Good afternoon everyone.
I previously posted an article (below) around saving to buy a Scorpio towards the end of the year. A quick summary was for me to put away $50 a fortnight to save more than enough for a Scorpio, games and accessories along with a gift for the wife to stay in the good books. What has allowed me to save is the fact that I had a temporary pay rise at work for 12 months. The fact that I’ve had to use it for other issues has made it harder but it’s still not impossible as it is only January.
Now if it wasn’t for the pay rise I would have to find other things to cut out of my budget to get me to the new console. I am quite a budget conscious person who plans his pay out pretty meticulously each fortnight and sticking to that budget works quite well in planning for a big purchase.
On mine and possibly your road to a Scorpio you’ll first need to set a goal on what you want to get. You’re goal may be $1,000 for a Scorpio and games or accessories. It may also include a goal to purchase a 4K TV to compliment it which may increase your amount to $2,500 or $3,000. That’s for you to decide and it will set your weekly and fortnightly goal.
So now let’s look at a few things that many of us could cut out to make purchasing a Scorpio on day one much easier. These prices are based on rough amounts due to variations in price across states and work on you buying them individually on the day, instead of having them included in your fortnightly shopping budget. They are:
1 less bought coffee a day $6
1 less bottle of Coke etc 600ml $4
Bring lunch to work $10
Working on it being roughly 41 weeks until the start of November (estimated release time based on previous info) there are roughly 287 days or 205 work days (based on a 5 day work week). You will need to divide your initial goal by 41 to give you a weekly target.
For each item listed above I will work on each being purchased during a normal working week only. I do understand that a lot of people don’t work on what is perceived as a normal 9-5 Monday to Friday week so maybe look at it as not purchasing 5 a week.
The calculations for each of the options above are as follows:
Coffee: 205 x $6 = $1230 or
Coffee and breakfast deal = 205 x $8.50 = $1742.50
Coke 600ml: 205 x $4 = $820
Lunch: 205 x $10 = $2050
So in removing one or more of these, and putting the cash away, you could have you Scorpio and optional extras from day one.
Now I know many people won’t give up on their coffee at all but these are just a few examples that give you a pretty straight forward picture of how easily you could save for your goal, and have enough money by November. These aren’t the only items you could reduce or cut out, there are many other things you could cut out which you could class as non-essential items.
Also, in the age of mobile banking, you could just set up a direct debit or manually transfer your daily amount (or weekly equivalent) so that it’s not available to use each week. A number of banks have savings accounts that don’t have any fees attached because they are solely online and are handy for these types of savings.
The last point to consider is that the likes of EB Games have pretty decent trade in deals prior to a new console release so, in the event you need a top up, you could always send some dust collection games or gear their way.
So, what is your plan to be ready to purchase a Scorpio on day one? Will you be saving from now? Have you already started saving? Do you have some savings tips you’d like to share with us?
Feel free to discuss it with us all below. I’m keen to hear everyone’s thoughts.
XBGD Matt.