How do you handle your toy budget (and/or significant other)???

Blaise wrote:

Nick (Bo) Comstock wrote: Yes. She completely shut down the car spending for almost five years. Now that I have a car I'm not allowed to do anything with it (really don't have the money anyway). And she threw a giant fit when I casually mentioned I wasn't too happy with the car I bought. I'm not entirely sure what I'm living for anymore.

Dude, what? Why? Is there a reason behind this? Or just 'because?' "Allowed????"

It's a long story that's been hashed out here probably too many times anyway. To sum it up I'm just a shadow of a man, slowly waiting for deaths cold embrace.

Sky_Render wrote:

z31maniac wrote:

RedGT wrote: I run the toy car/autocross/track/rallyx situation on $150/month

And this is why I quite doing HPDE even while I was still married. Excluding the cost of the car, a weekend at Hallett (very cheap for trackdays) with covered parking, gas/food/entry fees/water/normal wear and tear/etc...........even with a stock drivetrain Miata was north of $500/weekend.

Yeah, I've done one track night. I had a BLAST, but I stick to autocross, because doing track days can get EXPENSIVE with consumables. A lot of Mustang guys will go through a set of tires, pads, and rotors in a single weekend, and that's not counting all the other fluids and wear items.

It does take some planning. My 'track' car is a 2006 Mazda3 that I got for $2k and have put another $1200 into so far - shocks, wheels, tires, brakes, rear hubs/bearings, and a control arm. Tires are autox takeoffs ranging from 'free' to 'hey ya wanna codrive the rallyx car?' from the front of a friend's S2k, the rear of another friend's MR-S and a third guy's RX-7. It's easy on tires and easy on brakes. Track insurance is free because, come on, I have a whole 3 grand in the thing. I've done exclusively track night events so far, at the $35 run-work rate plus two at the $50-scca-member-early-reg rate for the full 3 sessions which is one HECK of a deal. Now I am back to the $35 run-work deal for the rest of this summer. I can't justify paying $125 for a track night because, as you mention, that's three autocrosses!

I do 3-4 autocrosses a month. That car is a Miata that, now that it's built, requires nothing but tires. Knock on wood. The Codriver buys the tires.

I cheat a little. If the car would have needed a maintenance item anyway, that's not in the toy budget. It didn't get to a timing belt change interval because of autocrosses, ya know? Likewise, fuel is absorbed into the normal fuel costs of being grownups and driving cars around, unless it's some huge trip to a national event.

Nick (Bo) Comstock wrote:

Blaise wrote:

Nick (Bo) Comstock wrote: Yes. She completely shut down the car spending for almost five years. Now that I have a car I'm not allowed to do anything with it (really don't have the money anyway). And she threw a giant fit when I casually mentioned I wasn't too happy with the car I bought. I'm not entirely sure what I'm living for anymore.

Dude, what? Why? Is there a reason behind this? Or just 'because?' "Allowed????"

It's a long story that's been hashed out here probably too many times anyway. To sum it up I'm just a shadow of a man, slowly waiting for deaths cold embrace.

If you're joking, then I apologize (though you really shouldn't joke about that kind of thing).

But if you are really that unhappy and potentially thinking about hurting yourself, you need to talk to someone. Maybe marriage counseling is a good place to start. Or seeing someone by yourself if your wife isn't conducive to couple's counseling.

In reply to Sky_Render:

Oh, I'm not going to hurt myself. I figure I've got about twenty, maybe thirty years before I'm put out of my misery.

Ian F wrote: Whatever she wanted, she bought with minimal consideration to my opinion. Whatever I wanted, "why the berk are you wasting your money on THAT???" It's one reason why I'm now single.

Between you and Sky_Render, that pretty much sums me up. Of course, she tried to murder my budget whenever she could by doing stupid E36 M3 like quitting her job, going on sick leave for phantom illnesses, etc. I still have the cars I wanted.

