Welcome to Radical Personal Finance, the show dedicated to providing you with the knowledge, skills, insight, and encouragement you need to live a rich and meaningful life now while building a plan for financial freedom in ten years or less. My name is Joshua Sheets and I'm your host. Today we have Radical Personal Finance short, a very simple personal finance concept that I want to share with you.

The title of today's show is Budget for the Accessories. Now this is coming from both failure and success on my part. Failure in that many times I've not budgeted for the accessories and lived to regret it. And success, and sometimes I have and I have been very pleased with the results.

The concept of budget for the accessories is extremely simple. If you're going to purchase something, whether that's an item, a service, whatever, make sure that you're not calculating your budget based simply upon the price of the object. Make sure that you're not setting a target figure such as I'm going to spend $500 and then purchasing on the single item or service the full $500 worth.

Make sure that you're holding back enough room in your budget to cover the accessories for that item. Because if you think about it, for most items, at least the examples I can come up with, the accessories are just as important or very important at the least to the value that you get from that item.

Now I'm going to give you a half a dozen examples here going from as simple as a cell phone and my last example will be talking about your house, about how to think through the budget that you make for your house. But the idea here is for you to think about something in terms of its utility.

Let's talk about a cell phone because that's the most ubiquitous example I can come up with where every single one of you either has a phone or is probably listening to me on your phone right now. So Apple or Samsung or Blackberry or whomever you like comes out with their latest, greatest brand new phone and these things are expensive.

I mean, $1,000 easily for one of these new top of the line phones. Let's say that you're looking through your budget and you decide, "Well, I actually have $1,000 that I could spend on a phone." Question is, should you go and spend $1,000 on the phone? I don't think you should because if you do, the only thing you'll have is the phone.

A better plan is probably to budget something like $600 or $700 for the phone and $300 or $400 for the accessories. Let's talk about some simple ones. Probably the most useful, most valuable accessory that you can have for your phone is the case. Many of you purchase these mobile phone insurance programs, things like that.

The cheapest form of insurance is to get a high quality, well-built phone case. If you've never looked around this market, here's a little bit of consumer information for you. You can find cases that are decorative and slightly protective or you can find cases that are extremely protective. There are different standards of protection.

I recommend to you that if you're shopping for a phone case, you try to get one of the ones that usually goes under the idea of ballistic protection. It passes one of the drop tests that they do where it can survive a repeated two meter fall. The phone is six point ...

It's two meters, I think about six and a half feet. Six and a half feet off the ground, you can drop the phone and the case has a sufficient suspension system built into it where it'll cushion the fall and keep your screen from breaking, keep the phone from breaking on a repeated basis.

That's actually the type of case that I have. If you're interested in a specific model, when I was doing all the research for my phone, I discovered a case that I really like. It's called the Thule Atmos X3. Thule, the same company that makes those car top carriers, T-H-U-L-E, Atmos, A-T-M-O-S, and mine is the X3 brand version.

I really like it. I'll link to it. I just made a note to link to it in the notes for today if you want to buy it on Amazon. They're super cheap now. When I bought it, it was 30, 40 bucks, something like that. The phone, it's been great.

It covers the phone and gives it protection from a two meter drop. It does a tremendous job of protecting the phone, but it's still very thin. It still slides easily in and out of my pocket. It's very comfortable to hold. It makes the iPhone that I use extremely firm in your hand where the original model without a case is not that way.

But it has that really high quality ballistic protection. Really love it. I bought my wife one as well when we got her a new phone. It does a great job. There are many others as well. If you are in a very dangerous environment, you're a construction worker, you work on a boat, et cetera, then you'll want to go for one of the waterproof versions of the phone cases unless you're getting one of these newer phones that are very well waterproofed.

I don't like the waterproof because I don't like having something on the screen and I don't really spend that much time where I need the screen protection. But that case will give you a tremendous usefulness of the phone and it's worth budgeting for that. So let's say that your budget for the phone were realistically $1,000.

If you've got to spend 10 to 20 to $50 on a case, you've got to pull that off of that. Well, what else? I've learned over time that the first thing I should do when I get a new device is make sure that I have proper accessories for it.

So the most useful accessory after the case is chargers. So when I upgraded from phones that were requiring USB connection to lightning connection, I didn't just simply stick with the one lightning cable that came with the phone. I went ahead and purchased a half a dozen new USB lightning cables.

And I really have gained tremendous benefit from doing this. Now this is going to be...this is a perfect fit for a #firstworldproblems. But here's what I do. I have a high quality cigarette lighter adapter in all three of my vehicles. And by high quality, I mean not the cheapy dollar store one that you can get that doesn't put out enough amperage to charge the phone, but one that does put out a high current, high voltage, high amperage or voltage, I'm blanking on my electrical theory at the moment, puts out a lot of current to charge the phone quickly.

