Budget Busters – The Sales! Monster

Don’t we just love sales? You can now buy more. Buy one, get one free! 50% off! Closing down sale! Everything must go. There is often a stampede and in some instances, the Police had to be called in. There is this feel-good feeling that comes with getting something cheap. Buy one get one free is a masterstroke. You actually feel you got the second one free. Nothing beats the feeling of getting something for ‘nothing’. Why pay for something when you can get it for free?

Buying on sale can be a good way of staying within your budget, or spending less if used wisely. However, the challenge is with the free mentality. When something is free, we just grab and grab and in the process spend beyond our budget and gather stuff we may never use. What do you do when you are offered an unlimited choice of free books of every genre? You grab or download all you can, even books in genres you don’t usually read. You just look at any title that catches your fancy and grab it. That is exactly what the store owners want you to do – help them clear out their old stock. The catch is, it is not really free. You have to pay for them.

There is no way you can save money by spending it, no matter how steep the discount is. Every sale party you attend leaves you with less money in your pocket, a lower savings balance, and a higher credit card balance. That is the untold story. That is the last thing you think about as you join the fray. The reduced price induces you to switch off your brain and indulge in the joys of retail therapy, often heaping up stuff people had returned.

You actually save money when you get items on your list on sale. You spend less. This means you actually time your purchases to coincide with sale periods. This is a smart way to use sales to your advantage. You simply stick to your list and avoid impulse purchases. By timing your purchases, you can buy your plane tickets for your summer holiday during the low season (making your booking months ahead), buy against next summer when summer stuff is being cleared out to give room for winter wear, etc.

This means you plan strategically, by expanding your planning horizon. Instead of planning and budgeting month by month, you plan and budget for the year, to ensure you capture items that do not recur monthly and decide the best time to buy them. That way you are proactive, planning ahead rather than reacting to events, and joining the last-minute crowd.

If you do not have a clear idea of what it is you want to buy, you will grab whatever catches your fancy, lulled by the perception of getting it for free. The only way it will be free for you is when you have two items on your list, you get to pay for one and get the other free. Then and only then will it truly buy one, get one free.