Operation Magpie Suffers Another Blow: A New Road Bike Has Been Purchased!

In September 2011, I pledged to say Goodbye to my Magpie self, stop spending, and make in-roads to paying off the credit card; while hopefully finding a better way of living along the way.

Many things have gone right.  Like dropping coffee shops and not going clothes shopping.  But, I have to make a confession...something went a bit wrong this week.  I spent £294.00 on a new bike!  "Eck!", I hear you gasping, "that isn't very frugal".  And I have to admit, it totally isn't.  But here's the story:

My sister-in-law is moving house.  She says to JW, "I would really like to get rid of my bike before I move".  JW says, "I know who would love that bike; your very own sister-in-saw would!".  "Great", says sis, "you've got a deal".  So through a rather complicated wrangle, I then end up buying the bike for £200, (a fraction of what it is worth, it is one fancy pants bike, but still a lot of money for little old me).

Add to that some modifications, so it fits me and I can ride it, and all in all it adds up to £294.00 spend.  Big whoops.

But, here's the difference.  Normally I would have slapped the cost on the credit card, or gone into the overdraft.  But, I didn't, as I am finally figuring out the value of money and the cost of debt.  Instead, I sold a load of stuff on e-bay and did a car boot sale, until I had raised the £200 I needed to buy the bike.


It was such a good feeling to hand over my hard earned money, which I had saved and squirrelled away.  A much better feeling than simply slapping down the plastic.  A hundred times better in fact!  It is an old fashioned way of working, to aim for something you want to buy and to put money aside for it until you can actually afford to buy it outright.  I was so used to hire purchase, bank loans and credit cards that I had totally forgotten how to save for things.  I have learnt a valuable lesson through buying my bike.

We still had to pay for the repairs, but that money came out of the bank account and not the credit card.  So, it is a start!  Now that my new bike is up and running, I plan to sell my old, (very heavy) mountain bike, so that money will go someway to the remaining £94.00 bill.

As soon as I got my bike back from the workshop, I was straight out on a run down to the seaside.  It was so great to be out on my new stead, with the sun on my skin and the frost nipping at my nose! 

The only thing is, JW is so enamoured with my bike, that he is now starting to pine for a road bike of his own!  I better get back down to that car boot sale!!