With the credit crunch squeezing hard, many of us are trying to make our pennies go a bit further. But are your
money-saving habits starting to cost you more time than they're worth?
If you're spending hours every weekend clipping coupons for the sake of a couple of dollars or discounts, or if every shopping trip involves trekking around multiple shops to compare prices, you might want to step back and consider whether the time spent is worth it
How Long Are You Searching? When you find yourself spending time in order to save money, make a note of how long it takes. Do you spend four hours making a batch of
homemade laundry detergent in order to save money? Do you hunt through websites like
Money Saving Expert for tips on grocery offers? It's easy to spend a lot of time online seeking out the best bargains, only to find that there's a difference of perhaps a couple of dollars in it. Is the hour you spend searching worth more than a couple of bucks?
How Much Are You Saving? How much are you
really saving? Maybe you got a book for $0.40 cheaper after hunting through every bookstore in town and every online bookseller - that might mean you spent a couple of hours of your life for the sake of $0.40! You would never take a job for $0.20/hour, so think seriously about whether the savings are worth it.
If it takes you an hour to
make your own salsa, but it only costs $1 more to buy it ready-made from the store, again, you might want to question if your time is really only worth $1/hour.
Go For The Best Savings For Time Spent Chances are, 20% of your time is yielding 80% of your savings (or thereabouts). Look for the high payoff savings that don't take much time. For example, these might be:
- Using just the highest-value coupons
- Checking the offers from two main grocery stores online, not six.
- Buying from either Amazon or Barnes and Noble, not hunting through every online bookstore and high street store.
- Using sites that will compare tons of stores at once, like PriceGrabber.
- Using ebay for second-hand clothes, but setting a time limit on how long you'll spend searching on the site. Does it really matter if you end up spending $0.30 more on a sweatshirt?
Enjoy Hobbies That Save Money The one caveat is that if you have a
hobby that saves money (for example, if you're a keen knitter and love making your own clothes, or if you enjoy gardening and grow your own vegetables), you needn't worry how time-effective it is. The point of a hobby is to enjoy an activity for its own sake.
But in order to have time for your hobbies and interests, you need to look at where you're spending too much time to save too little money. It's easy to become obsessed with frugality, but just like being overly focused on productivity, you'll find that you get diminishing returns for each hour spent "tweaking" your lifestyle.
Now, if you are going to stop clipping coupons simply to watch TV, you're not getting the intent of this. The intent is to use your time in a way that will maximize your cost savings or earnings.
What money saving habits do you have that don't cost you much time?  | Written on 1/13/2009 by Ali Hale. Ali runs Alpha Student, a blog packed with academic, financial and practical tips to help students get the most out of their time at university. | Photo Credit: Dustin Diaz |
译文:
急剧减少成本真的及时削减开支了吗？
随着信贷严重紧缩，我们中的很多人正试图节约每一分钱。但是省钱习惯耗费你更多的时间，它们真的值得吗？
如果你每周为了几美元或若干折扣花下数小时去剪优惠券，或每次采购都逛很多店为了比较价格，你可能需要退一步好好的考虑一下所花的时间是否真的值得。
你要花多长时间搜寻要买的东西？
当你要花时间去省钱，记录花费的时间。为了省钱，你是否要花四个小时制作一批自制的洗衣清洁剂？为了找到买到合适杂货的方法，你是否需要搜索诸如省钱专家这类网站？我们很容易花大量的时间在网上找到最佳的交易，但也许只是几美元的区别。然而你在搜索时花下的时间却不仅值几美元。
你节省了多少？
你真能节省多少呢？在搜索遍城里的每家书店和每家在线书店后，你可能买到了一本便宜了$0.40 的书——这可能意味着你花了生命中几个小时仅仅为了节省这$0.40！你不愿意接受一份$0.20/小时的工作，那么就好好的想一想这笔节省是否值得。
如果你要花一小时制作自己的salsa，而从店里买现成的只要$1多点，你就问下自己你的时间真的仅仅值$1/小时吗？
把时间花在真正省钱的地方
用20%的时间省下80%的费用（或大约）。寻找那些不需要话很多时间就可以省下一笔钱的事情。例如，可能是一下这些事情：
- 使用高附加值的优惠券
- 比较主要两家杂货店的报价，而不是在六家中比较价格。
- 向Amazon或者Barnes及Noble购书，而不是找遍所有在线书店和大街上的书店。
- 使用能立刻比较大量商店的网站，像PriceGrabber。
- 在ebay上买二手衣服，但需要设定花在这个网站上搜索物品的时间。如果买一件运动衫需要多花$0.30你真的很介意吗？
享受爱好能省钱 一个告诫是如果你有一个爱好，它能帮你省钱（例如，如果你喜爱编织，喜欢自己做衣服；或者你喜爱园艺，种自己的蔬菜），那么你不需要担心所花下的时间。爱好是对自己活动的一种享受。
为了给自己的爱好和兴趣留出时间，你需要审查一下花了很多时间却省了很少钱的地方。人们很容易被节俭迷了心窍，就如过多的关注生产力一样，你会发现每个小时在扭曲你对生活方式，而得到回报却在不断减少。
现在，如果你准备停止剪优惠券，而简单的转向看电视，你还没有明白这篇文章的意义。这篇文章的意图是把你的时间用在最佳节省费用上或者挣到更多的钱。
你有哪些不会占用你很多时间的省钱习惯？