Okay, I confess, now that I’m debt free “Lifestyle Inflation” is creeping into my life!
Summer isn’t helping! There are so many fun things to do in the summer! Lifestyle inflation is where you do the same things, but more of them or you upgrade to a better version of them. An example would be when you take your old 32 inch CRT TV (don’t laugh, I still have one) and replace it with a new 60 inch LED HD TV! Another example would be instead of just going out to eat at your favorite restaurant (Olive Garden for my wife, Wasabi Japanese Steak House for me) once a week, you would go out more often, perhaps 2 or 3 times a week.
It’s especially easy to spend money on your children. This is the current hurdle that I’ve been facing. I need to buy a new battery for our ride on car so my daughter can enjoy the car too (like my son did). The cursed battery cost over $50!!!
I guess I could stick to a strict spending budget, at least for the summer! Then once winter comes back, I can roll out of the spending budget since I naturally spend less…
What ways do you fight the urge to increase your “Lifestyle Inflation“? Or do you succumb to it, but with balance?
-MR
Oh, summer is going to kill me for sure. A lot of it is my kids sports camps. Once they get to high school, camps are required where they go to school, and I have shelled out a ton. Not to mention I have to drive a gaggle of girls to a college 2 hours away for a 3 day camp, and pick up on Friday.
Our entertainment spending in the summer is pretty reasonable as we go to the beach a lot and museums/zoos I have annual passes for. However, I do have to drive, so gas cost and wear-and-tear on my car is going to definitely increase.
I’m an anal-retentive budgeter, so when I see our expenses creeping up, I usually freak out. I’m getter a little better…
We do have a small amount of lifestyle inflation budgeted in though…when we get raises, we boost our vacation and fun money “allowances” by whatever feels right.
For example, when my husband FINALLY gets to sign his new contract for next year, he’ll be earning $4000-$8000 more than he does now per year ($47k-$51k instead of $43k). We’ll probably increase our fun money per month from $125 to $150 and our vacation account from $250 to $275 or $300…especially since we will have no debt other than our mortgage by then.
I’m fine with controlled lifestyle inflation, lol. 🙂
@Everyday Tips
I like the idea of buying an annual pass! I will have to try that idea, Thx!!!
Your schedule sounds a lot more hectic than mine! I use to laugh at the idea of a soccer/taxi mom, but now after driving my kids to a few of these events, I’ve developed a much deeper respect for the task. Especially finding some of the initial locations!
@Budgeting in the Fun Stuff
I increased my fun money this year, and although I don’t directly track it, my mind passively remembers…
I’m working on creating a dividend stream that will start to pay for future vacations, but right now I just don’t have enough invested 🙁
I would guess that “Controlled Lifestyle Inflation” (nice modification of the phrase by the way, I like it) is good, as long as you still save a decent percentage of the increased raise money than you spend? So maybe save 50% of the increase and use the rest for controlled lifestyle inflation?
Either way you do it, it sounds like a great plan to me!
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