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Buy it for life: Choosing quality over price

January 30, 2023 by Brett Tams

Note: This is a substantial re-write of an article I first published more than twelve years ago. (Yikes, I’m old!) I’ve opted to keep some of the older comments if they had good suggestions.

Earlier this week, I wrote about my quest for quality pajamas. I recently paid $80 to purchase a pair from Filson, a company I trust for well-made goods. It’s my hope that these will be the last pair of pajamas that I ever purchase. My goal was to “buy it for life”.

This experience reminded me of two other companies that I love for their top-notch stuff.

The first is a company called Best Made, which aims to make and sell “the finest, most beautiful and useful products made by any company anywhere”. And they do. Best Made offers an esoteric collection of clothing and household items, all of which offer quality reminiscent of your grandmother’s era. The catch? The quality comes at a higher cost.
Or there’s the Portland-based Schoolhouse company (formerly Schoolhouse Electric), which makes and sells a variety of lighting, hardware, and furniture for the home. I’ve purchased a few things from Schoolhouse over the years, and I’ve been blown away by the quality. The items were expensive up front and I was hesitant to purchase them, but my reservations have vanished with time and usage. The blanket covering my feet at this very moment, for example, cost $250 (I think) but will last the rest of my life.

Here’s something I’ve learned over the past fifteen years: One way to practice financial prudence while living the good life is to buy quality products, products that are a pleasure to use, products that will last a lifetime (or at least a decade).

Today, let’s talk a little about choosing quality over price. Let’s talk about the “buy it for life” philosophy.

How to Find the Good Stuff

The first challenge is to figure out how to find the good stuff. When you’re ready to make a purchase, how can you know which items are quality and which are run of the mill?

Sometimes you’ll know which company offers a high-quality version of whatever it is you need to buy, either from personal experience or from paying attention to friends and family. Or, if you don’t know off the top of your head, you know whom to ask for more information. If I wanted to buy audio gear, for instance, I’d ask my brother. He’s an audiophile and could steer me in the right direction.

Most of the time, however, you’ll have to do some research.

The end of the road: Preparing to buy a new car

January 29, 2023 by Brett Tams

Yesterday, Kim and I joined my cousins for an afternoon trip to the Oregon Coast. Our aim was to harvest a bounty of clams. We came home with zero. We managed, however, to harvest a bounty of mussels. Plus, the dog had fun.

My cousin Duane carpooled with us to and from the beach. We rode in Kim’s car: a 1997 Honda Accord that’s showing signs of its age.

“It’s a little warm in here,” Duane said about ten minutes into our drive. “Would you mind turning down the heat?”

“Well, I can’t turn down the air,” Kim said. “It’s stuck on high. But I can turn down the temperature.” She laughed as she demonstrated that the knob for the air volume has broken off at the post. The vents now permanently blow at full force.

“This car is falling to pieces,” I said. “Literally.” As if to prove my point, a bit of molding fell from a roof handle. I picked it up and wedged it back into place.

“I like my car,” Kim said. “I have an emotional attachment to it. But I’ve come to the realization that it’s time to start searching for something else.”

More and more, it looks like our vehicles have reached the end of the road.

Two months with HelloFresh: A quick look at the cost and quality of HelloFresh recipes

January 29, 2023 by Brett Tams

When I published my first HelloFresh review last June, I liked the popular meal-delivery service. Kim’s employer had given us a one-week free trial. The three recipes we received were fun and tasty. In the end, we chose not to sign up with HelloFresh but resolved to remember it for the future.

At the end of 2018, as I was evaluating my spending patterns, I was shocked by how much I was spending on food. It’s embarrassing to show the following numbers, but facts are facts and truth is truth. I was spending over $1100 per month on food.

“Something needs to change,” I told Kim. “Maybe we should try HelloFresh again to see if it can help us cut costs.”

“Do you think so?” Kim siad. “Isn’t HelloFresh kind of expensive?”

“It’s not that bad,” I said. “Besides, if having meals delivered can keep us from dining out so often, and if it can keep me from splurging at the grocery store, it might actually save us money.”

I signed us up.

For two months — January and February — we received three HelloFresh recipes each week. Based on our experience, here’s a new, revised review of HelloFresh.

Outsourcing my life: Why I pay others to do tasks I could do myself

January 28, 2023 by Brett Tams

When people talk about saving money, DIY is one of the first things that comes to mind.

Learn how to fix things around the house!
Change the oil in your Prius!
Make your own cleaning supplies!

Do all of this (and more) and you could save hundreds of dollars a year.

And thatâs great. I know lots of folks that enjoy growing a lush garden resulting in delicious produce (that can be canned or frozen) in due season. There are people in my life that find doing laundry calming, and others that will happily take on any domestic project that comes their way. Personally, I enjoy doing the dishes.

