Saving money is something that I take fairly seriously and part of my strategy for saving money is to get the most out of everyday items that I can. I just don't see why you should throw something away when it might still be able to serve its purpose in life. The following are just a few of the things we are trying to get the most out of.
The TV
The reason why I am writing about this topic today is because over the last week I have noticed that our second TV is starting to really crack up. It's an LCD TV and it only gets used a few hours each week for me to watch Game of Thrones and my wife to watch her DVD's.
We first started noticing that it had an issue about 18 months ago when the edges of the TV started to bleed. It didn't really detract too badly from the overall viewing experience, but I was still annoyed that it was having issues when it was used so infrequently. Still, I decided that it was serving its purpose as a 2nd TV and so replacing it wasn't really an option.
Anyway, this last week while my wife was watching a DVD I noticed that there was a strange solid black link about 2cm from the bottom of the screen. We passed it off as being a faulty DVD, but after the DVD was finished playing the line remained at the bottom of the screen.
Again, this is annoying, but the TV is still more than watchable and I can't justify spending another 1000 or so dollars replacing a TV that we use so infrequently and that still displays 99.9% of the picture - particularly when we have another TV that is working perfectly.
Toothbrushes
I'm pretty bad when it comes to toothbrushes as I always try to get the most out of them and it usually ends in my toothbrush looking like the dog has chewed it to death before I replace it. I know that toothbrushes don't cost a huge amount of money, but I just can't seem to get out of the habit of using it until it just can't be used any longer.
Clothing
Something else that I get the most out of is clothing, particularly shirts, undies and shoes.
In short, this means that I have a wide selection of shirts that I now keep as either gym shirts, fishing shirts or paining / around the house shirts. Most of the time they only have minor things wrong with them, but they aren't really presentable in a good social setting.
My wife hates that I hand onto undies as long as I do. Quite often I will wear them even when there are gaping holes throughout. I'm not sure why I have such a hard time replacing them, but I do.
Bed Sheets / Linen
Last month we ended up buying a couple more bed sheet sets as the ones that we bought for the bed when we first moved into our house have finally started to fray and tear in places. I don't mind spending money on these though as we have had a particularly good run with them and they were really starting to get very worn down and holey.
Cars
My wife and I have a car each, both with their own set of problems. My car has this really annoying squeak whenever I put my foot on the clutch to change gears, while my wife's car has a problem with the CD player in that it just refuses to play any CD's.
Neither of these problems are going to stop the car from operating, but both will cost money to fix. To fix my car then someone needs to take the gearbox out, and that will cost quite a lot of money. While my wife's car will likely mean a new CD player.
So the point I am trying to make with this post is that sometimes one of the best ways to save money is to try and get the most out of as many items as you can. If that means that you have to deal with a few faults along the way, then in my opinion it is worth the money saved. However sometimes things are just too critical not to replace when they start to have issues and so in those situations there really isn't many options other than replacing the item.
Question
Do you have any items that you are getting the most out of?
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