Feeling Conflicted About Spending

My husband and I have been spending crazy amounts of money lately. We’ve had a good deal of work performed around the house lately and we have a few more items on the list that I’d really rather pay someone to do.

Now that our windows and doors are installed I’d like to get the outside trim painted and there are a couple of rooms in the house in need of a paint job too. Though I know we can paint our own home I’d really prefer for someone else to do it. Our house has a lot of lead paint, particularly in and around the outside of our home and I’d really rather let that a professional deal with that.

Plus my husband and I always seem to fight when we paint together and truth-be-told we never do it as well as the professionals. I can paint the inside rooms, but I’d really prefer a professional to strip off the old paint outside and repaint. Of course, given our current luck with contractors I’m not sure how good I feel about hiring another one.

In addition to spending money for the house I’ve also spent some money on myself. I recently purchased five new summer dresses. I plan to return three of them after trying them on for my husband and receiving the thumbs down, but I will keep at least two of them. I also bought a nice, comfortable button down shirt and I hope to find some comfortable leggings that I can wear under the dresses. They are just a bit shorter than I would normally wear to work, so the leggings will definitely help me feel more comfortable.

I’ve also been giving more and more thought to remodeling our bathrooms. This has been on my to-do list forever, but now that the windows are in place I’d really like to knock this out too. I plan to call a contractor, (one that has done amazing work for us in the past), just to get an estimate.

I figure the best approach is to get an idea of how much it’ll cost us and then start saving for it. Plus, if we keep this goal in mind my husband will be less apt to spend the money on something else. Hint, hint.

After this we really need to get back to basics. To be honest I’m completely conflicted about spending the money. I love the enhancements we’ve made, but every time I think about the future I wonder, are we stupid to spend so much money. While I would like to retire sooner than later I also know that in order to enjoy your life and your home, sometimes you have to spend money.

4 thoughts on “Feeling Conflicted About Spending”

  1. Have you tried ServiceMagic.com…or kudzu?
    I know on Service Magic you can tell them that you're just in the planning stages. I like that b/c I'm a planner and I like to get different quotes first and figure it out from there.
    We have used Service magic a few times…a friend told us about it AFTER we got a new furnace…we needed a new central air unit and used Service Magic. within minutes of me hitting the 'submit' button, 3 people called! I set up appts and 2 came (1 no showed and 1 showed up late then called to reschedule…losing brownie points!). I picked the guy that came on time and he was very polite and explained everything to me. He had printouts for furnaces too and I looked at what he woulda cost us instead of the guy we did use….half off pretty much…ugh. The guy that came late was 100 bucks cheaper, and I told the guy that, and he matched the price AND took another 100 off! They came a few days later to do the work….and they were great!
    I used it last week b/c the motherboard on our furnace went. I have a best friend that's handy that can fix anything but since the furnace was under warranty and the fix would be free he didn't fix it…but for anything else in our house he's going to renovate for us.
    I like service magic….you should give it a try…even if just to get planning/budgeting done for it šŸ™‚

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  2. isn't that life? bleh.

    we don't have a home to spend on, but i know if we did, I would be conflicted whether to spend money to update the home or to go on vacation. Two VERY important things to me…

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  3. I am in the exact same boat. One thing has led to another and we went from having new wood floors and carpeting installed to purchasing a slab of granite to be installed in the kitchen for counters to a random stop at Macy's furniture that ended in new comfy chairs for our room and our sons room plus I just ordered new clothes for him from Gymboree and me from REI. When it rains it pours.

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  4. @spaghetti – I actually tried Service Magic awhile back. I got some quotes but didn't like any of my options.

    @newlyweds – Travel versus 'X' is always a question for me. I always dream of traveling, but often end up spending the money on something more practical.

    @anonymous – It does seem like spending comes in waves for me. I can go months without pulling out a credit card and then go on a shopping spree roll.

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