Personal Finance Advice

They say that recognizing the problem is the first step to correcting it. There is no reason that you cannot start saving money your money now. Work yourself off of your cigarettes (with or without professional assistance) and watch your savings increase and your health improve. Stop buying the $1.50 bottle of single serving soda and buy two liter bottles when they are on sale. Enjoy your soda at home with your macaroni and beans. That should save you another $4 or $5 per week without sacrificing the pleasure of your soda fix!

Good luck! (And good article!)

well, it sounds like you’re on the road to enlightenment.

I was going to suggest, before you said you ruled out the purchase, to just rent that truck for 1 week and get it out of your system. Becus i think for most people, the excitement about a brand new vehicle tends to wear off after a few weeks and it becomes, after all, just basic transpotation which i believe your Chevy Ram can provide just as well.

Try smoking roll-ups, only about $2 to $3 and gets you about 30 – 40 smokes.

Nice post. I have my own junk food vices (not to mention laziness) and this is the first day in a long time that I have brought coffee to work and am packing my lunch (opps, no snacks – an added challenge). Here’s to sticking with it!

That’s smart of you to recognize that smoking/drinking in a new car is the quickest way to make your new car feel like your old car. I had a friend who smoked all the time driving and the car smelled, there was ash everywhere and the door panels had burns all over from when she wasn’t paying attention.

This is actually the most interesting article I’ve read in a long time. We’re saving up for a minivan because its more comfortable with 3 carseats than a car is. But the longer it takes to save and the more things I find we will hve to give up to have it the more dealing with three carseats in a camry looks appealing. Afterall my kids are going to throw food around in a new minivan and I’m too fearful of lemons to buy used. The third will be here in March and I won’t have even a decent downpayment by then. I refuse to get a loan although our excellent credit could qualify us for 0%.

It’s comforting to know someone else is hooked on Diet Mountain Dew besides me. I don’t, and never have, smoked, but I have been downing the Dew for years. I only buy it on sale and I have tried to stop. No luck. I finally ended up buying shares of Pepsi so some of the money I spend I get returned in the form of their quarterly dividend. If you can’t lick ‘em, join ‘em.

Bad habits aside, the bottom line is that the author kept him/her self from buying the truck.

Now I

Its probably a good thing you didn’t get the truck especially since you’re trying to pay down your debt. I too smoke and doing the numbers is just scary. Just remember you can’t take away all of your indulgences and fun – you have to have something to look forward to. I guess on that note having all of your debts paid off could work.

Good Luck keeping the truck off your mind and the idea of quitting smoking on it. Just be happy you’re paying 3.50 a pack – I’m paying closer to $9

Very nice article. I always learn so much from the articles here. You made an economic decision, that went beyond money. You really thought about your new item, and how it would affect you and be affected.

Soometimes, I think to myself, I want a simple life as well. Just an apartment, my cars paid off as well, and maybe I’ll just figure I’ll work in a flowershop.

You know what I mean?

I too have an addiction I am still working on getting rid of. I found it easier to give that up by using something else that is cheaper and healthier. For example, my vice is Pepsi. I have been drinking it fairly steadily since I was a teenager. Due to health reasons, I have had to cut back, and I will eventually quit altogether. I do need to find other ways to deal with my stress, though, as that is the primary reason I drink it. I have found it easier to eliminate the temptation and substitute drinking hot or iced tea. It still gives me a caffeine boost, but it does not have the unhealthy phosphoric acid and sugar. Perhaps you could do something simple like taking a thermos of coffee or tea with you to work. As for the cigarettes, I don’t know, as I have never smoked. My husband buys pipe tobacco and cigarette rolling papers, which are together way cheaper than regular cigarettes. So whether or not you buy a truck with the money you save is another issue, but quitting smoking and drinking pop is healthier for you.

I had to laugh when I read this. I love the book ‘The Millionaire Next Door’ and the writers have something interesting to say about how money spent of cigarettes can add up over the years.

The spin off is also you will have improved health. It will take a time, but as you watch those $3.50s add up you will know your health is improving.

People often believe that those small sums don’t matter – HA – wrong! We did a money makeover as per the UK money guy Martin Lewis – and by cutting back and saving a few pounds here and there we ended up about $4,000 a year better off and we didn’t even notice the join.

We then got our teeth into real money saving and what a difference that’s made. Got a load of tips from ‘The Tightwad Gazette’ – boy is that one great book!

Good luck with whichever way you go.

A couple of corrections…

A month is NOT four weeks. It’s 4.3 weeks. In this case, it’s simpler to just multiply $5 a day by 365 days a year, which comes to $1825 per year.

As for putting the money in a high yield money market account for 12 years, it wouldn’t grow to anywhere near half a million dollars as Texas Girl responded. Perhaps she was thinking about what it would be worth at your retirement, assuming that’s thirty years from now.