What’s an “unpopular” spending or money decision that actually works well for you?

[HonestTealPoster]

For me, it’s not budgeting. I’ve tried it before and found it quite stressful, I ended up overthinking every purchase. These days I don’t follow a strict budget. I just spend fairly naturally and because I’m quite frugal anyway, I still tend to save more than I spend.

Is there anything you do that might go against the usual advice but works for you?

Never had a leased car. Always buy new (or nearly new) outright and keep them until they drop, usually 10-15 years. Saves an absolute fortune when you spread the purchase cost over the life instead of paying a monthly lease constantly, even after factoring in the servicing/repair/MOT bills. With buying new/nearly new and driving carefully, never had any major breakdowns/repair bills, never needed a new clutch/gearbox, nor exhaust, nor major suspension parts - just the "consumables" under normal servicing, such as brake pads, tyres, battery and spark plugs as per service schedule.

One of our cars is just coming up to 18 years old and as per my spreadsheet of it's original cost plus servicing/mot/breakdown cover over those 18 years, it's cost us less than £100 per month - and what's better it still looks immaculate inside and out. Hope to get a few more years out of it, but it owes us nothing and if it falls apart tomorrow, we're fine with that.

A previous car we got to 195,000 miles before it started needing "big" repairs/replacements, so we scrapped it rather than spent the money. Likewise, cost us less than £75 per month over it's life inc purchase price, repairs, etc., and we still got a few hundred when we sold it so the last few months were free!! Never broke down once, and same with repairs etc - just consumables per service schedule.

I honestly don't know what people have done with the cars that seem to be expensive to fix, i.e. gearboxes, clutches, suspension arms, etc - either they or previous owners must have driven badly, or they've been very unlucky. I know some makes/models are known for poor quality components, but most have no inherent expensive manufacturing defects, and it's usually pretty simple to google for known problems these days to research before buying.

My mum keeps telling me to go to Lidl to save money but I don't want to! The local store near me is messy and the cheese tastes like plastic.

There is no difference according to my mother. There very well is!

My children went to private school and so do my grandchildren. Not once has any of the 12 of them said ‘it’s great to be at a school where people want to learn’.

You need to be more careful about the things you say in front of the bairns.

I buy lunch every day, my work place has a canteen and it’s normally £3ish for what i want. I have a long commute and it’s the last thing i want to do or think about when im home in evenings. I live rurally so inevitably have forgot something I want to use/eat and need to go back to shop which is 10 miles away so it’s not happening. I should be more organised. But im not. And i’m too rushed in the morning, shit at getting get up early or I forget to take it with me. When i am trying to save for something grand i will make an effort to bring homemade but it just never sticks.,I budget the cost into my monthly money so it’s all accounted for. I like paying for the convenience and food options are healthy enough. Maybe once DC is up and out or can get themselves organised themselves i’ll be better. But until then….

Cycling locally. So much money (and time) saved on petrol and parking.

I thought this was normal? I have the same arrangement with my DH,joint account for joint expenses then separate for the rest. Why would that be unpopular or controversial?

Had my DC as a teen so before home, career, well anything. Also never married. I think this has all saved me a lot of money.

DP and I have always had separate finances. He gets to spend his wages after the bills on anything he wants. He’s got expensive hobbies for example a bike but that’s his wages so he can do what he wants with it.

only ever had secondhand cars, well secondhand most things. Don’t spend much money at all on anything. Once we’ve got an item we need it is used until it’s worn out, then repaired by us if possible before being replaced.

Didn’t buy my first home until my 40s (with my DP) but means my half is now paid in full from savings by year 5 when I turned 50. We hope to be mortgage free (dp’s share) when he’s 50. It’s a cheap house for the area we live in as it was a doer upper, only done a bit of it so far we just live in it as it is. Probably the worst house on the road but I’ve got pretty flowers in the garden so who cares.

never had a holiday together abroad, just a few caravan holidays here and there.

never used a financial advisor.

pay in cash as much as I can. Also have cash in the house incase of emergency.

I don’t drink and I’m vegetarian. Have milk delivered from a local dairy so no need to pop to the shops.

have a basic mobile hardly ever use it. No contract. Also cancelled subscriptions for everything. NT membership last year cost more than if we had just paid on arrival.

im not sure if this has saved me money or not it’s just how I live. I was homeless as a teen so a home and food in the cupboards is always my priority.

The thing is that they don't have the experience of being in a school where lots of kids didn't want to learn, i.e. a failing comp with disruption etc. So they don't know any difference.

A close life long friend of mine had gone to a grammar school back in the 70s, and "didn't see a difference", so she happily sent her own two kids to the local comp (which was average to good), and they basically crashed and burned. Her children sent their respective children (her grandchildren) to a private school! The grandchildren would say the same that they don't know any different, but the children (who didn't do as well as they could at the comp) both can see the difference.

You don't know what you don't know.

Can't be doing with Aldi (but Lidl is OK).

Expensive touring holidays (Japan, Australia) where all the logistics are covered - no idea what individual hotels/itineries costs are and can't be bothered with decision fatigue/disappointment when doing own research.

Jam today.

Younger self - making economies by darning tights yet blowing budget on new clothes.