While Iâm happy spending time on the things that I like, there are certain things that I hate doing â and that I will happily outsource to others.

Am I perfectly capable of cleaning my home and mowing the lawn? Sure. But why should I spend the time doing these things when I can pay someone else to do them? Here are some reasons I spend money to outsource parts of my life.

I Can Make More Money

The number-one reasons I outsource tasks I could do myself is that by doing so, I make more money. Wait, what?

When I talk about spending $200 a month on lawn care or $20 an hour on house cleaning services, many people are surprised to find that I make money by outsourcing these mundane chores.

Iâm a freelance writer, so any time I free up can be used to write an article, interview a source, or work on edits. Rather than spending two hours cleaning the house, I can pay someone $40 to do it instead â and make $500. Thatâs a net gain of $460 each week, or about $1,840 per month.

There have been times that I take my laptop with me to get the oil changed. Jiffy Lube takes care of it for $65 and I can do work amounting to about $200 in the time Iâm sitting there. Thatâs a net gain of $135.

In the past, Iâve used services like Blue Apron and HelloFresh to plan my meals and deliver the ingredients. That saves me the time and hassle of meal planning and grocery shopping, and allowed me to focus on other things. However, with my travel schedule, these types of services havenât been meeting my needs.

Instead, with Instacart now available in my area, Iâve switched to getting someone else to do the shopping, while I use a service like $5 Meal Plan to plan my meals and provide me with an ingredient list.

No matter how I do it, though, the cost of these services is much less than what I can make doing a little extra work. Whether you want more time to work on a side gig, or take action to grow your business, the investment you make in outsourcing can yield dividends later.

Food waste and food consumption in the United States

January 27, 2023 by Brett Tams

I’ve been thinking a lot lately about how much food I consume (and waste). I’m not happy with how I shop and eat, and it’s not just because I’m fat right now. I don’t like what I’m eating and I don’t like how much food I’m throwing out.

Food waste is a huge problem in the United States. Most studies find that Americans waste about one-third of all food that enters the supply chain. This is insane. And when you consider that food spending is the third-largest component of the average American budget, this is a great place for most folks to boost their budget.

According to the 2017 Consumer Expenditure Report, the average household spends $7,729 per year ($644.08 per month) on food. If, as the USDA reports, 31% of the average family’s food goes to waste, that’s the equivalent of burning $2395.99 per year ($199.67 per month).

For most families, $200 per month is a big deal. That can be the difference between deficit spending and earning a “profit”. That $200 per month could be enough to purchase a new car or to afford better health insurance.

Today, I want to think out loud about food consumption and food waste in my own life.

This article is unusual in that I’m not going to try to offer any solutions. Instead, I’m simply going to share some observations, and I’m going to divide these observations into bite-sized chunks.

If you have solutions to food waste, however, I’d love to hear them.

Mindful shopping: Learning to be deliberate about the things we buy and own

January 27, 2023 by Brett Tams

The older I get, the less I want or need. The older I get, the less I like to spend money. And when I have to buy something, I try to practice mindful shopping.

When I was younger, I wanted (and/or needed) all sorts of things. I wanted new clothes. I wanted tech gadgets. I wanted books. I was convinced that I needed a fast computer to be happy, not to mention a big house and lots of furniture. None of my shopping was mindful. It was mindless.

Now, at age fifty, buying things seems more like a hassle than a reward.

For one, buying something means I have to spend money — money that I’d rather keep for more important things, such as retirement. Or travel. Or beer. (Best of all: Travel and beer!)

Plus, there’s the entire shopping process. It’s a chore. If I need to buy a chainsaw, for instance (which I actually did this week), I have to research the best option. Then I have to find the best price. Then I have to order it or, worse, take time out of my day to go pick it up in person.

Then, after I buy a new thing, I have to store it. I have to dispose of the packaging, then add whatever I bought to my collection of Stuff. It becomes clutter in my life. (This is true whether the thing is actually clutter or not.)

I use my laptop computer all day every day, for instance, yet it still acts as mental (and physical) clutter. It’s always here in the living room, sitting next to my recliner. I see it whenever I walk by. It’s always on my mind.

I know I sound like an aging curmudgeon, but all of this is true. The older I get, the less Stuff I want — and the more I want to get rid of the Stuff I already own.

Now, I don’t want to pretend that I don’t buy things. I do. There’s no question that I do. I even spend frivolously if I’m not diligent. But I’m far less likely to buy things than I used to. And when I do buy things, I tend to be purposeful about my purchases. I try to be a mindful shopper.

Let’s use the chainsaw as an example.

How to cancel a credit card (without killing your credit score)

January 26, 2023 by Brett Tams

I have a credit card I’d like to cancel, but I don’t know if I should. I’m afraid it’ll hurt my credit score. Today I’m going to walk you through in real time as I evaluate this decision. Then I’m going to explain how to cancel a credit card, no matter why you want to do so.

