Feeling defeated by the cost of living these days

I am so sorry. It is definitely the topic of conversation in my social group these days. We live in an above average cost of living area, and just about everyone I know-doctors, lawyers, business owners, etc., etc. are all feeling the squeeze. Costs that most of us didn’t think twice over are now being carefully measured. Our cleaning ladies said a bunch of her long time clients have dropped her. People are putting off purchasing cars, and postponing home improvement projects. We are paying 40k a year right now on all our insurances since my husband left his corporate job and medical plan behind. We drive older cars and have high deductible plans.

It’s real, and it’s tough. You are not alone. 💔

I'm not sure where you live, but Publix offers $10 off the purchase of $50 gas gift cards every 4-6 weeks. You can buy 1 discounted gas gift card for every $50 in groceries you buy that week, and you can pick the gas station you want to purchase from. I usually get ExxonMobil gas gift cards, and I go to the local ExxonMobil with a garage. I just had them change my oil, and I have them do my annual car inspection, and then I pay for the services with my gas gift cards. It's not much, but every little bit helps!

Maybe a local supermarket does something similar?

Also, I know around here, Publix sometimes gets a bad rap for being "expensive," but if you shop their BOGO sales, it is even cheaper than Wal-Mart for groceries.

Finally, our local EarthFare has boneless skinless chicken breast and grass feed ground beef for $3.99/pound on Tuesdays. I usually try to buy the limit on the chicken each week - I freeze the leftovers, and then I have plenty stocked up for times when I am busy or the weather is bad on a Tuesday.

Check if your neighborhood has a Buy-Nothing group on Facebook. Not only can you give stuff away (sometimes broken stuff someone handy wants to try to fix) but you can request things on there... like you can ask if someone planted too many veggie starts and has extras to give away.

The library is also another resource, mine doesn't have a tool lending library (I wish they did, the ones I've seen online look awesome), but one near me is starting a seed library where you can trade plant seeds (or something, I don't know because I haven't done it yet.) so you don't have to buy 100 tomato seeds when you only wanted three plants.

Hang in there!

Just got a “stage two” orthodontic bill for dd.
$8200.
We have already spent $5000 for stage one.
I almost cried and was totally out of it for the rest of the day… we have the savings in place to pay for it but I feel battered and bruised and like every time I’ve just gotten my head above water I’m shoved back down again.
And we are quite frugal people which is why we have the savings when we live in one of the highest cost of living and unaffordable housing areas in our country. I cannot imagine how it would feel if we didn’t plan and save for future expenses like we do.

I'll also validate your emotions. My daughter is your age and she had a meltdown this weekend. Same thing - can't afford anything. Working 2 jobs - her husband is working 7 days a week and they're just getting by. Nothing extra. Between all the things you mentioned, their cost for housing is extremely high and taxes killed them. We're at retirement age and can't afford to be of much help to them. It's sad and scary.

Glasses at Costco or Walmart are around $200. Sadly Medicare covers some, but the monthly cost for supplementary is still significant. 

I could have written your post word for word, and it sucks. Feeding four kids (three teenagers and an almost-teenager) is ridiculously expensive on top of bills and unexpected expenses every month. I also feel like I am never getting ahead.


I have TONS of seeds and I would love to send you some! Please let me know what you're looking to plant this year and DM me your address. I'll put a seed care package in the mail for you.  

A big part of those high costs are the costs of raw materials. We see it every day with DH’s business, he has had to raise his prices not because he’s charging more for his labor at all but because the cost of all the materials he works with has more than doubled over the past few years. It started back with the Covid shortages and then prices just never came back down even after supplies went back to normal. When prices started to noticeably skyrocket, he really started shopping around and started buying a lot more from an online supplier or Amazon because the prices were so much less than the local place (which is a huge nationwide business itself, so you know they aren’t paying wholesale). They were really price gouging because they can, for convenience. But even the online supplier place’s prices have gone up.

Even things like a basic 2”x4”x8’ piece of lumber costs exponentially more than it used to. We needed some for a project at our lake cabin and DH about choked when he saw it was going for over $5-6 apiece, and when you go to the lumber yard to buy it, it’s all twisted and split crap. Our neighbors at the cabin rebuilt their place last spring/summer and they had to scale back their project by at least a third because the materials costs had gone up so much between the time they had their plans drawn and when they found a reputable contractor to actually do the build. We were so glad we did ours when we did in 2018-2019 because we wouldn’t have been able to finish ours like we did at the current costs. As it was we did as much of the work as we could ourselves to cut the labor costs down.

Meanwhile, all of the big corporations are raking it in hand over fist making billions upon billions in profits.

ETA: I just wanted to add that 2005 was almost 20 years ago now. I’m not sure how much more I would expect something like a roof to cost but I think I wouldn’t expect it to cost anywhere close to the same after that much time. I think a better comparison would be for the last 3-7 years, and even in that time frame things have gone up considerably.

I’m a HUGE fan of our local Buy Nothing group! I’ve given and received countless useful items through my group. I can’t believe the wide variety of perfectly nice things people offer up, and in turn I also offer up nice things we no longer use vs. dropping it off for donation. What I like best about that group is that it’s limited to only local people right in my specific area, so I know the items are going to others right in my community. My favorite part is that when I want to part with something I no longer need, I don’t have to go any further than my front porch and the people come right to me and take it away.   It’s pretty awesome.

I feel you. It seems like our entire married life that as soon as we get a few hundred dollars ahead, the universe decides to screw with us.

Dear CraftedbyS and family,
I hear that you have an extra $200 by scrimping and saving and doing without. Well, we can't have that, now can we. Here's a vet bill/car repair/doctor's copay/broken appliance bill for $400.
FU and see you next month,
The Universe.

It sure feels like that doesn't it.  Seems like every time I get a little saved up, I get hit with something, like an unexpected vet bill or a nail in my tire or something...It's so hard to get a little ahead.

Give yourself a very generous budget for food in NYC. I went in knowing it was going to be expensive, but it's frankly ridiculously expensive. I refused to spend $30 for hotel breakfast and ended up in diner spending $30 - I'm sure it's better if you're not in heart of touristy stuff, but it was crazy how expensive everything was there!