Beating Broke

Personal Finance from the Broke Perspective

How Much “Stuff” Do You Own?

By 12 Comments

Every few years or so the discussion in my house comes back around to how we’ve seemingly outgrown our house.  It’s about 12oo square feet, and there are currently 2 adults and 2 children living in it.  It can get cramped.  Sometimes more than others.   But, I try to remind myself that the people we bought the house from somehow managed to raise 4 children in the home.  How?  I have no idea.

We have a bunch of “stuff”

I think that one of the major differences between the couple that lived here before us raised their children in a different age.  It was an age of far less consumerist tendencies.  And, even with our increased awareness of consumerism, we still seem to accumulate stuff regularly.  I’d be lying if I didn’t say that I contribute almost as much to the problem as anyone else.  I’m frugal to a fault, but there are plenty of things that I accumulate that fit within those frugal means.  Books would be the primary culprit.  I’ve been better lately, buying books for my kindle more often, but I still have quite a bit of books that are hanging out on shelves.

Aside from the books, we’ve also got an entire shelf full of DVD movies.  We probably only watch about 4-5 of them with any sort of regularity.  And they’re all kids movies.  I can’t tell you the last time any of the adults here watched any of the adult DVDs.  It’s hard enough for us to find our time to watch The Walking Dead.

There’s so much other “stuff” that we just don’t need.  Every so often, we go through and clean a bunch of stuff out, and minimize a whole bunch of “stuff” out of our lives.  And, slowly, it all creeps right back in.  Either through gifts, or through replacement with other new things, it eventually grows to the same size.  I suppose it’s because it’s not really a “necessity” that we keep the minimalism up.

It’s nice to have a certain level of creature comforts around.  Things that we simply don’t need, but that we use once in a while.

[Tweet “Have nothing in your house that you do not know to be useful, or believe to be beautiful. – William Morris”]

Too Much StuffHow wonderful would that be?  Nothing that isn’t specifically useful, or that you don’t think is beautiful.  Of course, that means you’d have to find out how you define useful.  Beautiful is easy to define, even though it’s definition is a little different from person to person.  Useful, though?  That’s a different story.  At it’s simplest, you can probably define useful as something that you use daily.  Or maybe it’s something that you use weekly.  Or monthly?  Well, maybe it’s not so easy…

What You Want Balanced By What You Need

If you’re reading this article, you’ve likely read other articles.  And if you’ve read other articles, you’ve likely also read a few about people who live in incredibly small spaces.  Those are people who’ve really, really managed to discover just how much they really need.  The rest of us likely are living with so much “stuff” we don’t really need.  And, if we’re living with so much “stuff” that we don’t need, maybe it’s just the natural path of things.

I don’t know about you, but I don’t really want to believe that it’s just “natural”.  I think we accumulate “stuff”, even if it’s subconsciously, just because we can.  Because we don’t have any good reason to live minimally.  That would require work.  That would require some commitment.

And frankly, work and commitment are something that most of us aren’t willing to give to our “stuff”.  We’ve got better places to put our time and efforts.  But, we can take small steps.

What steps do you take to make your “stuff” more minimal?

Do We Inflict Peer Pressure On Ourselves?

By 10 Comments

When my husband and I got married, we were flat broke.  Broke.  We bought the cheapest wedding bands that we could find, and my diamond is small.  However, that was my preference.  I wanted to stay within budget, and I personally like smaller diamonds rather than the big rocks that some women wear.  (All I could think was that when I had babies, I’d accidentally scratch them with a big ring.)

Still, there have been times that I’ve been in the presence of a group of women, each with a huge rock on her hand, and I’ve been a bit embarrassed by my small diamond.  I’ve wondered what other people thought of us and our financial situation.

Peer Pressure Doesn’t End in High School

In high school, peer pressure is at its peak.  If you want to be popular, you have to follow what the other kids are doing.  I didn’t cave to peer pressure often.  Instead, I had a few close friends, and I followed the path that was important to me.  I was relieved when I graduated because I thought the peer pressure would finally be done.

