The Cost of Owning Things

I never thought about a lot of things I purchased once I owned them.  I figured the amount I paid at the store was the cost of the item.  Turns out that is not entirely true.

It's easy to illustrate the ongoing costs of things by using some obvious examples.  How about cars and homes?  These are big ticket items that cost far more than what we pay initially.  They incur costs like maintenance, taxes and insurance.  At one point, I would have never dreamed of renting a property to live in, but after thinking about it....what is the total cost of all those taxes and yearly insurance renewals?  How about the yard tools I need and the time it takes to groom the property so it doesn't get overgrown?  Oh, I'll need a shed for the yard tools, gasoline and yearly maintenance for the mower.  My HVAC?  That needs maintenance too.  Forget pride of ownership for a moment and focus on sheer time and dollars.

The big things are easy, but what about all the small things we overlook?  Sure, we need things like chairs, magazine racks and tables to outfit our homes and it's hard to imagine these things have an ongoing cost to own them.  They do.  It doesn't become evident until we have a quantity of items that is greater than our ability to manage them.  What the hell does that mean?  It means we have more things than we know what to do with.  I guarantee nearly everyone reading this can find a fair quantity of things around the house that have been upgraded, rendered obsolete, not used due to loss of interest, not used due to not having replacement parts or batteries, has no current purpose but we think it might later....

In aggregate these are the things that make a modest home feel smaller.  These are the things that force us to park the car outside because they are filling up the garage.  When the car is outside, it is exposed to the elements and depreciates.  That's a cost.  When our things fill up space we use for living, it costs us to heat them, cool them, move them, deal with them.

I've said this before....Everyone should have to relocate every 18 months or so.  The task of gathering up all of our crap and boxing it is a sobering one.

Fairly frequently, when a client calls us to sell items, we will find boxes in closets, garages and attics that have been moved multiple times from home to home and never opened.  You can't tell me it didn't cost anything to move it each time.  "What's in the box?" I ask.  "Oh that's my aunt's punch bowl set.  We've moved it from house to house because I keep thinking I might use it someday.  We had it in storage for a year when we moved from Indianapolis, but now I guess it needs to go."  Multiply that story by the dozens or even hundreds of items that might fall into that category for a single family.  Now get out your calculator.  Owning stuff costs us.

Open those closets, crawl into the attic and be ruthless with your things.  If you haven't seen it in more than a year....eBay, Craigslist, Salvation Army.  Less is cheaper.

Get it out of the garage.  It's costing you.