How many of us get trapped in buying coffee every morning on the way to work? Making an impulse purchase on the internet or at the mall? Buying fast food at least once a week despite having food at home? How about spending 1 dollar at the vending machine at the job every day? I wanted to write this quick little article to shed some light on what we could potentially be saving by cutting out these few bad spending habits a majority of us have.
•The morning coffee we purchase every day can add up to quite an amount! We have our latte and specialty coffee drinkers that spend approximately 3.00 dollars (and that’s being generous) a day… and then you have your average Joes (no pun intended!) who purchase from the deli and spend approximately 1.50 for coffee. Do you know that the latte lover who spends the 3.00 dollars a day is spending $720.00 dollars a year!! The average Joe who spends $1.50… Well, he is still spending about $360.00 a year! That is a lot of spare change!
• Making an impulse purchase at the mall or on the internet is another money drain. There are those who purchase about $60 a month, and those that use approximately $200.00 dollars a month on impulse purchases. These heavy shoppers sometimes will actually set aside a budget for this! But let’s look at the damage…. The $60 a month buyer is realistically spending $720 dollars a year (pretty bad paper cut!), where the Big $200.00 spender is spending $2400 a year!! That hurts!
• The old fast food curse. Most of us do it. The “once a weekers” are dishing out $6.00 a week, and the fast food experts are purchasing fast food three times a week for a grand total of $18.00 a week. The “once a weekers” aren’t looking so bad, with $312.00 a year, but the “fast food experts” are emptying there wallets by $936.00 a year. YIKES!
•Our “wandering vending machine buyers” are buying on an average of 2 times a week (roughly $3.20 for snack and drink total), while the “vending machine hoarders” are buying at least 4 times a week ($6.40 total). “Not so bad,” you say, but look at what they are spending a year. The “wandering vending machine buyers” are dishing out $166.4 (not devastating), but our “vending machine hoarders can spend up to $332.8 a year! Again, a lot of spare change.
So how much would someone be spending if they had all four of these little bad spending habits? A WHOPPING $4,388.80 A YEAR!!! The moral is this… take a note of all of your little bad spending habits you have, and calculate what you spend approximately a year fulfilling these bad habits. I guarantee you once you see the damage, you will re-think those spending habits altogether. And what does it take? Bringing in a bagged lunch? Bringing in your coffee from home? Cooking more meals at home, and storing left over’s in your fridge? Think about it!
