Cutting Costs

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When I first told my mom about my plan to start the Spending Fast, her first concern was a very important one, "So what does that mean for your hair?"  I'm so glad my ma' knows where my true priorities lie. 

But seriously, do I need to pay for the salon while I'm on the spending diet?  My answer is, "yes." 

Once again with this challenge, my "necessities" are at my discretion.  I am not paying for a gym membership, as Anna did, but I am going to continue getting my hair colored.  Why?  At heart I am a blond.  I've been every color under the rainbow, and I always go back to blond, it just feels like me.  For women who color their hair, it might be more cost effective to color at home.  This is always good for women wanting to darken their hair 1-2 shades, women who want to cover grays, or women who want to warm up or tone down their natural color.  As a self proclaimed beauty junkie, I do not recommend at-home-hair-color for women who go blonder and are not natural blonds.  JUST DON'T DO IT.

I get my hair colored regularly about every eight weeks or so.  My girl is really good, but can be pretty expensive.  Expensive = not Spending Fast friendly.  So while I decided to count my highlights as a necessity, I also didn't want to cheat myself out of maximum savings.  I have a hair appointment on Saturday, so I've found ways to cut the cost and save myself money. 

The first cut is hair cuts.  For the next year I am not going to get a hair cut.  My girl charges about $35 for a trim - not a cut, a trim! - which I think is a little much for a girl pinching-her-pennies.  When my hair was shorter, it was always worth it, but now that it is longer and still growing, I've asked my mom to trim my hair when I need it. 

I also usually get a full highlight, but for the next year will only be getting partial highlights (only the top half of my head). 

I am also stretching my in-between time from 8 weeks to 10 weeks.  Did you know that stretching this in-between time can actually save you two salon trips every year?!  Amazing.

After talking to my girl about making these changes, I have cut my normal salon bill by close to 60%! 

I have to remember that I'm doing this spending fast to hep myself.  If I am not willing to cut some of my luxuries I have failed before I even begin.  Because my salon trips are a necessity for me, but a want for others, I compromised, and made this "need-want" Spend Fast Friendly.

Walking in the Spider Webs

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Once I made my official list of needs, I realized that there were still places I could cut costs.  For example, I have an iPhone, and I hate it.  No, seriously.  I've had three iPhones, the OG version, the 3G and the 3GS and I have hated them all.  Currently I am just waiting for my upgrade to become available so I can take a hammer to my current phone.  Everyone loves this piece of garbage phone, but I swear it's the devil.

I think a big reason for my dislike is that I really don't take full advantage of it's capablities.  I use it as a phone, to text, an iPod and sometimes I use the internet.  I don't care about the games or other apps, and most of them crash anyway.  I carry a really nice camera in my purse with me, so I don't NEED the camera function, and I have three iPods, not counting the one on my phone.  I have the internet at home and at work, and for the sake of the Spending Fast, I really don't NEED it on my phone. All I do online anyway is blog and shop, and internet shopping is out, and internet-window-shopping would just be torture.  So, blogging can be done at home, instead of in traffic... I kid, I kid.

By removing the internet package on my phone plan, I can reduce my monthly bill by 50%!  That would put another $50.00 in my pocket every month!  I know that cell phone companies are funny about the iPhone and internet packages, so I'll have to look into it. 

I'm not completely sure I'll make this switch, haven't I given up enough already? But, at the same time, it does help me to see dollar signs, and the motto "go big or go home" keeps popping up in my head.   If the phone company won't let me, maybe I'll consider trading in my iPhone for a dinky one that doesn't do anything but make phone calls and text.

Netflicks...

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I know, I know.  After reading my post about what I consider "necessities" there are probably some questions floating around.  There's a few things on that list that I'm not exactly proud of.  For example, why am I keeping my NetFlix account?  Well to be honest, it is sort of my last ditch effort to hang on to some luxury... Is that cheating? 

I watch movies all the time, and right before I began the fast I switched my account down to the $10/month plan.  I will now get unlimited instant rentals and one DVDs out at a time (instead of 3).  I did a little math, which was tough, because I haven't done math since I took Calculus III my sophomore year of college.  This account will now cost me about $119.00 this year, as opposed to the $180.00 each year I was spending for one extra DVD.

Sometimes others may question my "necessities," and so it's important for me to reevaluate them and see where I can really save money.