Do you place a value on your time? How much is an hour of your time worth? How did you decide on an amount? Do you ever take this into account when making financial decisions?

Years ago, I read "Your Money or Your Life". I loved the authors' idea that we should consider all of our purchases, not in $$ terms, but in how much of our lives we give up (to work) to make the purchase. Since then, whenever I consider a purchase, I think to myself "Is this really worth XX hours of work?" A lot of the time, the answer is "NO".

I do now after spending the last few years being a coupon queen I have stopped. Costs me a little extra at the store but saves me hours of clipping, sorting, searching, etc for coupons. Well worth getting my time back! The only ones I feel are worth my time now are restaurants, events, etc. Like we love Red Lobster and they always have a $4 off coupon every month so that I cut out. All those 55 cent ones are just time wasters!

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A woman is like a teabag. You never know how strong she is until she gets into hot water.-Eleanor Roosevelt

I never thought of it this way. Thanks for the thought.

I used to when I worked out of the house..but I hadn't really thoughta bout it since I became a sahm...

Shoot, yes!! In Economics 101 they call it "opportunity cost". It is the cost of choosing one opportunity over another. For example, how much is the value of your time to choose between 1) spending time with your children or 2) washing your car. You value the time of one over another based on your financial conditions and a few other things as well.

Everything has a value. Whether it is a monetary value or a time value.

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Absolutely! One thing that gets me is travel time- as in, is it worth driving thirty minutes to save 40% off on something? Or- make vs. buy... sometimes I can buy something cheaper than I can make it, sometimes the reverse is true. I constantly weigh this.

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I don't believe in miracles; I depend on them

I guess I don't and I was actually thinking about this today. When I know I need sliced olives, I would never spend the money on the little can already sliced, I buy them whole and do it myself. The same goes with shredded cheese. I can't make myself pay the extra when I know I can do it myself. But maybe I should rethink....time is the thing I seem to have the least of.

This is VERY interesting that someone brought this up becuase my time... is the one of the MOST important things to me. Because DH works night shift and afternoon at as a drug and alchol councler, TIME IS THE BEST THING TO HAVE, our schedules are opposite, and that makes it hard, so I will surpase my want to be frugal just to spend time with him... even if it means getting take out or delivery to spend that extra 30 minutes together. Also, I value my time with him and do not want to not see him to shop or something so that helps me be frugal too... if any of that made sence

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CaRtEr
April 19, 2008

hmmm. I have never thought of it that way. That's a pretty good way to think about it when you are making hasty decisions on things not needed. Thanks for the tip.