Vices. We all have them. Whether it’s stopping in for a Snickers bar every time you fill up for gas or rolling through the Starbucks drive thru several times a week, almost everybody gets sucked in by something. Aside from the health concerns that may arise from your particular vice of choice, there’s also something most of us don’t think about.
What they’re doing to your wallet.
A regular cup of Starbucks coffee will run you around $2-3 depending on a myriad of factors (location, did you add any flavoring, etc). If you stopped for a coffee everyday on your way to the office, you’re spending anywhere from $10-15 each week or $40-60 every month. Those small coffees start to add up over time.
Years ago, when I worked in Uptown Charlotte, I’d meet my friends for lunch on a daily basis. That’s right, daily! Depending on where we went, my lunch would cost around $10-15 each time. I was spending $50-$75 each week on food I could’ve simply made at home. Annualized, this comes out to between $2400 to $3600.
That’s a ridiculous sum of money to spend on food considering a daily sandwich would’ve cost me one tenth the amount.
Are you a smoker by chance? Although the price of cigarettes is significantly cheaper in the south versus other areas of the country, I don’t need to tell you how expensive a habit this can be. With an average price of $8 a pack in the U.S., if the lung cancer doesn’t kill you, the heart attack at the register will.
How about gum? A pack of Wrigley’s Spearmint gum is only $1.38 at Wal-Mart. At less than $0.09 a stick, you’re getting a pretty good deal on a sweet treat that also doubles as a breath mint.
The problem is, gum has a way of seeping into your subconscious. Whenever you hop in your car, you feel the need to throw a piece in your mouth and hit the road. Add in the spouse/friend/child “can I have a piece?” factor and that pack of gum isn’t going to last long.
You’ll need to stop at the store and replenish sooner than you would think.
But it’s just $1.38. Who cares? That’s the point. These little purchases that each of us makes on a daily basis add up. It’s important to steer clear of spending money on fruitless items that provide a small amount of pleasure for a finite period of time.
I’m not saying that you should never buy gum or coffee (I would say you should probably never buy cigarettes, but to each their own). Each one of these is fine to purchase every now and then, but it shouldn’t be a daily or weekly habit.
Think of these small purchases as a drop of water landing in a bucket. One drop is no big deal. You’d barely be able to see it at the bottom of the bucket. But, what if 10 drops of water landed at the bottom each day? How quickly do you think that bucket would fill up?
You don’t need to use a scientific equation to understand it would be overflowing pretty quickly.
Holding off on our impulses is hard. Having no money to be able to pay your bills or retire comfortably is harder. Make the hard choices now, however small, to help better position you and your family down the road.
Tracking your small expenses and keeping yourself in check will make a huge difference in your monthly bottom line.
It also wouldn’t hurt to hide the gum the next time your friend wants a ride.
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