Today concludes my first month under a cash-only budget, so I figured I’d relay a few observations I’ve noted in the experience.
1. With a cash-only budget, you think more about what you buy.
Perhaps the most notable observation from this experience is that I, as a cash-only consumer, think more about what I am buying. With a cash budget, discretionary spending becomes something you think about a bit more deeply. When presented the opportunity to buy something I wanted, I often found myself asking: Do I really need this?
The answer was almost always no.
This leads to the second item…
2. With a cash-only budget, you see your money disappear.
This is the inherent problem with plastic — both debit and credit. Most people that spend using cards, my former self included, don’t keep check registers up-to-date.
And even if they do adhere to somewhat of a budget, swiping a card is just too easy.
With a cash-only buget, you see the precise amount of money available and conservation of that money becomes a priority over the various wants that tempt you on a daily basis.
And this brings me to the third observation…
3. With a cash-only budget, you spend wisely on things that matter.
This was an item Andi pointed out to me yesterday, and I noticed it in my habits over the past month as well. Because you see your money disappearing and conservation of that money is front-of-mind, you spend more wisely.
The example Andi mentioned, and again what I noticed in my own habits over the course of July, is that we now had the ability to “vote” with our money. Per the term she used, “voting” with our money meant choosing to support the businesses we feel strongly about.
Because we aren’t spending frivolously on unneeded stuff, we can shop at the local co-op and get the healthier substitutes to add to our diet rather than buying in quantity at a chain like Wal*Mart.
In other words, we “vote” to support the local businesses.
Sure, we may spend a little more (albeit, in truth, not much), but we get more out of it.
The sentence above holds an interesting truth that also fits this observation, but I’ll make it number four instead…
4. With a cash-only budget, there’s less waste.
Shopping at the chain grocers did a few things: seeing the high number of sales encouraged me to buy outside our initial grocery list.
This is two-fold wasteful.
First is the fantasy: I was buying groceries that were more a This sounds good… rather than I will eat this… Make sense?
Second is, of course, the money: Because of the fantasy, these foods often sit unattended. They aren’t part of my regular diet and so they tend to not get used. They expire. They get thrown out.
Wasteful.
In terms of the final sentence in #3, because I now buy only what I plan to eat, and that the food I buy is of higher quality, I spend a little extra on that food yet actually save money overall. My food budget began at roughly $60 a week and has decreased through out the month to about $45 as I monitored more closely what food purchases I made.
Likewise, there’s less literal waste overall thanks to cash-only budgets. Prime example: about a year ago we downsized from a full garbage can to a half-can. Thanks to this month’s cash-only budget, we didn’t even put out the trash last week.
We had just one bag and it wasn’t even full.
5. With a cash-only budget, standard consumer behavior appears gluttonous.
Andi and I were up in Bellingham last weekend to sell some items (side note: the money we received ultimately went into building up personal security funds). It was a hot day with the sun burning down and, being a redhead, I needed some sunscreen.
We were outside the mall, meeting someone who was interested in picking up collectibles she was selling. She mentioned a Target store attached to the mall and recommended I go pick some up.
So I walked through the mall and it hit me: the mall is quite the disgusting place. It has no character, no originality. Even things that look nice are not — they may cost a lot, but they’re cheap. And the people, too, seemed unoriginal.
I’ve had similar revelations about chain corporations and malls and so forth in the past, but it had never been this strong.
I didn’t loath the people there, nor the stores. Instead, I was reminded of Plato’s Allegory of the Cave. In a way, I feel as though I have been released from the cave — perhaps this occurred long ago, but only now I am acclimating to the hypothetical outside world.
This thought, of course, is not solely confined to switching to a cash-only budget.
For those stuck in a rut of consumerism, the striving to be the Joneses, they might understand the appeal of the cash-only budget, but they might struggle to understand the appeal of the more minimal, frugal lifestyle Andi and I yearn for.
I recently mentioned the downsizing to my mother. She applauded that I was able to get rid of stuff, but displayed audible hesitation around selling the house and buying something smaller.
I didn’t mention that the “something smaller” would be a 117 square foot trailer.
Figure it might take some warming up to drop that one on her.
Conclusion
Were I to not adhere to this more stringent budget, I do not believe a frugal lifestyle would be accomplish-able. The two, at least for me, seem to be paired hand-in-hand.
And this brings me to the final observation: with a cash-only budget, saving money becomes downright easy.
