“Hey Dad, you can change your own oil and save $20 bucks!”
“Honey, that’s not worth my time.”
My Dad and I had this conversation in high school, and at the time, I had no idea what he meant. How could saving money be a waste of time?
Now I get it. Traditional finance advice encourages you to waste your precious time in order to save pennies. Here are three money-saving tips you should avoid.
Time-Waster #1: Coupons
The TV show “Extreme Couponing” glorifies it, but couponing can hog your energy and cause you to stockpile things you don’t need. This energy-draining activity requires:
- Gathering coupons
- Printing or clipping the coupons
- Filing them in your wallet
- Hunting for a specific brand in the aisles
- Double-checking that you’re buying the “right” quantity
- Shuffling through your coupon stack at the register
- Stockpiling a 6-month supply of salsa just because it’s on sale
- Weeding the expired coupons out of your wallet on a weekly basis
I’m exhausted just typing it. Not only does couponing eat your time, it commands your energy and attention — and you should take great care about how you direct your energy. Our minds can only juggle so much.
Total Time Clipping Coupons: 2-3 hours per week.
Alternative Route:
Number one, buy stuff that offers the best combination of price + quality. It’s penny-wise, pound-foolish to buy something that will break in 3-4 months.
Secondly, grab a discounted gift card to the stores you normally shop at (for me, that’s Target and Home Depot, but for you, that might be a specific clothing store or chain restaurant.) I stash a few of these in my wallet and use it whenever I happen to be at that store.
It saves me 7 to 10 percent off whatever I buy, and it’s hassle-free: no expiration, no clipping coupons, and no stockpiling. You basically get a few bucks off every purchase with almost zero effort. (Total time: 5 minutes).
Time Waster #2: Bank-Hopping
Too many people shuffle their money between banks because Bank #1 is offering a savings account with a 0.025 percent higher interest rate than Bank #2. This interest-rate-chasing requires keeping up-to-date on savings yields, opening and closing accounts, and reading the fine print to make sure you won’t be hit by some surprise fee which would wipe out your gain.
Total time: 2-4 hours per month to keep up-to-date, plus 1-3 hours per new account opened.
Alternative Route:
Ignore that stuff. Find one bank that you like and stick with it.
If you have $10,000 in a savings account earning one-half of one percent, you’ll earn $50 a year. If you DOUBLE it after hours of painstaking internet research, you’ll earn an extra $50 per year.
The time cost? Let’s be generous and assume you “strike gold” after just 1 hour of online research plus 2 hours to open the new account. For the rest of the year, you spend only 1 hour each month scanning the Web for a better deal. Total time = 14 hours per year, or $3.57 per hour.
You’re far better off starting a side business or simply enjoying time with your friends and family.
Time Waster #3: Some – But Not All – D.I.Y. Projects
Don’t get me wrong; our friends regard Will and I as the King and Queen of do-it-yourself projects. I often write about these: I grow veggies in the yard and file my own (complicated) taxes while he repairs our rotting rental home: building a deck, installing new windows, tearing down walls.
But certain D.I.Y. jobs just aren’t worth our time.
Alternative Route:
Here’s my rule of thumb: a task that must be done repeatedly is worth learning. A one-time task — like certain technical back-end things for a website — are not worth my time to learn, since I’ll never need to do it again.
There are exceptions, of course. Some one-time tasks are ultra expensive, so they’re worth learning. And some repetitive tasks are so cheap that they’re worth outsourcing. That’s why Will says he’ll never change his car’s oil again.
To change your own oil, you must:
- Go to the store.
- Buy the oil/filter/pan.
- Wait for your car to cool once you return home.
- Lift your car with hydraulic jacks.
- Make sure it’s secure, so you don’t get crushed.
- Drain oil into a pan.
- Remove the filter (which is slippery and hard-to-turn).
- Pour in new oil and replace filter.
- Scrub your arms/hands/face, which are now covered in oil.
- Dispose of the used motor oil pan – probably requiring a second trip to the store.
Total Time: 1 – 2 hours plus $10 in supplies, including two trips to the store: one trip to buy the oil plus a second trip to properly dispose of your used oil.
Cost to outsource it: $20 with a coupon — yes, this is one coupon worth having.
Photo courtesy Krossbow.
You’re spot on with the coupon analysis. I have found that keeping track of regular prices for regularly purchased items is a much better way to save money.
For example, if you know that a package of tuna usually costs you $1.25, then you know to pass on tuna when it’s $1.50, and to stock up when it’s $0.75.
@Jasmine — Exactly! I have a pretty good idea about the price of the regular items I buy. There’s no reason for me to stash a thick stack of coupons in my purse, and try to track all the expiration dates. That’s too much of a headache!
