Note to self: It doesn’t pay to put off replacing things because you want to wait until they actually break or go bad. You might justify to yourself that you are trying to get every last ounce of usefulness out of an object before you replace it, but that gamble sometimes comes back to bite you in the wallet.
I had my basement waterproofed about 15 years ago. The last couple of years, I’ve been thinking to myself that I should probably replace the sump pump. But instead of being proactive and buying a new one, I kept forgetting about it because it still worked fine. That lack of foresight cost me a lot of time, energy, and money when we recently received five inches of rain. I didn’t realize my sump pump had finally died until I went down to the basement and saw water all over the floor. A plumber came and replaced it for me, but it ended up costing me a lot more money (and mess) than if I had done it earlier. Lesson learned.
House
What are some other areas in the house where procrastination can be costly? If you put off insulating around doors or windows, heat loss in the winter can cause your utility bills to spike. Something as simple as replacing a dirty furnace filter with a clean one can help reduce energy costs. And no one likes to have to replace a roof, but it’s a lot cheaper to replace it when the shingles first start going bad than when water actually starts pouring through the ceiling.
Clutter
I keep the contents of my home pretty organized, but there are shelves in the basement with lots of stuff piled into boxes. It looks nice and neat to the naked eye, but inside the boxes? Not so much. Any time I had something that came under the heading of “I might need this someday” went into the black hole that was my basement. After the basement sump pump fiasco, I went through everything and either pitched it, gave it away, or saved it in a new container.
For example, I had multiple shoeboxes full of old drapery hardware. Hooks, rings, brackets, you name it—it was all just dumped into the boxes. Once when I volunteered to install a curtain rod for a neighbor, I scrounged around for brackets until I finally came up with a single pair. But after I attacked the clutter, dumped everything out, and reorganized the pieces and parts of what I had, I found 20 more pairs of curtain rod brackets. Prior to doing that, I would probably have just gone out and bought a new set, thinking I didn’t have any at home.
Clutter accumulation isn’t just reserved for the basement or attic. Keeping the refrigerator organized can also help save dollars. Many times we have to pitch perfectly good food because it got shoved to the back where it was forgotten and then spoiled. You would never take a $5 bill out of your wallet and throw it in the trash can, but that’s essentially what happens when you have to throw food away.
Bottom Line
We’ve all had instances we can look back on and wish we had not procrastinated. Whether it’s paying a bill after the due date and incurring a late fee, not doing our homework to try and find a cheaper phone provider, or replacing a sump pump (gulp), hindsight makes us wish we had been more proactive.
I’m not psychic, but I’m starting to think that when my brain tells me to do something, I need to act on it. We get internal messages in varied and mysterious ways, but many times ignore them because danger isn’t imminent. If I had a dollar for every time I thought “I’ll get around to that sometime down the road” I’d be a wealthy woman. Heed your instincts, be proactive, and remember—time is money.
