Let’s face it, we all love to go shopping. Whether you go gaga over gadgets or you love shopping for clothes, there are a few tips that you need to integrate to ensure that you are being a savvy shopper, not a splurging spender. These top tips include:
- Use the Internet and catalogues: It’s important to be a bit of a comparison shopper. If you have taken out no fax loans in order to shop, you should make the most out of these loans and only items where you can get the biggest bang for your buck. The Internet is full of websites where you can buy loads of items without having to worry about whether you are being overcharged or not. Take advantage of this when you are shopping to ensure that you are getting the deal that you want.
- Make a shopping list: It’s really important to make a full shopping list of what you need to buy whether you are shopping for clothing online or if you are going to buy furniture. The first thing a shopping list does is it focuses you on what really matters.
- Buy mass market products: There is definitely something alluring in premium and luxury products. However, don’t forget about mass market products as a great way for you to get your shopping fix without the huge price take. Take advantage of short term loans as the perfect platform to buy all of the things that you need for yourself.
- Shop sporadically: The key to avoid overspending on shopping is by shopping every now and then. By shopping infrequently, you keep more money in your comment which helps you to save more often. Shopping sporadically also means that you don’t end up buying the same thing over and over again which is a typical way that people lose out on money.
Remember: Saving when you are shopping is a no brainer because the more money you save on one shopping trip, the more cash you have left over for another shopping outing.
A few things that have helped me:
1) Use a bag proportional to the size of the shop. While in a small shop (boutique), limit what you purchase to one small bag or even what you can carry with your own two hands. While in a larger shop (Costco, Target, whatever), big bags and carts are OK.
2) It’s ok to splurge every now and then if you buy smart. By this I mean buy timeless, and buy for the long haul. Let’s say I need a new pair of shoes and I have a choice, either I can get a $50 pair or a $200 pair. Which do I buy? Well, if the $50 pair will last only one year, but the $200 pair will last six, I buy the $200 pair! But I better be damn well sure that a) the shoes will actually last that long and, b) that I can see myself wearing those shoes in six years. So I buy timeless. Peacoats, for example, are pretty much always in style. Mine wasn’t cheap, but it’s still in perfect condition after twelve years and it sees use every single winter. This is a smart purchase.
3) Buy off season when possible, but sell it on ebay at the start of the next on season, the following year, if you do not use it. Let’s say I bought a really nice fall/winter coat on clearance in the spring of 2012, but I don’t use it that winter, what do I do with it? Unless it is super timely, I sell it at the start of fall, 2013. The reason for this is simple supply and demand. I work for a clothing manufacturer and can tell you that our winter season (when we start carrying fall/winter clothing)technically starts in July and our spring season starts in January. We basically operate six months in advance. Shops, on the other hand, often operate three months in advance. They typically start accepting winter deliveries and swap their shelves out to winter stock sometime around September. You want to be on the cusp of this, because it’s when supply is low, but demand starts to ramp up. And if it’s from last year’s collection? Guess what, it won’t matter. If it did, the buyer wouldn’t be using ebay.
I wholeheartedly agree with your last point. Yesterday, I felt the impulse to shop – so what did I do? I located something in my house that I knew I would need down the road (in this case, more diapers for the baby – they ALWAYS need more diapers!) and went out and bought some. It’s like buying toothpaste – how can you feel bad about buying something you need and use?