Got to disagree with you and Jasmine. I know quite a few people who coupon successfully and none of us spend anywhere near the Total Time Clipping Coupons: 2-3 hours per week that you quote.
We all basically do the same thing. Take the entire newspaper coupon insert that comes in the Sunday paper. File the entire insert by date. On shopping day go to any of several coupon blogs that match up the sales for your favorite store with available coupons. All the coupon match ups will either be downloadable or will let you know which insert to look in to find the appropriate coupon. You download and clip only those coupons you want or need.
Typically my wife and I spend maybe 10 or 15 minutes reading our favorite coupon blog and downloading or clipping those coupons we want and need. As a general rule we typically save 35 to 45% off of our grocery bills. The blog owners do all the real work for free, and nobody I know buys stuff they don’t want or need (except for occasionally stockpiling things like soap or paper goods that don’t spoil). None of us bother cutting out coupons beforehand. We only cut out the ones we need that day.
@Weston — I figured I’d get a comment from a few people who have found an effective couponing system.
If you can coupon in a way that only requires a minimal amount of your time and energy — that’s fantastic! The bottom line is to find a “sweet spot” in your savings — a task that gives you the largest savings for the least amount of time. If you can coupon quickly and effectively, that’s awesome!
I do clip the “oil change” coupon since I know it’ll give me a cheap oil change and it won’t take up any of my time or energy. I also buy Groupons (which are a little different). Otherwise, though, I prefer to just roll in with a discounted gift card, get a flat 8 percent off of everything, and not spend too much time thinking about it.
Weston, I do the same thing. Only clip the coupons that are needed when I read about a deal in a coupon blog.
I agree with Weston. I only look for/clip for things I know I’m going to buy. So it doesn’t even take that long.
But I do get your point. There are some people out there that could be doing way more productive things with their time.
I file my own taxes, too! I just can’t understand why people would pay someone tens to hundreds of dollars to do something they really can figure out themselves. (Especially when the IRS has a free # to call if you come across a particularly sticky situation.) Something I don’t do myself: my hair. I used to. It was working out great for years and then once I made one unfortunate snip….
So true. I have been thinking the same. There are certain things that are worth the time, like lifestyle changes (ex. eating in instead of out), but I will never clip coupons. I usually google coupon code + the company’s name when I make big purchases. It takes a few minutes and I can usually get at least 10%.
@20′s Finances — In the last few months I’ve made a lifestyle shift towards eating at home more. Its one simple but major change, and its saved me far, far more money than any kind of penny-pinching ever has. Plus I eat healthier because of it.
I’ve often tried to google company name + “coupon” but most of the sites that offer this information require me to ‘click’ to recieve the coupon code — i.e., to buy the product through that site’s portal. I prefer to shop through a frequent-flier mileage portal in order to rack up my rewards miles, so my google search doesn’t usually yield me any usable results. Of course, I do the math to see which option will save me more money, but assuming 1.5 cents per mile, the frequent-flier route usually is the better choice.
I couldn’t agree with you more about the do-it-yourself projects. I do a lot of work on my own cars but there are several car projects I never do myself. Tires, brakes, exhaust, and fluid changes are at the top of the short list. There are too many discount service centers willing to do this work at greatly reduced prices to make the effort worthwhile.
On the other hand, with dealer labor rates over $100/hr and flat rate billing systems charging four hours to do a one hour job, I often do other car repairs myself. If you have, or can get, the skills and the tools to do the job right, it doesn’t make sense to pad the pockets of someone else.
@70usd — Definitely!! My boyfriend says he’ll never change his oil again, but he definitely fixed the car’s A/C when it broke … that D.I.Y. job saved us several hundred. The way I see it, you’re always going to own a car, so fixing cars is always a skill that will come in handy.
Without the equipment that auto mechanic shops have, changing oil can be time consuming. Auto repair shops don’t even make much money on oil changes either, it’s moreso used as a way to get people in the door and then they can look for the more profitable projects for them…
I’m happy to take my car to the shop for an oil change so I have time for more important things 
People can think coupons are waste of time and energy but for some people, it is very helpful. We spend no more than 15 minutes going through coupons on weekly basis and we end up saving some money. It’s not a lot but it’s still something.
@UltimateSmartMoney — If you can manage coupons in a way that requires only a small amount of your mental bandwidth and your time — and it sounds like you can — then that’s fantastic. You should stick with it if it works for you. I’d merely caution people against devoting too much time and mental energy into couponing, at the expense of improving their career/business or relaxing.