I normally don’t pay much attention to my credit score. I know that it ranges between 800 and 820, so I don’t worry about it. With a score like that, I’m considered to have “exceptional credit”, and that’s good enough for me. (Kim’s very proud that she has a higher credit score than I do, by the way.)

That said, for the past several years I’ve been carrying a credit card that I don’t want or need. It’s a Chase British Airways card that I signed up for in 2011. It’s a fine card, but I never use it because I have better ones. My primary credit card right now is the Chase Sapphire Reserve, which I use for 99% of my personal credit transactions.

Basically, I’m paying $75 per year — the British Airways card’s annual fee — for nothing…except to maintain my credit score. I don’t like it. I’d rather cancel the card and take a temporary hit to my credit. But is it bad to cancel a credit card? And if it’s bad, how bad is it?

I’ve decided to document the process! Let’s find out together.

The pink tax: The hidden cost of being female

January 26, 2023 by Brett Tams

Women working to achieve financial independence face an extra hurdle: the hidden cost of being female.

Though itâs cheekily referred to as the âpink taxâ, the additional cost women incur for personal-care products, toys, clothing, dry cleaning, health care, mortgages, and vehicle maintenance is no joking matter. It inflates our budgets, limits our ability to save, and sometimes hinders our ability to access affordable and safe sources of credit.

Based on that semi-intense description of the pink tax, you may think itâs already been made illegal to charge someone more on the basis of their gender. But thatâs not true. Thereâs no federal law prohibiting companies from charging different prices for products that are identical (or very similar), but which are marketed by gender. At least not currently.

Only one U.S. municipality â Miami-Dade County â has banned this practice. California enacted a similar restriction in 1995, but it applies only to the pricing of services. New York City followed in 1998.

On top of the pink tax, women still earn less than their male counterparts. The average woman is paid 82 cents for every $1 her male colleagues earn; the discrepancy is much worse for women of color.

When youâre paying more for basic goods and services from birth until death â just because youâre female â itâs easy to understand why so many women are pushing to âAx the Pink Taxâ.

What is the Pink Tax?

Twenty-five years ago, in 1994, the State of California studied the issue of gender-based pricing. They found women pay about $1300 more each year for the same services as men. Accounting for inflation, that figure is now closer to $2135 per year.

If that figure doesnât shock you, maybe this will: By the time a woman turns 29 (like me), sheâll have spent an estimated $39,203 on the pink tax alone! Can you imagine how much money I could have right now if Iâd put the money I spent on the pink tax in a savings account? Especially one with compounded interest!?

In 2015, the New York City Department of Consumer Affairs (DCA) published a report on the pink tax entitled âFrom Cradle to Cane: The Cost of Being a Female Consumerâ. The report found that womenâs products cost more than menâs products 42 percent of the time. 42 percent! By comparison, menâs products cost more than the female version 18 percent of the time.

According to the DCA report, products for female consumers were likely to cost more across industries:

Girlsâ toys cost more 55 percent of the time, while boysâ toys cost more 8 percent of the time.
Girlsâ clothing cost more 26 percent of the time, while boysâ clothing cost more 7 percent of the time.
Womenâs clothing cost more 40 percent of the time, while menâs clothing cost more 32 percent of the time.
Womenâs personal-care products (shampoo, conditioner, razors, lotion, deodorant, body wash, and shaving cream) cost more 56 percent of the time, while menâs products cost more 13 percent of the time.
Senior home health-care products (supports and braces, canes, compression socks, adult incontinence products, and digestive health products) cost more for women 45 percent of the time and cost more for men 13 percent of the time.

Nowhere is the pink tax more evident than when it comes to personal-care products. Personal-care products geared toward women cost approximately 13 percent more than similar products marketed toward men.

Similarly, women are financially penalized for having their menstrual cycle. The U.S. government has deemed menstrual products a “luxury item” despite the fact that menstrual cycles are a monthly reality for all women, not a âluxuryâ.

An introduction to square-foot gardening

January 25, 2023 by Brett Tams

I grew up in the country. My family always had a vegetable garden. For us, gardening meant a large plot, plowed and raked, then planted with long, widely-space rows of vegetables. It also meant weeding and hoeing, weeding and hoeing. Lots and lots of weeding and hoeing.

Gardening was a chore.

When my ex-wife and I bought our first home, we both wanted a vegetable garden, but we didn’t want the drudgery that came with it. Besides, we didn’t have a big space in the country â we had an average city lot. Fortunately, we discovered Mel Bartholomew’s Square-Foot Gardening.

Bartholomew’s method allowed us to enjoy reasonable crop production in a small space. With his technique, almost any homeowner can grow her own food.

