Buy like there’s no tomorrow? Not possible lah…

This morning, the topic on Melody FM was on money. How to reduce expenses since life is hard. A caller called in and said his household income is around RM11,000 and yet every month, he could only save a few hundred ringgit if he is lucky. He asked the invited guest speaker how to save more. The guest speaker said the first thing everyone should note would be to write down things that we are spending today. Chances are there are many that we forget to remember. Cut those… (expensive drinks, food would be major culprits too) Personally, I think these days we no longer buy like there’s no tomorrow. It’s due to financial awareness too. Spending too much may ‘kill’ us when we see the credit card bill. However, I seriously believe that most of us tend to spend MORE when we earn more. The first thing which we must cut is the tendency to buy everything we see and like in the shopping mall, during a CELEBRATION. For example, the upcoming Chinese New Year (CNY).
Let me illustrate just one real example. I saw one long sleeve shirt, brand starts with P the other day. It looks good on me and the colour is right for CNY. However, it was RM199 and has only a 20% discount as it is new arrival. I did not proceed to buy. There are still a lot more important stuffs to buy, not to mention cheaper options. Plus my friends would not know that this RM199 shirt looks better than another one I am wearing during CNY. Last but not least, when it costs 50 percent cheaper towards the end of 2017, it will STILL look good on me. Haha. Okay, hopefully there is still my size. I think the type of malls we go to can also either make us spend more or less; due to the brand choices availability. My favourite mall is 1Utama mall. It’s the nearest mega mall to my home, it has the brands which are considered affordable to me, lots of food choices and of course plenty of parking spaces which is cheaper than the city centre. Yesterday, after parking for slightly over 10 hours, the total parking was still lower than RM10! Haha.
Anyway, there were lots of people there and I can safely say that the mood is now turning into Chinese New Year. The lanterns are being put up, the familiar songs have started and many visitors are buying new clothes for their loved ones. So is everyone buying like there’s no tomorrow? Well, since salary has just been released, there’s definitely more shopping. With Chinese New Year (CNY) being on the tail end of January, it meant that the shopping will continue for the whole of January. Let me predict, the retail numbers for January 2017 would be good. 🙂  It’s important not to overspend these days. However, to deny ourselves some fun in picking nice new clothes, to deny our parents some nice new clothes or a handbag is indeed wrong. Spend responsibly. There’s still a tomorrow that we need our money for, yeah?
written on 3 Jan 2016
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