If asked I say no thanks. But if not I often get home with a whole bunch of extra stuff.

 

[WestUniversity]

We have always put the excess napkins in the center consoles of each of our cars to use as Kleenex…

 

[friar1610]

Paper is my thing.

I’ve been trying to break the habit, but for years I’ve cut 8” x 11” sheets of paper that are only printed on one side into 6 or 8 pieces. I keep them in a tray on my desk and use them for grocery lists, notes I leave for my wife (“I took the dog out”) and for jotting down noes when I’m on the phone (date/time for next dental appt, etc).

Similarly, I have pads of paper given out at meetings, conferences, etc. going back God knows how many years. Also, partial notebooks from when my kids were in high school/college.

There is no way I can possibly live long enough to use it all up.

 

[pjigar]

We save grocery bags and reuse them for kitchen wet trash. (We buy compostable small trash bags when we run out of our stash!) Save unused napkins from fast food places for car use. Save dry cleaner hangers. Save packaging paper. List goes on. We are not FI yet but close and we really don't have to do these things. We continue to live with those habits because we realized that those are the good things to do any way in order to keep the earth a better place when we depart.

 

[athena53]

We’ve been decluttering this past year. In 1995, I inherited MIL’s sewing machine. In the drawers were hundreds of buttons and packages of snaps, plus a lifetime supply of thread. Yesterday I threw out all the buttons. I think in the past 25 years I’ve used 3-4! Most of them were useless anyway-decorative, not matching anything.

I inherited button collections from two MILs and listed them as Free Stuff on Craigslist. I git e-mails form several people begging me to hold them aside for them.

Subway- even that is a sign of being frugal. It's my go-to place on road trips even though I've got a $4,000 Alaska cruise (excluding airfare in Business Class) coming up next week. My dear parents used to go to Subway and agree on what sandwich they wanted because it was cheaper to share a 12"! I do something similar- I buy a 12" on long trips at lunch and the other half is dinner. I keep the napkins in the car and the house to wipe up spills.

I like to think that the overall mentality of "don't waste" is part of what got me here in such good financial shape, even with my expensive travel and jewelry habits.

 

[marko]

Nothing for me personally, but back in the 70's my oft-mentioned grandfather who was worth mid-eight figures would park his humongous Cadillac Fleetwood a block away from the Salvation Army building and go in and get free cheese on the day they'd be giving it out.

This is the same guy who, when his caregiver told him she'd lost her other job he decided to cut her pay. Why? "Because I figured she had no where else to go". ( we had to pay her the difference behind his back).

 

[Car-Guy]

We save our extra napkins when eating at fast food restaurants, not to save money, but to be prepared for the next time we eat out and they don't give us any... Seems we either get way too many or none at all.... (Same with soda straws)


Oh, (joke) and I never use the the wrong napkins... Example, If we eat at McDonalds, we won't use extra napkins that we kept from Burger King... Sort of like drinking wine from the wrong type of wine glass... (See oenophile thread)

 

[mpeirce]

We save our extra napkins when eating at fast food restaurants, not to save money, but to be prepared for the next time we eat out and they don't give us any...

Same here.

I now keep a roll of paper towels in the “trunk”. Not as convenient as having them in the glove box, but still handy at times.

 

[ElizabethT]

We are entering Year 10 of FIRE, and I am having a bit of an epiphany about the impact some of our frugal ways are having on our portfolio. It's grown substantially, even after buying a new and more expensive home four years ago. It's grown so substantially we are now looking to increase our standard of living or risk leaving a much larger inheritance than we have planned/thought.

Some of the ways in which we've leveraged 'silly' frugality since FIRE'ing-

- Hate paying to park, so we walk a little further to avoid doing so. In good areas, as an FYI. I'll happily pay for safe parking, and then some, in iffy areas.
-Trek to three different supermarkets each week to leverage each one's unique price advantages.
- Keep the house slightly cooler or warmer than others might, depending, to manage our electricity bills. We're now used to it, but do adjust when others come over. To inflict our preferences on others moves the practice of frugality over to cheapness IMO, and that is something we would not care to do.
- Vacation incredibly frequently, yet frugally, in our RV.

We spend money, rest assured, quite a bit of it in fact, but we try very hard to do so deliberately, not as an 'oops' because we didn't think or plan ahead.

 

[Markola]

I’m imagining the Subway napkins at the center of a Venn Diagram of Ingrained Frugality, Recycling Virtue and Delaying the Purchase of New Napkins.

There’s a lot going on here with the stupid napkins!

 

[Closet_Gamer]

I have no problem with day to day frugality in the face of big spending pointed at something meaningful.

If you save money where you can, you can then spend money where you want.

 

[OldShooter]

As the OP points out, some of our decisions seem to be really inconsistent. I think the behavioral finance people (aka Richard Thaler) can explain it, though.

(First, economists us the word "utility" to represent ideas like value and satisfaction: https://www.investopedia.com/terms/u/utility.asp )

So ... the way we usually think of purchases is that they provide "acquisition utility." When we buy a hamburger at McDonald's we are saying that having that hamburger provides us with more utility than we get from keeping that money in our wallet. Broadly, any purchase we choose to make is a statement of the relative utility of the the thing purchased versus the utility of not spending the money.