If you try to run a big phone and you're trying to do something like I do, I often will use a GPS app on the phone. My favorite is an app called Waze, W-A-Z-E. If you're not familiar with Waze, it's a free app that is completely big brother snooping in your life and it is really hard to say no.

Because what the Waze app does, again, W-A-Z-E, is it uses all of the user data on your phone and it uses all of the other people who are using the app to give real-time GPS information to help you get real-time traffic information about if you're sitting in a traffic jam, how long the traffic jam is going to be, or even better, it'll reroute you around the traffic jam based upon how big the traffic jam is.

It's really great because it's pulling that real-time data from all of the user's phones. It's a really good app. I usually drive with that on because it helps me to avoid traffic problems when I'm going somewhere. I find that to be a really useful feature. The other thing I like about it is you can turn on a little alert, which sounds a tone if you exceed the posted speed limit in a zone.

I like to do that because if I ever exceed this posted speed limit, I want the alert so I can drop my speed back down. I don't like to pay speeding tickets, a little personal finance thing, and I generally have no reason to ever be in a hurry. I use the Waze app.

Well, if you have one of those cheap drugstore, dollar store things, chargers, if you have your screen on with a big phone, a cheap dollar store cable and a cheap dollar store cigarette lighter doesn't deliver enough current to the phone to even maintain the battery, let alone charge it.

If you get a high-quality cable and a high-quality cigarette lighter adapter, you can get in and you get in the car and your phone's at 50% and you plug that thing in and you're using the screen, talking on it all the while, and when you get out of the car sometime later, it'll be 75%, 80%, perhaps 90% or 100%.

I have a habit that anytime I'm in a vehicle, I'm charging my phone. Your phone is usually one of your most important, most valuable accessories in your life. Want me? If you left your phone behind when you leave your house, how many of you would go back and get it or have gone back and gotten it?

Most of us, we've gone back and gotten it. Most of us, if we leave it behind, we would at least seriously consider it. Now, I can't think of anything else that if you left behind, you'd be that tempted to go back and get. You leave your wallet behind, "Well, I probably need, but I can get by." You leave your socks behind, "Well, I'll just be sockless today." Easier for some of us in Florida than some of you guys up in the north.

The phone is a valuable accessory. All of these lighter adapters and the high-quality cable in each of the cars makes it so that my phone is always very well charged, so I don't have to worry about it running out of juice. I don't want to worry about it being down at 10% or 15% or running out when I need it.

That dramatically improves the usefulness of the phone by having all those electrical cables in all the cars. That dramatically just makes me actually have it. Back to the point where I said you're better to buy a cheaper phone, it's better to have a cheaper phone, maybe a little less memory or a camera that's not quite as high quality that's actually charged and working when you need it than to have an expensive phone, but you blew all your money on the phone and you didn't have the money to keep it charged all the time.

I know I'm laboring on the cell phone, but I'm trying to give you some practical tips because I know all of you have phones, but also to use this as a broader metaphor for other things in your life. So I invest, it's a little bit weird to use that word, but I think it's accurate.

I invest in high-quality cigarette lighter plugs and cables for each of the cars. And if you're married or you have other people, you might want to go ahead and have two. I like to carry an extra cable in the car for other devices. So friends have a USB phone, things like one that charges, an Android that charges with a USB cable.

It's nice to have a USB cable or a simple adapter. There are a couple of simple ways to do that. I'll skip past it for now. But I also like to have cables that stay in other places in my house. So I like to have a cable that's on my desk so my phone can be charged when I'm at my desk.

I like to have a cable that's charged by my bed if I put my phone by my bed. Sometimes I do that, sometimes I leave it in the office overnight, you get better sleep that way. I like to have also a separate cable and adapter that's set up in my travel kit.

And that way when I'm traveling and I'm packing, I can pack in about 15 minutes because I just have a separate dop kit that has all of my toiletries in it and it has a standalone charger and adapter and cables and all of that for electronic devices. It costs a little bit of money, but it's a one-time purchase that you can use for a very long time until they change the adapter, which is going to be a number of years at least.

And it gains so much value for me of having the benefit of always having the phone charged, always having the phone and not having to unplug a cable from here and take it from there. It's just very, very simple. It costs a little bit of money. I have found that it's one of those things that's been very helpful for me.

