What is Free Money?
Unless you have a very minimalist lifestyle you have expenses.
Charlie Chaplin - The Little Tramp - circa 1915 - Symbolising a generation
These expenses fall into three cateogories:
1. Unavoidable - > Food, rent, power, telephone
2. Avoidable but likely - > Insurance, maintenance, replacement of items
3. Totally avoidable - > Entertainment, luxury food Items, drinks
So if you earn $500 in a week (after tax, a totally different subject) and your categorised expenses are:
- Unavoidable $300
- Avoidable but likely $100
You are left with $100 which we call 'Free Money'. You can spend it freely, or invest it.
Breaking this down; for every free dollar, it took $5 earned.
Put another way, when we spend a free dollar, it will take $5 earned dollars to replace it.
And in another way....If you buy your lunch for $10.00, but could have made it for $5, it actually cost you $5.00 Free Dollars and $25 earned dollars.
If you did that for 5 days, the week's lunch cost in earned dollars is 5 * $25 = $125
If you make a habit of buying your lunch, the total true cost is 40 weeks x $125 = $5,000 a year.
If you earn $500 a week (after tax) then you are working 10 weeks a year to pay for not making your own lunch.
One fifth of a year of you life, each year, dedicated to being... dare I say it... lazy.
Free Money is the resourse that you can use to create your future. Or you can use it to buy your lunch.
Of course, most people's plan is to get a pay rise. And acting like a miser at the pub will not impress your friends or that potential date. So you have to keep it real.
Consider the things that you don't need and see if you can recover Free Money.
Ideas
- Make your own breakfast
- Make your own nutritious lunch
- Don't buy coffee or fizzy drinks
- Energy drinks are actually not energy drinks so don't waste your money
- Learn to drink water. There are lots of ways to prepare it and it becomes a favourite just as easily as any other drink
- Plan your dinners so you are never short of the ingredients
- Save money as a result of good deductions and introduce habits that preserve your future