In this blog, we'll cover a few things related to the following list plus more;
Car Maintenance
Motorcycle repair
ATV repairs
Buying a Vehicle
Trailer rental
In order to get the things we want, we need money. First you need to earn more than enough to live on, then find a way to save enough of it to get what what you want. Seems simple enough.
But what if there are ways to make your saved dollar go even farther, providing you with a double or even triple benefit?
In this post I will go over several examples of how money can be saved, while still having fun.
Saving is 2 things - having a surplus income over expenses in order to save, and reducing expense, whether discretionary or mandatory, or both.
Every dollar you spend has to be earned, then paid taxes on. So, you need to earn $1.50-2.00 for every dollar you spend. Saving is a long term process and as you develop your skills, you'll get even better at it.
Get brand name value at a huge discount
If you like tools, you can save a bundle by buying off brand. Many store brands such as Mastercraft and Craftsman offer great quality hand tools for a lot less money than the high-end brands such as Snap-on. They also have great warranties and often can be bought on sale at deep discounts. I acquired most of my tools by watching for deep discount sales and buying things that I knew I'd need in the future. I'm still using them after 30+ yrs, with only 2 or 3 breakages in that period.
On the flip side, it can also make great sense to pay up for Brand Name quality, especially with power tools. I have a Heavy Duty cordless Hilti drill that I've had for over 11 yrs. It has done a ton of work in that time and still works like new. It's even better if you can acquire these on sale. Compared to the cheap Cordless drill I had before that, which only lasted for about 3 yrs, the Hilti has been a real bargain.
Cost analysis before purchase
When I look to buy an asset- I'll usually spend a fair bit of time assessing the real costs of that item. For example, when I bought my pickup - I didn't buy the first year of that model, but waited until that design had been on the market for a few years. This allows the aftermarket lots of time to come up with accessories and replacement parts, so there was lots of choice.
I also look at production volumes, simplicity, and ease of maintenance. Here's a good example; My previous pickup was a 2006 GMC and I was looking to potentially buy a GMC again for the replacement. However, I was also seriously looking at a Toyota Tundra, due to their reputation.
In the end it fell to the math & the cost differential was quite surprising;
The lifetime cost of fuel, insurance, repairs, up front cost, aftermarket replacement parts, etc. of the GMC ended up being literally 1/2 of the Toyota over a 300,000 km life cycle. Based on that, I could buy 2 GM trucks (at that time for what the Toyota would have cost in total, vs the GM, over 300K km). Hard to believe, but the math didn't lie. Even if the GMC was going to need a lot of repairs, it would still be a lot cheaper than the Toyota.
Now, this isn't a plug for GMC, but that's how it happened to work out that time, partly due to the GMC having a nice discount on the purchase price. Since that original purchase, in 2017 I have put 230K km on the GMC and have only had to replace 1 front hub, so it has been quite reliable. All other costs have been normal maintenance; oil changes, belts, brakes etc, all have which have lasted longer than expected. It's quite possible that it could work out a different way if I was purchasing today.
Another general example is that certain German marques, such as BMW and Mercedes used to have a reputation for long life and reliability. However, they have completely changed their engineering culture over the past 25-30yrs, adopting the Rube Goldberg philosophy of complexity, mixed with cheap materials on many critical parts, and life cycles that are now limited to a few years, rather than many decades. Although expensive to buy they are now also incredibly expensive to own, due to the crazy repair costs they now have. They also have very little parts interchangeability, adding to the cost.
However, if you are mechanically inclined, with a high tolerance for frustration, you can often pick these vehicles up used for cheap, thus you can at least save a huge amount of the cost of ownership. Or, you can fix them up for resale at a profit.
The point is that it can really make sense to do some research, math and analysis before spending your $$..
This whole process is also how ZOOM Cleaner came to be- I wanted the results of a high performance cleaner, but didn't like the retail cost of the offerings on the market at the time. Also, many products didn't live up to their promise and/or were very limited in their application. It took a few years, but ultimately the problem was solved for myself. It turned out others wanted that solution as well.
Speaking of ZOOM, here's how it can save you a bunch vs other competitors
Greatly increasing residual value.
This is a form of saving money on your things over the long term, while spending as little as possible to get to that goal.
First- keep your stuff clean. Seriously, it doesn't take a lot of time, effort, and with the right approach it doesn't require much money. Ie ZOOM cleaner.
How does this benefit you?
- You get a nice pride and ego boost by having a clean car, motorcycle, RV, etc..
- The amount of increased value at sale pays you a significant hourly rate for the time you spent keeping things clean- anywhere from about $20/hr to over $100/hr depending on the item and circumstances. You actually get paid to clean!
- If your toy is nice and clean when working on it, you remove the risk of dirt getting into places it doesn't belong.
- While cleaning it, you can kill 2 birds with 1 stone by inspecting it while cleaning. This allows you to address small issues quickly before they become large problems.
For things like cars and trucks in the Salt belt, or near oceans, or wet areas, rustproof them regularly. There are a number of good products on the market, but specifically stay away from electronic module, asphalt and rubberized products, as they are wasted money & worse than doing nothing. (See Here - Electronic Module post)
Shop the best rustproofing products
What do you really want/need?
Do you need the top of the line item, or can you get everything you want by getting a mid level trim item. For example, on 2 of my recent purchases, I went with a lower trim level, as it gave me everything that I needed and wanted, and saved a lot of $$ in purchase costs. The saved money allowed me to buy other aftermarket accessories that I wanted, all of which I was able to save still more money on by price shopping.
Do your own maintenance
Maintenance is a given on just about any mechanical item; ATV, dirtbike, snowmobile, boat, car etc.... Doing it yourself, properly, can save you a ton of money. If you're unsure how, Youtube is full of videos showing you how to do pretty much anything. Often, all you need is just some basic tools, which can be easily paid for with the money you save in expensive labour costs. Or, learn from a buddy that knows what they're doing....
Regular maintenance
As with anything, maintenance is a very important part of the equation. Whether it be timely oil changes, keeping brake slide pins maintained on your car, changing transmission oil, or washing your vehicle on a regular basis. Regular maintenance helps you catch small problems before they become big problems, or even catastrophic. You also save $$ on labour and can save on your maintenance items by buying them on sale, or during other promotions.
These maintenance concepts apply to many different things you may have & preventative maintenance is pretty much always much cheaper than the alternative.
Lose the Cable or Satellite TV.
You can now access pretty much all TV & movies for free and there's so many great platforms with great content, such as Youtube, Rumble, Bitchute and more. Plus, Youtube is a great place to learn many maintenance tricks, skills and get help with repairs, further saving you $$. Losing the expensive TV/Satellite packages can easily save you $100-200/month...
Rent before you buy
If you're interested in trying a new hobby, it can make a lot of sense to try it before you buy. Want to get into RV camping? Renting one for a few days can teach you a lot about it and give you a solid sense of whether or not you want to actually do it. If you buy first, then decide it's not for you, it will cost you a lot more in depreciation, sales taxes, etc.
Rent out surplus assets
Have a trailer or other piece of equipment you aren't using very often? You can often rent these things out and make extra cash to put towards the things you want. If you have an RV, Companies such as RVezy and Outdoorsy make this process safe and easy.
Hopefully this info provides some value and allows to to have more fun for your hard earned dollars!
None of our Blog posts are written with AI. All our blog posts are fully written by a real person, sharing real world knowledge and expertise.