I started with the separate accounts thing where we put an agreed upon amount into a joint account that is just to cover living expenses. It worked for awhile, but as our income changed that amount did not. It honestly led to a few bitter moments when I had extra cash and she didn't and vice-versa. After almost running the ship aground financially, we reevaluated and determined that it was selfish to keep money aside for ourselves and it didn't better OUR position. I held on to the "if I have to talk to you about it, you'll never let me have money for fun stuff" mentality for too long. I've had to take on the mentality that it isn't asking for permission, it's running my dumb ideas through a filter to make sure they make financial sense, and that my wife isn't trying to hoard our finances for herself or prevent me from doing what I enjoy, just that sometimes it doesn't make sense and needs to wait.

Not married and 100% single here so I can't comment from experience.

I think a friend of mine has the ultimate arrangement though because his wife has a horse that she pays to have boarded and he has his cars. I can imagine that if at any point a heated discussion starts about how much he spends on cars comes up he can simply say "So how much does boarding cost monthly?" or "What was the last vet bill?" Both of them are expensive hobbies to maintain!

I think it ultimately comes down to being responsible enough to live within your means and not go overboard. The woman (or man) that tells you to stop doing something you are really passionate about isn't the one I'd want to marry. Now if I turned our yard into a parking lot (or junkyard of non-running project cars) she'd have a point.

In general my first line of defense is to point out that if you average it out over time, I spend less owning ~15 cars than anyone who is making a $400+/mo car payment on a single 'new' car. If i'm trying top be funny i'll say that i just buy a $400 car every month instead.

Pretty easy for a married guy. Ask for what you need based on your paycheck. Did you do good? Probably ahead on your bills then. No need to worry. Ask every pay day. Wear her down. Eventually she will see that the "piece of crap" in the garage will never get better or worth more unless you are out working on it. She will also be relieved to see you "doing something" rather than laying on the couch and watching YouTube videos.

She used to try to give me greif about car spending, but the rent was paid, the bills were current, and she still wasted money at Mary Kay weekly.

Then it was time that was the issue. I need, like, four Saturdays a year. We don't do anything that interests the other, anyway.

Divorce. Even at $3k a month in alimony, I have more money now.

We have separate personal accounts and the joint household account. We both contribute equally to the house account, and stuff like mortgage, food, utilities and crap to fix or improve the house comes out of that. Car insurance comes out of that too but the amount contributed toward that fluctuates by who has the most "expensive" vehicles in their name on the policy at that time.
For the most part this works well and everything hums along pretty smoothly. When unexpected stuff happens we just sit down and figure out what we can do to cover it. Sometimes more comes out of one pocket than the other but we approach it as a team, not adversaries. We don't make tons of money, but that doesn't have to stop us from having project cars scattered all over the driveway.
I still get the best parking spot. And although neither of us gets to park a car in the garage, that's where his motorcycles and my tractor live, so we share that pretty equally too.

In reply to EastCoastMojo:

Completely off topic...but as long as I'veare your acquaintance online im pretty sure this is the first I've heard of you being attached to anyone.

Sky_Render wrote:

Nick (Bo) Comstock wrote:

Blaise wrote:

Nick (Bo) Comstock wrote: Yes. She completely shut down the car spending for almost five years. Now that I have a car I'm not allowed to do anything with it (really don't have the money anyway). And she threw a giant fit when I casually mentioned I wasn't too happy with the car I bought. I'm not entirely sure what I'm living for anymore.

Dude, what? Why? Is there a reason behind this? Or just 'because?' "Allowed????"

It's a long story that's been hashed out here probably too many times anyway. To sum it up I'm just a shadow of a man, slowly waiting for deaths cold embrace.

If you're joking, then I apologize (though you really shouldn't joke about that kind of thing). But if you are really that unhappy and potentially thinking about hurting yourself, you need to talk to someone. Maybe marriage counseling is a good place to start. Or seeing someone by yourself if your wife isn't conducive to couple's counseling.

I'm fairly certain Mr. Comstock is an upstanding man ans just has an amazingly dark sense of humor.

Having 'too' many toys seems to keep me single. Every female I flirt with has the knee-jerk comment that I should only have one car not three. :what the:Even the single mothers with a kid that isn't supported by the father. Yeah right hon'.

mndsm wrote: In reply to EastCoastMojo: Completely off topic...but as long as I'veare your acquaintance online im pretty sure this is the first I've heard of you being attached to anyone.

