I am a bit of a clothes horse. And at any given time my closet is over-flowing with odds and ends or every size, shape, style, and flavor. I love to wear red, I have a collection of tanks in every shade of the rainbow to compliment, and modestify my ward-drobe. What I am most proud of is how little I paid for each item in my closet. I am a major deal-monger. I have attractive shoes that I've spent less than $3 on. I have a fancy jacket I bought on ebay for much less than it retails for, and I have probably changed out my ward-drobe every 2 years withouth spending much money on it. When I get tired of something, I list it on ebay, and use the money I get to purchase the next item. I once bought a semi-formal dress on clearance at Dillard's for $25. Two years, and several wears later, I hocked it on ebay for $49. Not too shabby, eh?
I love that I can always find a way to get what I want. The oddity here is that am terrible at budgeting. I just plain don't do well with finances. But I always know how to find money when I want something. My husband is continually frustrated with my magic ability to have whater I want w/o using the family money. I think he wishes I'd sell stuff on ebay and start a savings account with it instead. I barter, and sell, and bargain hunt until the item I am seeking fits inton the narrow window of possibility that I have created as a guideline for it's acquisition.
I've also learned that by trading things out frequently, the value of the original item holds longer. This is especially true with electronics. I proabaly get a new camera every year. And I generally sell my old one for at least as much, or more than I purchase the new one for.
Once, after discovering that Kitchenaid now makes their mixers in Red, I was determined to get one for my new house. I had a white shabby, not so chic, one that functioned just fine, but I really wanted that red one. So I put mine for sale, and I got $278 for it on ebay. Then I watched, and waited, and hunted. About a month later, I found a refurbished one with a full warranty for $279 including shipping. AND, it was RED!! I was delighted! Some people may find these habits shallow, and materialistic, but for me, I see it as a a creative shopping outlet, and a way to enjoy the hunt so to speak, without frequent overspending.
Wednesday, April 1, 2009
Friday, February 20, 2009
Bartering in Modern Times??
I just had a wonderful sense of happy gratefulness wash over me as my house-keeper left yet again, and equally as happy as I, with an armful of fabulous items in exchange for her past few weeks work.
In December I told the woman whom I'd been paying to clean my house on a bi-weekly basis, that I could no longer afford her services. What a terrible time for me to have to tell her that, let alone the fact that she was doing a great job and I really needed her. She was quite gracious and understanding about it, and even offered to come a few more times in exchange for a couple of leftover scrapbooking items that we had previously discussed bartering for. I happily agreed as her services would see me through the mess that was our Holiday Season.
After Christmas she continued to call and come as regularly as before, and mentioned that I still had things she was interested in. I finally just had to ask her how long she thought this arrangement was going to work out, because I didn't want to depend on her if she was going to quit coming one day. She just smiled and said, "Don't worry, you have lots of things that I want." I was stunned, as well as very grateful that she was willing to continue our bargain.
It is now approaching early march, and she has shown no sign of quitting anytime soon. She is a little more free about the time she arrives, and if there is a day here and there that she can't come, but otherwise just as dependable as always. So far I have given her a 6 foot folding table, a couple chairs, a food processor I wasn't using, some Quickutz metal alphabet dies for cutting letters out of paper, plastic drawer units, a dresser, and more. And she still keeps coming every week, twice a week. She leaves just as satisfied as I feel about being able to still have my home clean even though I am too busy right now to do it myself.
The more I have thought about it, the more grateful I have become. It has been a huge blessing in disguise, and I feel almost guilty about it because I am getting 2 things from it. One is a clean house, the second is I am little by little ridding my home of it's excess. Something I've been planning to do for a long time anyway. I had planned to list lots of stuff on ebay, which takes quite a bit of time. So now she just lets me know what things she is interested in and during the week I decide on a price for those items. I have explained to her that I really need to recover a fair price for my scrapbooking items, as I would be able to do on ebay. So some of the things that are more pricey she doesn't choose, but on other things I try to give her the best deal that I can. All in all you've got two happy ladies here!
