Spending Money and Saving Money

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I have a little quirk. It's probably not attached to Asperger's, but it is a problem.

I always spend all my money.

It feels like... I can't cope until my funds are down to $0. I buy videogames all the time and just don't PLAY them, because owning them is enough. Of course, I feel pretty bad when I'm at $0, but I earn money fast enough that it's never been an issue for too long. But I'm trying to start saving so I can live at Uni, and... I just can't do it. I'm irresponsible as hell.

It's come to a head recently, though. I've started to overdraw - on purpose. And even though I know I'll get money soon to put myself back into positive in my bank account, it's still... I'm fed up with myself! It's like I have an addiction to spending money and... nothing else. And of course, I get upset when it causes problems, but I just won't face it! I just keep buying and buying! And going down to zero is at least safe. But overdrawing on purpose?? I don't know what to do.

What I'm doing now is sticking notes to my monitor that say DO NOT SPEND ANY MONEY, but... I've done this before. It doesn't work. I just keep looking at things on the internet until I have no money left. Then I earn more money and it starts again. I really do need help with this. How do you guys deal with this kind of stuff??

yeah 100% the same here

I used to have issues with money until I made fixing my money issues an interest of mine. Now I am almost obsessive over how I deal with my finances and have managed to put several thousand dollars away. It actually made my life easier since having the buffer in the bank stemmed the chaos my life was always in. I went from hoarding salvaged auto parts to hoarding cash and things are finally starting to become ordered again.

How did I make it an interest? I started analyzing my cash flow to find the inefficiencies. After that, I started seeing everything through a sieve of efficiency and asking myself if I really needed what I was buying. I also started getting interested in the global economic picture, which taught me that the system is broken and the future is uncertain. Thus, it pays for me to use some of that efficiency to hedge against instability. Now I actually do better with money than almost all of the NT's I know.

Have you ever tried having a second savings account that you can automatically transfer some of your wage into? Be careful with overdrawing on purpose as that can be how some people start to fall into the trap of looking for more debt to pay off the overdraft.

Setting up a budget planner or even just tracking what you've spent your money on (keeping receipts etc) helps some people. If you have a reason to save then try to picture how good it'll make you feel when you've saved enough to do that particular thing, in your case fund your way through college . Perhaps think about selling some of the unplayed games etc and getting some of your money back if you think that might help get you started.

Outofplace those are some good ideas. Most of the time I try to buy things I know I can make into something useable or that I can sell, but that leads all too regularly to cash being tied up and no way to move forward. Not to mention having been emotionally blackmailed into parting with any notable gains. My daily 'must haves' barely add up to $10 but gas going up takes a healthy bite. Maybe you can give a small breakdown of your scenario?

I was having a hard time saving money, too. What helped me was a budget plan and spreadsheet. I now keep track of every cent that comes in and every cent that goes out. I've made a game out of it. I organize everything I buy into categories (rent, utilities, telecommunications, transportation, groceries, savings, extras) and put limits on those categories. Once there's a limit, I can't go over it.

The part of this that especially helps is the "savings" category--it's the only one that doesn't have a limit. It's not really money that's been spent--it's money that's been transferred into a separate account, so it's still mine, but not as much. I've found that if I treat it like it's been spent, then it's not there for me to spend on things I'm not going to use. So, next time you're feeling uneasy because you have more than $0 in your bank account, "spend" what you have on your savings. That way, you can "safely" reduce your checking account to $0 and still "have" the money. If that makes much sense...

Maybe it will work, maybe it won't, but you'll never know if you don't try.

I'll try to give a bit of a breakdown if I can. I basically decided to look at what I was spending and see where the waste was. I had gotten into a bad pattern of paying bills late and paying pay-by-phone fees and late fees every month. This was one of the first things I had to eliminate, so I started paying the bills earlier every month, Once I got backwards enough to eliminate the fees, I kept on paying the same amount I had been paying, only now instead of paying unnecessary fees I was now paying down the balance. Eventually I was able to save something close to $100 a month just doing this. It also helped me fix my credit. In this same vein, I also picked one bill to eliminate at a time by paying it off quickly. Usually I did this in order from lowest balance to highest. This meant that if my income was low one month, I had lowered my minimum obligation by eliminating one or more bills. After eliminating one bill, I would then go on to spend the money I had been putting on getting rid of that one and move up the line to the one with the next lowest balance. The idea was to lower the balance so that the amount of money from each payment that went on the principal increased.

I also worked on other areas of "economic efficiency" as well. I deliver pizza for a living and so vehicle costs are a big part of my monthly income. Thus I decided to see where I could save money with the car I drive. I analyzed a number of scenarios to find the cheapest car to run for pizza delivery. After looking at new cars and all manner of used cars I came up with a singular conclusion: There was no cheaper car to run than a 3 cylinder/5 speed Geo Metro in good working order. So, I bought not only one of them, but I actually bought two! This was unintentional but now the second serves as a parts car. While I have put a bit of money into sorting it, I expected that for a running and driving car I bought for less than $300. On average, it costs me $200 a month less in fuel than the Nissan Frontier I had been using. Oddly, I actually make more money when fuel costs go up. This is because our vehicle reimbursement is calculated based upon 25 mpg and the little 3 cylinder gets me around 40 mpg in town. Thus, the math works in my favor.

I had other issues as well. Like many people here, organization and prioritization are issues for me. I decided that my number one issue was a need to complete my education so that I could get a normal job with a future. However, the chaos of all the incomplete little projects around me was too distracting and caused me an inordinate amount of stress. I had been putting the projects off and had instead been spending my spare time buying more crap and parts chasing. This went on for a good 5-10 years and I knew I had to break myself of this unhealthy routine. So, I enacted a zero population growth policy for new projects unless they were absolutely necessary (like the Metro). Thus, I started completing minor projects, like my nitro R/C car, first and then started working towards the bigger ones. I also worked on getting rid of the things I would never need. This included things like spare lawn mowers and all of the general crap a mechanically inclined person tends to accumulate over time. The chaos of it all was causing me a lot of anxiety and I was happier with it gone.

Now this is where the tale gets ugly. I decided to take in a friend of mine as a roommate to speed up the process financially and it turned out to be very negative. He didn't respect me or my home and worse still, he was a raging alcoholic. This shut me down emotionally and now, even 5 or 6 months after he moved out, I am still dealing with the emotional toll he took on my life. However, I have now started back down the same path I was on a few years ago and am once again finishing things to get rid of them. Unlike before though, I have plenty of money in the bank and am well hedged for the future. I never stopped doing the smart things like paying bills on time and keeping credit card usage to a minimum. Thus, my credit is now better than ever. I am hoping to get back to school this spring and at least finish my associates by the end of summer. I just have to fight past my current state of total exhaustion and emotional shutdown to do it. It's not easy, but sometimes you have to just figure out what needs to be done, sequence it so that completing one thing feeds the next, and do it until finished.