He is actually a member here, he just doesn't post whore like I do.

Take after-tax income and multiply by 1.1.

Why, no, I haven't been on so much as a date since around 2005, why do you ask?

EastCoastMojo wrote:

mndsm wrote: In reply to EastCoastMojo: Completely off topic...but as long as I'veare your acquaintance online im pretty sure this is the first I've heard of you being attached to anyone.

He is actually a member here, he just doesn't post whore like I do.

You've chosen well! Or he has. Either way.

In reply to mndsm:

Thank you! Sometimes I need to remind myself that I'm talking to real normal people and not just the voices in my head

My cars' values: Sequioa tow rig: $4k WRX (daily driver): $8k if I'm being generous Porsche 924S: $2k as it sits e30 rally car: $6k just a guess Trailer: $2k maybe Total: $22k. All paid off All racing or car projects are financed by either my seasonal 2nd job, or by my yearly work bonus (I work for the government so it ain't much!)

Where my primary income goes to: Wife's vehicle that she picked out: late-model CX-9, loaded house wife loves in the neighborhood she wanted to live in (I'd rather live someplace"further out" with a big garage, and she knows it) ability for wife to stay home with the kids (which she generally enjoys) and do whatever she wants (+kid stuff) all day

Wife puts up with the car projects since she knows I enjoy it and I'm moody when I'm bored. And when I don't have car projects, I like to rearrange furniture and paint rooms and stuff (which she does NOT like me to do, lol). So she prefers I'm working on cars :) She rolls her eyes at each new project car but as long as the projects stay in the garage and don't make the driveway out front look trashy, she's ok with it.

She lets me go racing with my buddies, and she gets to go to the beach for 2-3 weeks per year with the girls. We each have our hobbies and they don't have much crossover, really, so as long as we're both doing things we like to do, we're both happy.

We have enough in savings for emergencies and occasional big purchases and are saving a reasonable amount for the girls to go to college in 9-15 years....though I'm sure by then they'll need more!

My toy budget goes to feeding and educating our four boys. And I'm OK with that

Car expenditures right now are purely based on keeping them operational. I still enjoy driving and thankfully I can live vicariously through all of you!

I don't have the amount of cars that most here do nor do I turn over that many cars. I have a tendency to keep them till they aren't worth anything then get another. In my case, my wife doesn't understand or like my hobby. Where she's from transportation is a need and disposable. She's Korean. I didn't participate in this hobby when the kids where growing up and I was in the military, couldn't afford it then anyway. Plus we moved regularly. I also told her that she knows what I'm doing and where I am, at least I'm not out running around chasing like I used to. I'm the breadwinner also. She's now retired with a small SS check that is her mad money. She does once in a while tell me she's praying that I give up my hobby and go with her to church. She's very religious. As long as the bills are paid and some gets put away. Also house comes first, been doing a major thing to the house every year for the past several years so when I retire in 6-7 years we won't have to worry about house repairs/updates. I can do purchases of a reasonable amount without discussing with her. Big $$ whether we have it or not gets discussed or I don't bother, depends on how bad I want it. This is why most of the mods done on the Miata are someone's castoffs when they upgraded more or sold the car it was going on. Consumables I can get as long as I don't go overboard. Things like tires. Do have to tell her before I buy though, sometimes she'll say wait till this date and sometimes it's ok now is fine. That's also why I keep the Miata, things are cheap for it. Since I also like antiques/classics, I have to balance between the 2. If the Opel GT needs something this month then the Miata don't get anything but gas. I also travel for work, more in the past than now though and usually don't spend all of per diem. I save up the per diem payments to buy car related things. That's how I restored the Opel GT a few years ago. Last year she insisted I buy a brand new truck instead of dumping $$ in the older RX8 I was driving. Although that meant the RX8 went away but still have the Miata and Opel GT. I remember when I bought the Miata, she told me to go out and buy a used economy car since the truck I was driving at the time was getting expensive. I came home with the Miata and she said I thought you were buying an economy car. Told her it get 30 mpg so it is an economy car. Now it is primarily dedicated autocross car/occasional fun driver and slightly not stock. Can't really complain about her though, she puts up with me and has for over 35 years. She does the finances, I have no idea how much money we have. All I know is the bills are paid, usually early and when I ask for money I get it. May not be the amount I asked for but she always gives me some. What they call check to wife option.

