this post was submitted on 23 Aug 2023
33 points (97.1% liked)

Frugal

5112 readers
1 users here now

Discuss how to save money.

founded 1 year ago
MODERATORS
 

When I think about bills, I annualize them. $30 a month? That's $360 a year. $5/mo? $60 a year.

I use this to help me grasp the long term cost of all my decisions, but nobody else I know does this.

For instance, my brother and I are moving soon into 2 separate apartments (we currently share a 2 bedroom) and the new complex doesn't have Google Fiber Internet. I complained to my brother that on top of everything else I'll have to pay $5/mo extra for Google extended storage I was getting for free.

He said it's only $5/mo, just get and don't worry about it. I was like, that's $60 a year which is basically a Costco membership. He said "oh hmm, good point yeah"

So I'll work on reducing my storage usage on Google to be able to stay on the free tier, but am I alone in thinking this way about everything I buy?

you are viewing a single comment's thread
view the rest of the comments
[–] mayo 3 points 1 year ago

I'd guess this is normal for people who budget. Same as @vynlwombat I consider how many years I'll use it. I also amortize capital expenses which is useful for figuring out how affordable something is to me.

In the past I've put together a budget with all annualized services and amortized capital expenses to figure out what is the most spendy/find outliers.