In college, I found that the peer pressure did relent.  People would respect your choice if you didn’t do what they were doing.

However, as I got older, I began to realize that there are societal norms that you’re expected to maintain.  This becomes the “keeping up with the Jones'” phenomenon.

The Pressure Becomes Internalized

Self Inflicted Peer PressureMy husband and I are digging our way out of serious debt.  We are scrimping and saving, knowing that in a few short years we will be out of debt and can start fresh.  We can have all of our money be our own once we’re out of debt.

Meanwhile, we drive a 10 year old minivan with over 125,000 miles on it.  I wear my small diamond ring, which I don’t ever plan to replace with a bigger version.  We rent an apartment instead of owning a home.

No one is pressuring me to spend money that we don’t have.  No one is passing judgment on us (at least not to us directly).  But it’s hard not to look at other people’s lives and see the “stuff” that they have.  The nice cars.  The nice home with brand new furniture and a manicured lawn.

No one is telling me I’m failing, but I feel it sometimes.  I feel that I’m not living up to society’s standards.  I can see how easy it is to want to keep up with the Jones’, even if you can’t afford it.  I can see how easy it is to pull out the plastic just this once because you’ve been scrimping and saving and just want to be like other people once in a while.

For the people who can afford it, there is no danger in this.  For the people who can’t afford it, there’s just debt and heartache.  You might then be just like those you want to be like.

Me, I’ll keep resisting the peer pressure, even though now it’s mostly pressure I put on myself.

A Two-Step Approach to Preparing Kids for a Giving Holiday: Part Two

By 4 Comments

The holiday season will soon be upon us.  If you find yourself stressed out every holiday season by financial and time demands, now is the time to decide that this year will be different.  Now is the time to decide on a giving holiday. Not only will you benefit, but your kids will as well.

Last time we talked about teaching your kids to give during the holidays, and this time we’ll talk about the second part of creating a giving approach to the holidays–teaching your child to have reasonable expectations for presents.

Years back, the holidays weren’t simply a time to get-get-get.  As a girl, I loved reading Little House on the Prairie, and I was always amazed by how delighted Laura was by the simple presents she received.  One year it was a tin cup and an orange.  Another year it was a corn cob doll.  Now, our kids receive oodles of presents and still demand more and are disappointed when the present opening is over.

Preparing kids for a giving holiday part 2How to Set Reasonable Expectations

If you’re the parent of older children and you previously gave them too many presents, you might sit down with them well before the holidays and let them know that they won’t be getting as much this year.  You can explain that you want to focus more on giving rather than receiving.  Plan on some resistance, but if you hold firm and continue to treat holidays this way, your kids will adapt.

If you’re children are younger, you can start the tradition of a simpler Christmas now.  Your kids may express some resentment as they age and see how much their peers are getting, but if it’s your family tradition, they will likely understand.

How Many Presents to Give

You and your significant other will need to decide what works best for your family.

Some families decide on a dollar limit per child and don’t go over that amount.  This is the way that my mom always handled Christmas for my brother and I, but she carried it a step further and made sure that we each got an equal number of gifts, too.

Other families say that Jesus received 3 gifts from the Wise Men, so they give their kids 3 gifts for Christmas.  Another take on this is to give your child 3 specific presents–something they want, something they need, and something they’ll wear.

In our family, we are blessed with grandparents and godparents that give our children many presents.  So, we buy our children very little for Christmas.  The one time we did buy our kids a lot of Christmas presents, they simply received too much.

Finally, some families take an extreme approach and don’t exchange presents at all.  Instead, they donate all the money they would have spent to charity.

If your children are already used to lavish holiday celebrations, scaling back may be difficult, but it’s not impossible.  First teaching children to be givers and then scaling back may help ease the transition for your child.

How do you determine how many presents to buy your child?  Do you worry about going overboard with gift giving?

Original photo credit: Theresa Thompson, on Flickr