Hi, I am Scott McMonigal, Property Valuer, with knowledge and experience specializing a variety of property types and geographical locations in NSW. I have bought and sold many properties over the years and had experience in many situations including dealing with tenants & owners, natural & personal disasters. I am bringing that experience to you.
However, actions speak louder than words and my life motto!
I’m going to talk about “YOUR PERSONAL ECONOMY” now this is a concept that I have lived by all my life. I do like my mathematics, and I do think things can be broken down simply by maths, which can eliminate vagueness, waste of time situations, and measurement of things that you do every day that don’t have a $ value. Let’s get straight to it. I will use a number of examples to show you how it works, and how much time you spend on buying things. You will then see how much time and effort you spend on doing things that really don’t have a monetary value.
We all have costs per week to live;
Phone at $25
Car at say $100 including rego and insurance
Accommodation is a BIG factor and can be anywhere between $150 if you’re living at home and maybe up to $400 if you are paying for electricity, water, and renting by yourself. So, let’s just pick a figure of $250 a week to cover off (I’m sure it is more than that though)
Food $200
Incidental costs $50 (gyms etc)
For a single person-let us quickly add that up now. That equals $625 per week.
Deduct that from our net income of $800.
So, you have $175 to buy other things such as clothes, holidays, etc…
For example, just say you earn
$20 per hour after-tax and superannuation. You then have the usual situation of say a 40 hour week so therefore you’ve got $800 in money that you can spend on your commitments and then see what you have left.
Now, let’s divide that by your 40 hours and it equals $4.40. (I’ll use this figure soon)
So, these figures suggest that if you say buy a new phone case for $60 are willing to work 13.6 hours this week for it?
($60 divided by $4.40)
You got me?
That outfit in the wardrobe that cost
$440. That will cost in hours after costs 100 hours ie 2.5 weeks of work (5% of your year)
But wait …it gets worse!
So, then if you wear it say 10 times over the next 3 years, each time you wear it, it would of cost you $44.
Scary stuff I know right?
As long as you’re prepared to work for it I have no problem what you buy but sometimes the things we buy don’t reflect how much it actually costs us to work for it. Food for thought.
Now, before my next feature here is
your homework.
Homework: What’s Your Personal
Economy $ amount per hour?
