Worth the Cost – Part 1
This week I wanted to offer ideas to determine when frugal crosses the line and becomes plain old cheap. Kim beat me to it by posting this great article. I doubt I can top those cheap ideas, so I’ll just substitute it with something that’s been on my mind a lot this past week: Time is money.
We’ve been visiting grandparents for the last 10 days. Both sets of grandparents live in the sticks and only have access to dial up Internet. O h. M y. I think the paint on my kitchen walls dried faster than pages load. All the time I’ve wasted sitting here while something loaded, could have been better spent doing something else. Although I am doing other things while waiting, jumping back and forth has killed some of my productivity and piqued my frustration at times. I can’t imagine doing this on a daily basis.
There is little doubt that I am spoiled rotten when it comes to Internet connectivity. We’ve had high speed Internet for the last 7 years. That might sound extravagant, but for us, time is money and it’s a frugal choice. Let’s see how that’s possible…
It has definitely costs us more to have high speed internet, but the time is money concept comes into play. Rich needs fast Internet when he works from home. He needs to be able to send large files back and forth to work. If Rich is waiting for files to upload or download, he’s wasting company time when he’s not productive. The dollar a day we pay for high speed Internet is much cheaper than the multiple dollars per hour that slow load time would cost his company.
I do a lot of work through the web too. As a stay at home, homeschooling mom, I need to quickly finish my online business and get back to my children. I also need to be on and off before the kids notice and get into trouble. One 10-minute “artist session” on the living room wall might cost me hours of clean up. It could also permanently ruin something that we might have to replace. Although my children have a strong sense of right and wrong and may be Messengers, they aren’t always angelic. “Creativity” happens.
I talked about my iron saga a couple weeks ago. With a high quality iron, I’m able to cut my work time by half. I can use those extra hours for family time, to be productive around the house or help with the family income. Some of those extra hours go towards using the Internet for education and research. We view the Internet as a tool right along with the refrigerator, lawn mower and vacuum cleaner. If it doesn’t work well or efficiently, productivity suffers. Internet service is just one of the many things where time can equal money in different ways that aren’t always obvious.
I realize that not everyone really needs high speed Internet. It also isn’t available in all areas. A trip to the library a couple times a week might be worth it when you need to do research. The time saved might very well be worth its weight in gold. I also know that there are many folks who just use the Internet for entertainment. For those folks, they need to decide what’s prudent for their family and go with it. Rich and I are business users and feel the need for speed. But like I’ve said before, what’s frugal for us, might not be frugal for you.
Where are the areas that you’ve decided time equals money in your family?
Next time we’re going to talk about frugality and DIY. Is DIY worth the cost?
Want more like this post? Read on!
- The Cost of Convenience A couple months ago we purchased a pulley clothesline system...
- Measuring the Cost of Children Recently, I have again been reading articles discussing the extraordinary...
- Is renting a vehicle for a vacation worth the expense? The math screams yes! frugal living by Ray @ EasyLivingSherpa Planning on taking a...
8 Responses to “Worth the Cost – Part 1”
October 24th, 2007 at 4:51 am
I know not many people are going to agree with me on this one, but I pay someone to clean my house every other week. She also runs 4-5 loads of laundry and puts them away while she’s here. I pay her $50 for each visit.
It’s completely worth it to me because I teach full-time (five courses of high school science). My husband works in sales full-time. I’d rather spend my time saving money by grocery shopping and cooking healthy meals. We used to eat out much more, because I was spending more time cleaning or being stressed about cleaning.
I know I make up that $100/month and MUCH more by getting the best deal for our money at the grocery store and cooking healthy meals at home. Plus, I’m less stressed and able to spend more quality time with our family (both of which are healthy benefits).
Like you said, Janel, what works for us may not work for everyone else!
October 24th, 2007 at 7:19 am
We consider high speed internet to be the frugal choice for us for all of Janel’s reason but also because the cost of a land line plus the cost of dialup internet is very nearly what we pay for our faster internet.
Similarly, we feel that cellphones rather than a land line are a frugal choice because we live very far from town; if a quick call on the cell when I’m already in town can help us prevent a few unplanned trips to town each month then we’ve nearly paid the bill.
And I’d just as soon *not* find myself stranded w/8 children and no phone on a twisty, hilly stretch of road with a mile or two to the nearest house.
October 24th, 2007 at 9:16 am
For us too, we choose high speed internet. I love being able to look things up, learn things, share things, etc. Dial vs. cable modem for us is about $5/mo difference. I’ll pay it.
We also chose to invest in a good digital SLR camera, so I can take portraits of my kiddos instead of paying someone else. I’ve loved improving my skills and have several pictures I’m quite proud of. We have more pictures of the kiddos now, than when we’d pay to go somewhere and be given pressure sales.
Like Kim C, we chose cellphones instead of landlines because I can call and get calls from anywhere. Great for emergencies. If I don’t want to answer the phone, I can turn it off. Will have to figure out something when kiddos are old enough to stay by themselves sometimes (get them a cell phone or get a landline again) so they can call for help if needed. My cell has come in handy several times.
October 24th, 2007 at 12:22 pm
Like KimC – we also have high speed internet. We live just far enough from town that DSL isn’t available, but cable internet is. I own a web design business, so having dialup just isn’t an option. Having cable internet and phone is actually cheaper here than having a land line and dialup anyway, so it’s a good tradeoff.
Another thing I’ve been toying with is getting a new computer. Not because I want one – I’m perfectly happy with the one I have. It’s getting so slow though that like you mentioned, I need to be able to get to the computer, do some work, and get off quickly to tend to my son.
We’ve also considered going to all cell phones and ditching the cable phone because the internet phone quality just isn’t that great. At the moment though, the price is still lower so we haven’t yet made the switch.
October 24th, 2007 at 2:15 pm
For the two years that I’ve had a computer in my home I steadfastly refused to get high-speed service, believing I was making a sacrifice to save money. Imagine my astonishment when I found out I could get high-speed CHEAPER then dial-up. I was able to sign up for a combination phone/internet service from a local company and save $20 a month. I can think of a lot of other places to put that money and a lot of things to do with the time saved. So check around, don’t just assume that harder is better!
October 24th, 2007 at 2:49 pm
We got DSL about 3 months ago and we LOVE it!! I know it is not as fast as high speed, but it is definatly not as slow as dial up.
I love to cook and I figure time equals money on certain kitchen appliances/gadgets. I am longing to get a high end mixer, mainly for the purpose of lesseing my time in the kitchen.
October 25th, 2007 at 10:11 am
I think everyone has their own level of expertise and comfort. So what I may pay someone to do or pay top dollar for maybe a waste to someone else. I keep that in mind when people share their lives with me. What works for me, is just that, works for me.
I can do without DSL and a housekeeper…….but I however found it to be best for my family if we have a vacation once a year. For us, it keeps our sanity. We do it as frugal as possible and we always pay cash. But it is what works for us!
I am so glad to read this post as often I think people think I am silly to clip coupons, shop thrift stores but then buy annual passes to Disney (vacation of choice and we live just 3 hours away from there, so we go often.). It is good to know that others *get it*.
God Bless,
Michele
October 25th, 2007 at 11:34 pm
We have high speed right now because I write online for extra cash. Having fastr access has hlped in so many ways, especailly when esearching an article.
However, before we made the switch I found tasks that could do while waiting. Folding towels, knitting, making notes. Anything that can b done sitting down at the computer so that there is no jumping back and forth.
Leave a Comment