Most of my toy budget is spent on my project with the highest priority- my kids.

I save enough to be able to buy cool stuff for the 'Burb, and right now I'm trying to save up for an older Miata to replace the motorcycle. The combined purchase cost of my two current family haulers is less than $5K, and I like it that way. No need to stress about door dings, I do most of the maintenance myself, and it allows me to wrench, which keeps me happy. When the small car arrives, I'll start allocating more money to the Suburban as it is available, to get it built.

The wife graciously agrees to keep me in parts, and I graciously agree to avoid killing the budget. It works well for us.

My wife is completely OK with my spending but does get questions from some of the women she's worked worth; now keep in mind we live in Vegas, she says "he's not hanging in bars pouring money into bar top poker machines or doing the same at strip clubs" She has also commented "no way is he going to give some woman his tire money"

I make the comment that I hit the wife lotto; when I raced bikes, we camped but she would marinate some steaks, made up trays of veggies and taters. She's horribly sqeued when we shopped for the new/current house she insisted on a 3 car garage. While I'm sitting here typing this she shows me an ad for a mobile work bench at Costco.

Like a lot of you we split the bills. I make no secret about being the ADD poster child so she's good to bounce ideas off of, if I see some gotta have and start thinking she might actually react negatively (she hasn't yet) that pretty much lets me know,it's a stupid idea. We are also both cheap.

As someone else mentioned it helps that I have tools to fix things and do maintenance on her cars plus I'm able to teach our son to work on stuff. That helps a lot. I'm also a suck up; when I go into my local bike shop my long time friend always tells people that I have a beautiful wife and then says "Tom how'd you land such beautiful wife?" I rub my fist on the end of my nose "brown noser". When our son was little I would only race the Saturday of our double regionals, on Sunday I'd load the boy up in the car and we'd go hang out at the track so she could have a full day to sleep in, garden or whatever lease she wanted to do.

The down side is sometimes she's an enabler; I joked about buying a new dual sport bike, I'd gotten a huge pay increase via a promotion and she said "well you have the money" 3 weeks later I had a new Beta 520, first new bike I've bought in 25 years.

We had a rough patch financially about 17 years ago, got caught out when my job unravelled, right when we were cash poor. I quickly sold off my Volvo rally car for $4500, she was actually bummed because she new I loved the car. To this day she has total disdain for the arse-hat of a VP who turned the company upside down. I told yes I loved the car but it's just stuff.

I think the only car that she has ever even come close to having issue with was the D-Sports Racer; she could tell it made me miserable to own and despite it being a black hole of cash she never said a word till after I'd come home and announced "that car is going" even after that her only comment was that while she wasn't thrilled about the money she was happy I was selling it because I was routinely coming home from the track unhappy whereas I used to be on cloud nine with all the other cars.

So my recommendation for newly married guy would be; keep a separate car fun account, keep track of every penny, don't hide the spending and do something nice for them.

Finally I have to confess that I'm a kept man, while I make good money she makes 20% more than I do.

Tom

mndsm wrote:

Ian F wrote: Whatever she wanted, she bought with minimal consideration to my opinion. Whatever I wanted, "why the berk are you wasting your money on THAT???" It's one reason why I'm now single.

Between you and Sky_Render, that pretty much sums me up. Of course, she tried to murder my budget whenever she could by doing stupid E36 M3 like quitting her job, going on sick leave for phantom illnesses, etc. I still have the cars I wanted.

The somewhat annoying thing is... I make decent money; she makes more than I do by a fair chunk. Combined our household income would have put us solidly in very a comfortable position. The problem was her complete and total inability to ever bend from her way of doing things. I tried to bend for 11 years. Then I broke. Four years later, I'm still broken. So while I currently have more money than I ever thought I would, I wouldn't say I'm particularly happy.

When I got married, "my" responsibilities and "hers" became "ours". So we discuss everything and decide what to do. This seems to work great.