A few months ago I was in my neighbors backyard and noticed they had recently disassembled their chain-link dog run and tucked it behind a shed. I asked what they were going to do with it and she just smiled and said, who knows! We don't need it. I immediately thought of how I could use it, and remembered us talking before about her buying some of my folding tables that I had inherited from a recent business purchase. So I offered to trade her those tables for the dog run. Well this week, her unwanted dog run was re-assembled in my backyard and covered with wire. It now houses our 13 baby chickens we've been raising the past few months.
The more I think about this, the happier I get. I have fallen into the trap in recent years of collecting too much stuff. And now I am in the position where I want to simplify, and I can't get what I want out of my stuff. People just won't pay very much for used stuff, no matter how nice or how valuable. And that can get frustrating. So I'm thinking I need to be more aware of what's going on around me so that I can use bartering more to trade value for value and get the things that I need without spending money. This accomplishes the 2 things I mentioned before. (1) I get what I need, and (2) I give up what I don't need. Could there be a better deal?? Well those are my thoughts on the subject today, I hope you enjoyed them! Maybe you'll try out bartering
now and see where (or what) it gets you. Bartering has literally made my life a breeze!
In December I told the woman whom I'd been paying to clean my house on a bi-weekly basis, that I could no longer afford her services. What a terrible time for me to have to tell her that, let alone the fact that she was doing a great job and I really needed her. She was quite gracious and understanding about it, and even offered to come a few more times in exchange for a couple of leftover scrapbooking items that we had previously discussed bartering for. I happily agreed as her services would see me through the mess that was our Holiday Season.
After Christmas she continued to call and come as regularly as before, and mentioned that I still had things she was interested in. I finally just had to ask her how long she thought this arrangement was going to work out, because I didn't want to depend on her if she was going to quit coming one day. She just smiled and said, "Don't worry, you have lots of things that I want." I was stunned, as well as very grateful that she was willing to continue our bargain.
It is now approaching early march, and she has shown no sign of quitting anytime soon. She is a little more free about the time she arrives, and if there is a day here and there that she can't come, but otherwise just as dependable as always. So far I have given her a 6 foot folding table, a couple chairs, a food processor I wasn't using, some Quickutz metal alphabet dies for cutting letters out of paper, plastic drawer units, a dresser, and more. And she still keeps coming every week, twice a week. She leaves just as satisfied as I feel about being able to still have my home clean even though I am too busy right now to do it myself.
The more I have thought about it, the more grateful I have become. It has been a huge blessing in disguise, and I feel almost guilty about it because I am getting 2 things from it. One is a clean house, the second is I am little by little ridding my home of it's excess. Something I've been planning to do for a long time anyway. I had planned to list lots of stuff on ebay, which takes quite a bit of time. So now she just lets me know what things she is interested in and during the week I decide on a price for those items. I have explained to her that I really need to recover a fair price for my scrapbooking items, as I would be able to do on ebay. So some of the things that are more pricey she doesn't choose, but on other things I try to give her the best deal that I can. All in all you've got two happy ladies here!
A few months ago I was in my neighbors backyard and noticed they had recently disassembled their chain-link dog run and tucked it behind a shed. I asked what they were going to do with it and she just smiled and said, who knows! We don't need it. I immediately thought of how I could use it, and remembered us talking before about her buying some of my folding tables that I had inherited from a recent business purchase. So I offered to trade her those tables for the dog run. Well this week, her unwanted dog run was re-assembled in my backyard and covered with wire. It now houses our 13 baby chickens we've been raising the past few months.
The more I think about this, the happier I get. I have fallen into the trap in recent years of collecting too much stuff. And now I am in the position where I want to simplify, and I can't get what I want out of my stuff. People just won't pay very much for used stuff, no matter how nice or how valuable. And that can get frustrating. So I'm thinking I need to be more aware of what's going on around me so that I can use bartering more to trade value for value and get the things that I need without spending money. This accomplishes the 2 things I mentioned before. (1) I get what I need, and (2) I give up what I don't need. Could there be a better deal?? Well those are my thoughts on the subject today, I hope you enjoyed them! Maybe you'll try out bartering
now and see where (or what) it gets you. Bartering has literally made my life a breeze!
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