I can’t drive (but DH does). When I go out locally, but not walking distance, I often get taxis instead of public transport.

i justify this by remembering that we don’t pay for 2 cars (DHs car was paid off years ago)

Separate bank accounts. No idea what DH has in savings or brings home every month (apart from it's a lot less than me currently).

A house cheaper than we can afford (we spend money on fun/hobbies/holidays). Say yes to experiences rather than stuff.

Don't have a budget- we live below our income enough that can absorb shocks, but also recognise we are lucky to do this. Not sure a budget would add anything except stress.

Don't meal plan

Until recently DH and I both had subsidised canteens at work and bought lunch most days. And a subsidised coffee.

Have no feelings about cars whatsoever, buy used, drive until they die.

Also did not leave London. Job opportunities are better and transport cheaper in London and there is more to do for free. My controversial opinion is that London is much cheaper to live in than lots of areas of the country if you got on the property ladder early enough. Or are happy with somewhere small or in a less fashionable area.

Yes, perfectly normal. We don't have separate finances now, as we've been together for nearly 40 years, and everything is merged/integrated, but we had separate and joint (equal) funds for probably the first 20 years or so.

In fact for the first 10 years before we bought a house together and got married, we went one step further and back then more use was made of cash, so we had our own purses/wallets and a "joint" purse/wallet which we took on holidays and days out, pub nights, meals out, etc. We'd put the same amount of money each into the joint wallet and then when we paid attraction entry fees, or bus fares, or meals etc., we'd pay cash out of the joint purse. If there was a difference, i.e. I bought a T shirt and he bought a fridge magnet, we'd pay separately using our own purses/wallets.

It worked really well for us, but our friends and family thought we were nuts. It set the precedent of joint and separate accounts for when we started doing more together, buying the house, paying household costs etc so we just naturally morphed into having sole and joint current accounts, credit card accounts and savings accounts. It meant there were no arguments or conflicts about "who pays for what" as we'd established the precedent back when we first started dating and we were dealing with much lower amounts of money on a date night or day out to the seaside etc.

Actually I don't think you sound stupid! Stupid would be failing to listen to the advice, or disregarding it as you think you know better. You've listened to the advice, acknowledged that it would make better financial sense, but decided that the peace of mind is worth more to you than the financial gain would be. I think that's legitimate.

@Photobot

A house cheaper than we can afford

Yes, that's a good "unpopular" decision that a lot of people don't comprehend. The general advice seems to be to max yourself out with the biggest/most expensive house you can afford with the biggest mortgage they'll give you.

I couldn't live like that.

Yes, I know the potential for long term gains are there, but I'd never sleep knowing all my savings and most of my wages were committed to a home.

We still live in the first home we bought when we first got married - neither of us owned a home before. It really is our "forever" home as we have no plans to move, ever. It's a lot smaller than we can afford, and everyone expected us to move up after a few years, especially when DS came along (it was tight for space for the 18 years he lived her), but now he's moved out, and it's just the two of us again, it's absolutely fine.

I do see your point.

Why have a miserable life when your kids are young?

I mean, there’s a balance here, as tomorrow WILL come (well, unless we die) but I don’t think prioritising retirement above all else necessarily makes sense.

Yes of course you save on interest if you overpay, but I think there’s something in what you say.

Free at Waitrose!

I budget fastidiously but there are three things I don't don't do that go against popular money saving advice.

The first two are meal planning and batch cooking. I have tried but it just doesn't work for me. I have tried to meal plan many times but end up halfway through the week and thinking 'nah, I don't fancy that'. Plus I can never buy just 'enough' of an ingredient to use it for the set meal(s) I've planned so it goes to waste. I suppose it might take practice to perfect it but I can't be bothered. As for batch cooking, I don't have the time or space to be cooking massive meals and whenever I've tried my husband just eats the leftovers before I get the chance to freeze them.

The third thing is always cooking from scratch, although I do a lot anyway because I like cooking, and it's healthier. But though it might have been true a few decades ago that always cooking from scratch saved you money, I don't think that's necessarily true anymore. You're telling me that buying all the fresh ingredients for a chicken pie, let's say.... Flour, eggs, butter, fresh herbs, etc is going to be cheaper than buying a ready-made pie from the chilled section in a supermarket? No way. And again, there's inevitably more waste.

I don’t budget.

I buy lunch most days at work.

i don’t meal plan.

i have the opposite of a capsule wardrobe (lots of ‘just in case’ pieces).

This thread has been a great confessional and guilt reliever!

Borrowing as much money as I can in this lifetime. Currently up to 1.2 million

We have one car between us. It’s almost never an issue.
We also live in a house much cheaper than we could afford but we’re priotising being mortgage free, having investments for the DC that mean they can avoid university debt, and I’m planning on retiring at 60. It’s taken quite a bit of mental effort to move past the idea that we should be moving up the property ladder.

What works for me is living alone and having no kids.

Been there, got the wee soaked mattress. Never again I'm afraid.

"Why not just put it into instant access savings?"

Might be different in the UK, but where I live instant access savings account give almost 0 interest so there's no point.

Exactly. A kitty you’ve both paid into for the days out.

We work in a similar way. When we have a weeks leave usually a staycation we have a holiday budget. A main bit for both of us and our own for our own spends. So we can treat each other or ourselves like ice cream on me and so on. I have mine as cash in my purse my DP’s on his phone.

Chase has got a good one going on at the moment