7 Expensive Money Habits You Need To Stop
If you occasionally stress over money, you’re not alone. Only 51 per cent of Americans said they were financially secure, according to a recent Pew Survey of American Family Finances. Fifty-five per cent of respondents reported either breaking even or spending more than they make each month, and 33 per cent indicated they had zero savings.
Chances are you should be saving more and spending less. Instead of waiting for your situation to magically improve, take a hard look at some of the not-so-good money habits you may have developed over the years.
I see people doing these expensive habits and to be honest I end up doing some of these. And if you’re looking to save some money then maybe you should take some of these into consideration.
1. Overpaying for vacations
I think a lot of people want to spend money when they go on vacation. Makes sense. If you’re working for 4, 5, 6 months in a row and you want to go on vacation somewhere or you want to go on a cruise. It makes sense to want to spend some money but sometimes we spend money where it doesn’t make sense if we spend maybe 5 minutes to find a flight that is cheaper. Or a cheaper hotel and get the same value for maybe half the cost if we spend some extra time looking. You can save a lot of money if you don’t just jump in and book the first flight or the first hotel or using a travel agent. Another way of getting cheap prices is to go offseason. If that’s possible to do maybe try to go offseason. Or if you’re flexible with the location you can go to a less popular location that gives you the same value but for less money.
2. Buying a home too soon
This one is a little controversial but hear me out. I think the biggest misconception that people have is that if they buy a home they suddenly don’t have a cost of living. They don’t have to pay for rent so they’re saving money when they buy a home. But that’s not necessarily the case. If you buy a home you’ll have a property tax, home owner insurance, repairs and maintenance costs. I see people paying let’s say $1000/month they buy a home then when you calculate the mortgage and everything else all of the sudden they pay $2000/month.
So if you buy a home make sure you do your due diligence on it and make sure you can afford not only the mortgage on it but all of the other various expenses for it that can add up on a monthly bases. Do your research, don’t buy too big too soon, make sure you get a good deal and that you can afford it.
3. Food delivery
This one can literally kill your wallet. I see a lot of people that maybe they’re at their job, or maybe they don’t have time to prepare, or they’re working late and they order food. But that $10 salad can turn into $20 after the delivery service adds their fee, and perhaps you want to tip the driver. And suddenly you’re looking at a $20 for a sandwich or a salad and that can add up to a lot if this happens two, three, four times a week especially if you’re working a lot, or you work or live further away from shops.
What I do to avoid this is to prepare my week in advance. I take a few hours on Sunday to prepare all my food for the week so that I don’t get caught off guard. Just taking the time to prepare some food it can save you a lot of money in a month.
4. Trusting other people too much
It’s surprising how many people thing that if a friend of them or relative is talking about personal finances they must know what they’re doing with their personal finances. There’s no correlation there. Just because someone knows a lot in theory doesn’t mean they know what works in practice. If you are going to invest your money don’t just trust this person or that friend or that relative. Do your own research, choose what works for you. Do take their general advice but don’t buy some stocks just because they did or don’t copy what they did, learn from them and choose something that works for you. Create your own path.
5. The twofold blows
This is the type that it’s costing you money now but it’s going to cost you even more in the future. This are the things that are deteriorating your health. This are the tobacco products. It may cost you $5 or $10 on a pack now but can cost you a lot more in the future. But not just tobacco can do this a lot of processed foods can do the same thing. Taking care of your health now is literally going to save you so much more money in the future when you don’t have excessive medical bills because you’re not going to have a lot of health problems.
6. Payday loans
This one just really bothers me a lot. I hate when I see those adds. I think they’re predatory. There are a lot of companies out there that take advantage of this. I think this is just a recipe for disaster when people are burrowing money to go to their other expenses and they start getting into a bigger and bigger hole. And this obviously goes with any type of debt as well. But payday loans scare me quite a bit. If you’re at a point where you don’t get paid until next week but you can’t really afford this stuff right now maybe you should find a way to cut this stuff out or start to budget ahead of time so that you don’t run into that problem. I know that being on a low income this might be difficult but try to avoid loans in general because they’re going to cost you money. They’re taking a percentage in most cases for this payday loans they’re obviously making money off you so just be careful with those.
7. Making excuses
People tend to shift blame on other people or situations. I see this all the time, people say “I’m in a massive debt it’s that person’s fault because they’re the one who coerced me into getting that loan”. Sure there’s a lot of predatory people and businesses out there especially in the credit industry and in all the financial niches. But pointing the blame at other people and the victim mentality doesn’t get you very far. At the end of the day it comes down to your decisions you should take responsibility and ownership of those decisions. Even if someone manipulated you and you made the mistake to listen to them after the fact all you can do is learn from it and and find a way to fix it without getting deeper into debt.
No one is perfect. We all make mistakes. All we can do is learn from them and get better at everything we set our mind to achieve in life.
