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I started logging every book I bought at Goodwill into a spreadsheet and my spending dropped from $60 a month to $18
I know spreadsheets sound like a boring answer to a book haul habit, but stick with me. Back in January I was hitting the two Goodwills near me in Fort Worth every Saturday and walking out with a stack every time, usually 6 to 8 paperbacks at $2.99 each. By the end of the month I had spent around $60 and half of them were stuff I grabbed just because it was cheap, not because I actually wanted to read it. So I made a simple note on my phone with three columns: title, price, and whether I wanted it before I walked in the door. Sounds dumb but the first week I put back five books I was only holding because they were a deal. Six months later my monthly spend is sitting at $18 and I'm actually finishing what I bring home. The other thing I noticed is I stopped buying doubles of books I already owned, which happened way more than I want to admit. The half price books on Camp Bowie is my other spot and the same rule works there. Has anyone else tried some kind of list or rule to slow down the impulse grabs?
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paige_harris2d ago
Ha, so you invented a spreadsheet to stop yourself from buying books you don't even want. That's a very fancy way of saying you finally started reading the titles instead of the price tags. The doubles thing really got me though, buying a book you already own is a whole new level of "oops." My rule is I only buy it if I can name one person I'd lend it to, which has saved me a lot of money and probably a lot of shelf space. $18 a month is solid, now the real test is whether you still hit both Goodwills every Saturday or finally got your weekends back.
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