Money is an important item to have, if you want to open up many doors, metaphorically speaking. When you’re opening up any of these doors, you will have to trade in your money. This is fine for some doors that bring value to your life, but there are other doors that are not worth losing money over.
Remember, the world wants to take your money in any way it can; so in this article, I’ll point out 10 things you should stop spending money on or at least spend less on.
Some of these may be pleasurable to you and may have caveats in certain situations, but majority of time it’s a waste of time and money.
Bottled water
Besides potentially polluting the earth and having the risk of toxic plastic chemicals melting into the water, bottle water is very expensive.
With tap water, it only costs a few cents per gallon and is available in unlimited amounts. Bottled water on the other hand cost almost around 1,000 times more than the tap water and has a limited amount available.
Now, the caveat is that if your tap water is not drinkable then go ahead consume the bottled water, but majority watching aren’t in that situation and should get a refillable water can that has some tap water filled from home.
Extended warranties
Extended warranties, either by the manufacturer or third-party, are mostly unnecessary for many products, especially if you take really good care of them. Usually the warranties will never be used and if the product does break down, it will usually break down after the warranties period is over.
For some products, like electronics or house appliance, they can be affordably repaired by third party service providers or even replaced. There are some exceptions for some products that are really expensive to repair or replace and are in constant danger when utilizing them, like an automobile or a house furnace. Otherwise, you should save the money for something else.
Antivirus software
There is a lot of malicious software out there that can damage your device and your life. This is where antivirus software comes into play and saves the day.
The problem with antivirus software is that some scam you into paying for protection when there other software that can protect you for free.
In fact, many modern antivirus programs have now become bloatware and nagware asking you to pay for subscription fee over a certain amount of time for premium protection. Do not do that!
If you’re using Windows or Mac OS, just use the built-in antivirus software like Windows Defender and Xprotect respectively. Other types of operating systems, like Linux, don’t even need anti-virus software for protection.
There’s not really any exceptions unless you are computer illiterate, but even illiterate people won’t benefit from paying because they are most likely gonna mess things up when figuring out how to utilize their computer.
So instead, I recommend just learning how your computer works and how to operate it properly for the best protection.
Cable TV
Cable TV is pretty much useless in today’s society. We now have the Internet to bring us many types of entertainment at a cheaper price. This can be streaming services like Netflix, Hulu, Amazon, YouTube, and more.
What’s great about streaming is that there’s mostly no ads that get in the way of enjoying the content and most importantly you can watch it when and wherever you want to.
If paying is not your thing or you don’t watch much TV, you can just get free public television stations via an antenna hooked up to your TV.
There is no caveat to ditching cable unless there are some exclusive content on certain channels you enjoy, but even that leaks on to the Internet. Thus, making cable an irrelevant thing. So cut that cord!
Subscription to various magazines and newspapers
Not only has the internet taking away cable TV’s meaning of life, it has also taken away the newspaper’s and the magazine’s meaning as well.
The internet gives more up-to-date content for a cheaper price than anything the printed media has ever done.
In fact, most of the Internet’s content cost zero dollars!
Another problem with subscriptions is that there may be entire issues that don’t interest you, but you still have to pay for them and have it count as part of your subscription quota.
With online, you’re able to see what you want to see and you’re able to enjoy many ways of interacting with the content like watching videos and reading other people’s comments on the topic. Some print media is available electronically for a cheaper price.
The exception to the suggestion is if you like to read your in a printed form; plus, reading from a physical print will let you retain the information better, but other than that, just cancel the subscriptions you have!
Coffee from restaurants
Purchasing coffee from various restaurants like Starbucks or Bigby coffee is very expensive.
It also may have more sugar and unhealthy nutrients in it. If you make your own coffee at home, you will save a lot of money.
Coffee from restaurants usually costs around six dollars while making your own coffee at home cost around fifty cents per cup! Also, you have the ability to make sure your coffee is very healthy and you can modify the taste to however you like it.
It’s okay to occasionally stop in a restaurant as a treat or if you have something occurring, but you should avoid the habit of purchasing coffee from Starbucks often.
You will thank yourself later on how much money is left over.
Useless college degrees
College used to be where people go to get a high income job if they were smart and prove that they were capable of something.
Nowadays, almost everyone goes to college and is willing to pay a lot of money for attending. This as a result, caused many universities to increase tuition and offer useless degrees that did not benefit the graduates at all when finding a job.
If loans were used for tuition, the students are pretty much trapped in the debt.
The only reason you should go to university is to good degree in the stem field, which is science, technology, engineering, and mathematics or the medical health field.
These two fields have many jobs that are readily available to you and guarantee high pay, for the most part.
Other degrees don’t have much readily available jobs and, to be honest, require you to know someone to get employed.
If you are interested in those two fields, you should go into a trade like plumbing or become an entrepreneur by starting your own business.
Bank fees and late penalty
When you are selecting a bank, you should always be on the lookout for fees.
There are some fees that are understandable, like an overdraft fee, then there are are types of fees that can be outrageous like the minimum balance people, where the banks charge you for not storing a certain amount money in the account.
Regardless, you should avoid paying any fees at all to your bank. The bank is where you’re supposed to park your money for future use with interest built.
If a bank is charging unreasonable charges, it’s best to switch to another bank. This is what I did and it benefited me pretty well. This tip can also be applied to bills, such as credit card bills.
If you don’t completely pay off the balance of a credit card statement, you will have to pay interest that’s around 15 to 25 percent, which can take a while to pay off and that takes a lot of money. This is why you should pay off any bills you have immediately.
High maintenance cars
I myself am a car aficionado, especially when it comes to sports cars, but deep down, I would never purchase ownership a majority of them because these cars are liabilities.
Most modern cars nowadays are designed to fail earlier and be harder to repair.
Also, many car companies know that many people lease the car for a few years and then move on to a newer model, so there’s no real incentive to be reliable.
Also, 99% cars will always depreciate in value and you’ll never get your money back. So it’s important you choose a car that’s very reliable and exciting enough for you to keep it.
Books
Books can be great for you but only if you actually read them and enjoy the content. If the book fails to capture you in regards to entertainment or information, then is a waste of time and money.
This is why you should go to the library to rent the book and see if it fits your agenda. If it does then feel free to purchase it. But if you enjoy it, you may find yourself enjoying it once and then stowing it away forever to never read again.
This is the reason why I don’t recommend buying most books even if you like it because unlike movies, video games, and music, books require you to utilize your brain’s processing power at high amounts, thus many of you will feel lazy to read.
Plus, resale value is not really high for 99% of the books out there. So rent the book if you can and then move on when the book no longer serve your need.
If the book catches your attention constantly, then go ahead and purchase it.
These are the 10 things you should avoid or minimize paying for. Do you do any stuff? If so, why? Is there any more things you should not pay for?