My light bulb went on with the second aspect of a purchase, "transaction utility." This idea captures the pleasure in getting a bargain and the annoyance of being overcharged or spending more than we needed to for the purchased item. Note that this utility is independent of the price of the thing being purchased.

So ... I'm hooked on transaction utility. I love a bargain, regardless of the price of the purchase. Some purchases have no transaction utility for me -- for example, planning and buying an expensive trip with a private guide and driver. No bargains to be had there. But, books! I get a lot of transaction utility when I buy a used book on Amazon and it is as good as new when it comes. (That is the usual case BTW.) We don't wash zip-loc bags but I can see where someone could get positive transaction utility from doing so.

An example: The accusation that Amazon does dynamic pricing and people's outrage at the idea. The problem is that if the price is constantly changing, one has to feel that the transaction utility will be negative; we can't be certain we weren't overcharged. I think this eventually kills the dynamic pricing experiments, tempting though they may be for sellers.

Another example: Viking cruises. We get one or two mailings a week from them, each offering a different deal. Free air. Two for one pricing. Free beverage package. And so on. For me this is as bad as dynamic pricing and I will probably never buy another Viking trip just because of the potential distaste from being overcharged -- negative transaction utility. This is not absolutely rational but it is the way I am wired. If I ever do consider traveling with them I will ask for a guarantee that we will get the lowest price offered to anyone for that particular trip. And they will refuse.

 

[athena53]

<snip>

Some of the ways in which we've leveraged 'silly' frugality since FIRE'ing-

<snip>
- Keep the house slightly cooler or warmer than others might, depending, to manage our electricity bills. We're now used to it, but do adjust when others come over. To inflict our preferences on others moves the practice of frugality over to cheapness IMO, and that is something we would not care to do.

I think one of the things that's really helped me is keeping tabs on the monthly payments. I'm sitting here perfectly comfortable with the thermostat at 80 and a fan going nearby. Other examples: Ting for cell phone ($18/month), buying MS office outright instead of monthly subscription, only one streaming service, no cable TV programming, buying cell phones outright and keeping them till they're almost obsolete rather than getting "free upgrades" that get built into the cost of monthly contracts. None of those decisions really affects the quality of my life but they add up.

 

[old medic]

Got a draw full of assorted condiment packets... and more in the camper... truck consul is full of napkins...

 

[audreyh1]

Nothing for me personally, but back in the 70's my oft-mentioned grandfather who was worth mid-eight figures would park his humongous Cadillac Fleetwood a block away from the Salvation Army building and go in and get free cheese on the day they'd be giving it out.

This is the same guy who, when his caregiver told him she'd lost her other job he decided to cut her pay. Why? "Because I figured she had no where else to go". ( we had to pay her the difference behind his back).

I hope he left you all a bunch since he was determined not to spend it on himself nor his caregivers!

 

[Bamaman]

Saving napkins in the console of a car is one thing.

But start worrying if you find softball size balls of rubber bands or stacks of used aluminum foil. That was what we found cleaning out my 90 year old aunt's house.

 

[daylatedollarshort]

I don't save the condiment packets as those don't have expiration dates on them. They would just pile up in the fridge. I do save napkins as we use those. At home I use cloth napkins I can wash in my water and energy efficient washing machine, and then hang out to dry. I try to avoid as many single use products as I can and live sustainably. It is better for the planet and saves money, too.

 

[Gumby]

... If I ever do consider traveling with them I will ask for a guarantee that we will get the lowest price offered to anyone for that particular trip. And they will refuse.

In business agreements, often known as a most-favored-nation (MFN) clause, and by lawyers as "schmuck insurance" (i.e. - I don't want to look like a schmuck when someone else gets a better deal).

 

[daylatedollarshort]

An example: The accusation that Amazon does dynamic pricing and people's outrage at the idea. The problem is that if the price is constantly changing, one has to feel that the transaction utility will be negative; we can't be certain we weren't overcharged. I think this eventually kills the dynamic pricing experiments, tempting though they may be for sellers.

I usually look at the Amazon price history of products on camelcamelcamel if it is something that can wait. If it is expensive and I can wait to make the purchase, camelcamelcamel.com will send an email when the price changes to a specified target price. It is crazy how much some products fluctuate in price just over a month or two period.

 

[Sojourner]

If I were worth $100MM dollars, I still would not throw away perfectly good, usable items like fast food napkins, grocery bags, leftover (fresh) food, etc. I would find a way to use those items or I would recycle them. I try to avoid careless waste in all aspects of life. Anything with some useful value left in it, I generally feel a strong urge to try to keep it out of a landfill. Slightly OT, but it appalls me to see people just toss out (or allow to be tossed out) large quantities of perfectly edible, leftover food from a meal.

 

[OldShooter]

In business agreements, often known as a most-favored-nation (MFN) clause, and by lawyers as "schmuck insurance" (i.e. - I don't want to look like a schmuck when someone else gets a better deal).

Yes. IIRC the name comes from the Opium Wars treaties between the western nations and China, basically requiring that all nations get the same deals.

I usually look at the Amazon price history of products on camelcamelcamel if it is something that can wait. If it is expensive and I can wait to make the purchase, camelcamelcamel.com will send an email when the price changes to a specified target price. It is crazy how much some products fluctuate in price just over a month or two period.

Yes. I also set triggers on "Third Party Used" as that is usually the Amazon Warehouse selling customer returns at decent prices. Those are not always available but I get a notice when one comes up.