Comments on: On how car dealerships helped me save money

By: Felix

Felix — Tue, 26 Oct 2010 10:18:36 +0000

I tend to think in terms of years of free time it buys me (1 year of lazyness = 6000€). This keeps me very very motivated.
It also helps me keep my expenses low. Who wants to lose years of freedom for random purchases?

I’ll have to try walking past a car dealership, though.

By: Steve in W MA

Steve in W MA — Sat, 25 Sep 2010 08:30:43 +0000

I read this article about a year ago and it didn’t really click with me. But today I read it and I really really like this article, Jacob! What a great mental frame/mental trick to motivate me! I am going to start doing this too!

Right now I can buy one “decent” used car or 5 1999 Geo Prizms. (However, a $1000 1999 Geo Prizm (as I recently saw advertised) is actually quite a reasonably good car and would be 7 years younger than my existing car, which still runs great! I actually helped a friend buy well-running 96 Prizm recently for $600 so if you look at that depreciation curve it is pretty shallow! And I can really make a beater run! My existing car is 18 years old!).

Very soon I will be able to buy one new Honda Civic in cash. Of course I would never do something that stupid. $2000 is the top price I will consider for a car unless I suddenly get rich.

I would like to increase my income so I can save money faster, but right now I can save enough to buy about 1/2 of a new honda civic per year.

I’ll be looking to get an imaginary fleet of them. 500k/16,000=31.25 2010 Honda Civics.

Where will I park them all? I will have to line my street with them.

Or how about this: a fleet of 500,000/1000= 500 1999 Geo Prizms (maybe not so appealing as an image!)

Where would I park all of THOSE? I could fill all the parking spots in my small city with those! Except for the parking tickets of course!

Maybe instead I will start counting in terms of Peter Pan/Coachliner buse, or Freightliner Tractor Trailers. Ialways did 500,000=5 Coachliner buses or 5 Freightliner tractor trailer rigs (My brother drives those for a living).

Thanks again for the great mental trick and image!

By: John Ingle

John Ingle — Fri, 18 Dec 2009 00:24:26 +0000

Some of this older stuff is pure gold! You should link to your own articles more often. I love this particular idea. I’m a super-computer geek and I may just start thinking of my savings in terms of the raw processing power I could purchase with it. Thus far I’ve been thinking of my savings in terms of expense replaced per month. So if I save $1000 this month, then I’ve just replaced $3/month of my expenses.

Raw computing power sounds like a more awesome unit of measure though.

By: Steve @ cpastories.com

Steve @ cpastories.com — Sat, 10 Oct 2009 17:38:04 +0000

For some reason I don’t remember reading this piece when I was reading your story a few months ago. I suspect that it is because I don’t click around until I am done with a story. I figured I may have missed something, so I am here to re-read your story.
This is a really neat idea. I have been measuring my savings against my FI goal, and it has been “discouraging” to see that it is so miniscule. However, if I start measuring it against something not so big, for example, cars like you did, or monthly without a job, or something like that, it will be totally encouraging. You mentioned that it takes a genius to create a paradigm shift (in part I) and you said you were no genius. Well, I got news for you… you are a genius in my world! You not only created a paradigm shift for yourself, but you just created one for me. Thanks!

By: James NomadRip

James NomadRip — Wed, 14 Jan 2009 22:19:16 +0000

Nice idea! Breaking it up into smaller items like that makes a bit of a difference on perspective! I will have to try putting that to good use! (Just found your blog today, and am going back and reading from the beginning.)