So, does this end up being a question of one’s hourly worth? So a poor person should coupon but for a rich person it would be wasteful? At what point is it worth your time and how do you calculate that? For me, I take my monthly take down and divide by 16 hours per day. I’d say that’s a reasonable time instead of 8.
So for the savings account example your take home every two weeks would be around $800.
The other favorable factor would be sign up bonuses. I know this one guy that apples for 13 credit cards and got 500,000 air miles. That’s good for a days work!
@Sun — The mass credit card tactic is risky, because it damages your credit score. (Many factors go into your credit score, including the number of new accounts you’ve recently opened and the average length of the history of each of your accounts). Then again, if the man who used the credit card tactic plans on leaving the U.S. for several years, he might not care if his credit score is dinged.
Pump the brakes! I disagree with you about coupons. My family has been clipping coupons for years and the savings add up! If it takes someone 3 hours to clip coupons, I can only imagine it’s because their hands are arthritic. I have a grocery list template. When food runs out, I look for that coupon. I also use my grocery store card, which allows you to download coupons to the card, then deducts the value at the register when you swipe. It’s all about couponing smarter, not harder.
@Coco — I’m seeing a lot of readers who are pro-coupon, which tells me that these might be effective for some people. If you can successfully coupon without devoting too much time or energy into it, that’s fantastic — go for it!
As technology improves and we can “automate” our couponing, I imagine that couponing will become more efficient. As it currently stands, though, old-fashioned clipping coupons seems pretty inefficient. I would never — personally — take the time to look through coupon books, pull out the ones I need, and try to remember which products have coupons / when they expire / what store locations they’re valid at.
Thanks for your insight! Like I said, if couponing works for you, and it doesn’t take up your mental energy or too much time, that’s awesome! That’s more money in your pocket to invest / spend on amazing experiences!
I can imagine that the extreme couponers spend hours, but most couponers probably aren’t that devoted. I spend a few minutes a week going through the weekly insert and checking a printable coupon website, usually during commercials while I watch TV. I only clip coupons for products that I would buy at a good sale price anyway, and the coupon usually cuts anywhere from 25% to 75% off the already low sale price, so it adds up to a few dollars per shopping trip.
Once a week, when I get the grocery store mailers, I go through them and prep my shopping list and clip any coupons I like from the mailers. Then I go through my coupons and pull any that apply to items on the list and I’m good to go. Including prepping my shopping list, I doubt that I spend more than 30 – 40 minutes a week, and I consider it enjoyable – like a game – not drudgery.
As for DIY, now that I can watch someone else do a task on You-Tube and order parts from repairclinic.com, I’ve saved hundreds on repairs to appliances, watches, electronics, fixtures, etc. The only ones I outsource are those that I just don’t feel I understand well enough to do safely even after my research, and the ones, like changing oil, that are too messy or physically uncomfortable for my aging joints.
Just tonight I opened my store flyers and found a perfect example of couponing, my way. One of my local stores has a promo – a dozen large eggs free with the purchase of two rolls of Jimmy Dean sausage, at 2 for $6. We eat both those products when we get them at the right price (which is NOT $3 per roll), so a while back, when I ran across a manufacturer’s coupon for $1 off two rolls of JD sausage I clipped it, plus I kept a store coupon for one free roll, part of a customer-rewards flyer that arrived a month ago. At my store, both will be accepted. So I’ll get two pounds of sausage and a dozen eggs, that would cost $7 to as much as $9 if purchased at regular prices, for a total of $2. Total effort maybe 3 minutes, if that.
@Pearl — If you can coupon efficiently, without using up too much time or energy — that’s fantastic! The real goal is to find the “sweet spot” that gives you the largest savings for the least amount of your time.
You mentioned that this sausage-and-eggs coupon deal only took a few minutes. May I ask a question: How much mental energy or attention do you need to give it? How do you keep track of what coupons you have, what stores each of them are good for, and what date each of them expire? I find that my head starts spinning when I try to track all of that stuff …
I’ve heard of people using spreadsheets to track it, but that seems like an awful lot of work.
My two cents on the oil change one: it completely depends on the type of vehicle you drive.
We own a truck, you can just hit the parking brake and slide on under. Including traveling to/from the store, it takes me maybe 30 minutes to do an oil and filter change. I think it’s $45 at the local shops – we don’t live in a city with things like groupons available for oil changes. (no coupons either).
Maybe it’s paranoid of me, but I change my own oil only because having it done for you isn’t as thorough. I let all the old oil drain out before putting the new oil in, so the two don’t mix. The ten minute oil changes aren’t enough time to drain all the old oil out.