How Square-Foot Gardening Works

The square-foot gardening concept is simple: Build a raised bed. Divide the space into sections of one square-foot each. Lastly, plant vegetables (and/or flowers) in just the amount of space they need.

The advantages of this system include reduced workload, less watering, easy weeding (and not much of it), and easy access to your crops. This is a great way to learn to grow some of your own food.

Back in the 1990s, Kris and I had raised beds similar to these (from Flickr user johnyaya).

We built our square-foot garden one Saturday in mid-April. I spent the morning constructing three raised beds out of two-by-sixes. Each bed was twelve feet long, four feet wide, and twelve inches tall. At the time, I most certainly was not a handyman, yet I was able to build these in just a few hours. It was fun.

Digging was less fun.

I spent the afternoon double-digging three patches in our lawn. We maneuvered the frames into place, leveled them, and then filled them with rich soil (purchased from a nearby nursery-supply center). Finally, we created a grid over each bed using tacks and twine. When we were finished, our raised beds looked like orderly grids.

After we built the raised beds and outlined the growing space, we followed the guidelines in Bartholomew’s book.

My plan for purchasing a new car

January 24, 2023 by Brett Tams

It’s funny. Fifteen years ago, daily personal finance was a chore for me. I didn’t understand how to go day to day making smart choices that were aligned with my values. I wasn’t even sure what my values were!

Today, things are much easier. Sure, there are challenges. Sometimes I make poor choices. But mostly, what I spend aligns with what I want out of life. (With the caveat, of course, that who I am and what I want shifts over time.)

I’m glad I’ve developed good habits. Right now, it’s keeping me from making a rash decision. For most of 2019, Kim and I have both been fighting the new-car itch. The old J.D. would have succumbed by now. This year’s model still does dumb things like spending hours building custom cars on the Mini website, but so far I’m not scratching that new-car itch.

Instead, I’ve come up with a plan, a path to a car purchase. And Kim has come up with a plan of her own too.

My Plan for Purchasing a New Car

“Look at this,” I told Kim a couple of weeks ago. I carried my laptop over to show her my latest Mini design: a super-powered orange convertible that makes no sense for our lives.

Kim shook her head. “You’ve got to stop going to the Mini website,” she said. “And you especially have to stop using that build-your-own-car tool. That’s dangerous.” She’s right.

Earlier this week, as Tally and I strolled through the hills and picked blackberries, I did some serious thinking about if/when I should get a new car. I think I’ve gained some clarity.

Sure, if I cashed out some of my investments, I could justify making this purchase today. But, as I learned last year, this sort of action carries a huge tax consequence. If I sold investments to buy the car, I’d effectively be paying a 15% premium to make the purchase. I’m not willing to do this.

Plus, it’s hard for me to rationalize paying so much for a new car. It’s crazy how expensive vehicles are these days. (Do I sound like an old man yet?)

Speaking of being an old man: The one thing that even allows me to consider a new new car is that I’m getting older. I’m fifty. It’s highly probable that if I purchased a new vehicle, it’d be the last new-vehicle purchase of my life. (I tend to keep my cars a long time. I can see that at 67 or 70, I’d buy another used car because a new Mini would last me until then.)

While the dog sniffed the roadside for rabbits, I formulated an actual plan for buying a new car. I decided that there are three conditions that would lead me to make this purchase. From least likely to most likely, those conditions are:

Interest rates on auto loans drop low enough for me to justify making payments. As I said, I don’t want to cash out my investments to buy a car. My monthly income has reached a level where I could conceivably use part of it to pay for a car, but I don’t want to pay a lot of interest if I do. Right now, the U.S. national average for a 60-month loan is 4.21%. That’s too high. 0.0% would be low enough, obviously. But at what level would I be willing to take out a loan? I’m not sure. I think 2% may be too high, but 1% is okay.
My current Mini Cooper dies. My car has had a couple of major repairs since 2016, but mostly it runs fine. There’s no rush to replace it. But if it were totaled in an accident (heaven forbid!) or if something else major were to go wrong, well then I’d consider moving on to a new car.
I save enough to pay cash for all (or most) of a new vehicle. GRS is starting to make more money. Not a lot — not like in the olden days — but some. I plan to set this aside in a car fund. Meanwhile, whenever I get lump sums, I’ll stick that money in the car fund too. (I’m negotiating a project that might give me roughly $15,000 â if it ever happens.)

If any one of these three comes to fruition, I’ll do pull the trigger. I’ll buy a new car. (Unless, of course, I manage to shake this new-car itch for good. But that’s unlikely.) In the meantime, I’ll make do with the two vehicles I already own: my 2004 Mini Cooper and my 1993 Toyota truck. I like them both and they run well. They’re good enough, you know?

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