Aptly Titled “Stuff”
I started thinking about my own buying habits after stumbling upon this AskMetafilter post today. Those who are close to me know that I’m one of the biggest gadget whores ever to walk the earth. I’m constantly fascinated by nifty, shiny things even if I have no practical use for them. I often find myself rationalizing inside of my head “Oh, surely there must be a use for this Kyle! It’s so cool, how could there NOT be a use for it?” and I’ll walk out with some adapter or widget that really doesn’t end up being that useful. I think I’ve improved over how I used to be, but there’s still a lot of frivolous spending I could be cutting out. One of my most jarring realizations was when I figured out that I had spent more money on hardware and peripherals for my gaming desktop than I actually did on the games themselves.
My hindsight method for figuring out whether a purchase I made was a good one works sort of like this (doesn’t cover everything):
Games: Did I play it for at least 15 hours/get 15 hours out of it? If I didn’t manage that, did it have a single player mode that I finished? Was is well-designed and entertaining enough that it was worth $60 (for consoles) or $30 (for a DS title)? If I didn’t play it for at least 15 hours, and/or I didn’t finish the single player mode, I probably shouldn’t have bough it.
Books: Did I open it up and start reading it? If so, did I finish it? If I finished it, did I like it enough to recommend it to other people or buy other books in the series (where applicable)?
Gadgets: Do I use this every day, or if not every day, often enough to justify the purchase price? Basics like monitors and phones fall into this category. My portable hard drive is a good example: I don’t use it “every day,” but it’s saved my butt enough times to make it totally worth the money I paid for it. Also useful for helping other people out with backups and repairs, etc. Things like cables I never used or gizmos I used for two days and never touched again are things that shouldn’t have been bought.
The list goes on. The problem is assessing this kind of this pre-purchase. I’ve gotten better at it, but I’m far from perfect. Mistakes like Lost Planet still seem to happen more often than I’d like. Maybe my problem, with games at least, is that I’m willing to branch out and try new stuff all the time. For every total flop like Lost Planet, I seem to find some true gems like Phoenix Wright: Ace Attorney (and its sequels) and the Trauma Center series.
My biggest problem is the “reward” issue. Take today for example. My car recently had its little maintenance light come on, indicating that it needed an oil change and some other upkeep tasks taken care of. I thought going to the dealership was going to be an irritating, stressful experience on the way over to Boch Honda in Norwood, and I thought to myself “After you’re done, Kyle, you can drive over to Barnes and Noble or something and get a book for your troubles.” This is despite the fact that I have a book from my last trip to the bookstore still sitting on my bureau, unread. I need to learn to not give in to those sorts of things. (The same thing sort of applies to me liking to eat stuff all the time. I eat when I’m bored/stressed out, and it shows.)
The dealership experience was actually quite pleasant in the end; there’s a cool business idea they’ve put into practice that I want to talk about, but that’s a story for another hour. 
You have a stuff issue? I tried to take a picture of the room demonstrating my heaps of “stuff” versus your meticulous side of the room, but I think I need to buy a wider lens to do so.
A good way to control the bleeding of money, though, is to buy stuff used. The simple benefit is that you save money initially.
The better benefit, though, is if you go to resell it. For example, I bought a $250 radio that I don’t use that often. So I think I’m going to sell it. When I do, I expect it to bring in $300 to $350. You look at it more as “renting” in a way, but if you do what I do and watch hundreds of eBay auctions before buying, you can end up paying “negative rent” and making a small profit when you resell it.
It’s harder with a hybrid, but you can do a decent amount of car stuff on your own. Just simple stuff like checking fluids and filters can do a lot. And then, instead of perpetual “preventative maintenance” things, you just go for a tuneup a couple times a year or so. This is still a bit of an ‘emerging area’ for me, but “Auto Repair for Dummies” is highly, highly informative. (Don’t buy it. I have a copy.)
I know it sounds stupid, but I sometimes forget that I can borrow books for free from the library. And, as rarely as I read (which is a shame), I still find bookstores to be very tempting places. But I’m somewhat fortunate to have a very frugal side that leaves me writing down ISBNs of books that catch my eye, looking them up on Amazon for reviews / details, and then turning to half.com for the actual purchase.
there’s a cool business idea they’ve put into practice that I want to talk about
I have a hunch what it is. If so, my boss’s dealership does the same thing, and it’s one of those, “Why didn’t I think of that!” moments.
n1zyy
26 Oct 07 at 7:49 pm