Well, what else? What other accessories are useful with a phone? What about car mounts, having a nice mount in your car? Makes a big difference. If you don't have a high quality mount that sticks to your dash or that's just screwed into your dash or that hangs from your mirror or something like that, you're not getting the full benefit of the phone.

If you just have to look down in the cup holder that's dangerous, you can't use some of the GPS functions, et cetera, as well as you can otherwise. And so go ahead and spend and get a high quality, it doesn't have to be expensive, but you're going to spend $10 to $30 for a high quality mounting system.

And you can get a mounting system that's very convenient, one of these nice magnet ones or something similar. Adds a lot of value to the phone. I'd rather have a slightly cheaper phone and a mount in my car where I can use that phone for its functions such as GPS, such as safely managing audio files while I'm driving down the road than a more expensive phone that I have to stick down in the glove box or stick down in the cup holder.

Other batteries, I've mentioned on the recent hurricane show how important cell phone batteries are. I think that all of you should have at least two high quality lithium ion batteries as far as battery backups. Very simple, we should have one that goes into your pocket or your purse, a small type of lipstick case or one of the small flat ones if you're a guy.

Me as a guy, I like to have one of the small thinner battery cases. If you're a girl, for my wife, kind of the lipstick, more tubular design works better for her purse. That way if you're out and you're not near a car, you're not near your house and you do like me where you actually use your phone a lot, the batteries don't last a full day.

So it's nice to have that charger and a little cable there to be able to plug it in and charge it up. I also think it's really valuable when traveling or when out and doing a lot of work or when you're doing emergency preparations to have a nice high capacity 15,000 milliamp hour, 18,000 milliamp hour, 20,000 milliamp hour battery that you use that can go in your pocket and recharge your phone a half a dozen to a dozen times.

These batteries are really valuable to have. And so I'd rather have that phone and those accessories to keep it using, to keep it going than the more expensive phone. Cheaper phone, more accessories, better in my opinion. Now that's really phone centric. I'm using that example because I think it's something that you can probably relate to.

Most of us who use smartphones use them a lot. And I always scratch my head when I see somebody with a thousand dollar phone that ran out of juice because they didn't plan ahead to have juice. Now we can go one step further. Those were all just ideas to have the basic functionality of the device.

What about ideas to enhance the functionality? Something like a monopod and a little clip to be able to use the phone for taking high quality stable video or a simple mobile tripod, something like a GorillaPod. I have a mobile video kit that I use. How about something like an external microphone to capture higher quality audio for your videos?

Audio makes a big difference. Actually more important when you're studying video, content is number one, audio is number two and video quality is number three. So you can have the greatest fancy new camera on the iPhone 7, but if you still have the junky microphone and you got a bunch of wind noise, eh, not going to work so well.

So all of those accessories and the sky's the limit. So I won't go into all those different things that you can do, but I'd rather have a $300 iPhone 5 if they still sell those, whatever the cheap SE, they're on the SE now, the iPhone SE and all of the accessories than a 7 with no accessories.

I really think that's a better move. Now you choose the budget, you pick the accessories, but think about that. Think about the benefit. Now let's talk about something where as an example of hurricane preparedness that I just mentioned and I want to mention this again in case you didn't listen to that hurricane show and we'll go on to something like your car next, but a generator.

I see this and right now there's loads of people, loads of you who are digging out from after Hurricane Matthew. Some of you, many of you perhaps still without power and you always see this when people are trying to prepare for a hurricane or other type of power outage where they go out and buy this expensive generator and maybe one five gallon can of gas.

Think about what is the functionality that you want when you're buying a generator for power, you need power while the power's out. Well five gallons of gas will run a generator anywhere from say five to 10 hours perhaps depending on the generator, depending on the load, all that stuff, but it's not a ton of time of power.

If I'm choosing and I've got a $500 budget, instead of buying a $450 generator and a single can of gas, I'd rather buy a $150 or $200 Harbor Freight generator and have $300 worth of gas and gas cans or other storage mechanisms set by so that the generator can provide several days of power.

And also importantly, I'd rather lay in the accessories to be able to fix the generator, simple tool set, change of oil, better to have a $150 generator and an extra oil filter and an extra quart of oil set by so that after you've run it the appropriate lifespan, you can go ahead and change the oil than the big expensive generator that you run out of gas because you only had one can and you fry if you do get more gas, you fry because you can't change the oil.

So think about the accessories. Talk about vehicles and cars. If you buy another car, if you buy a new car, whether it's a new model year car or whether it's a car that's simply new to you but it's an older model year, think about the car that you're buying and what you're trying to get from the car, how you anticipate using it and make sure that you don't spend all of your money on the purchase price of the car.

If you're going to want accessories for your vehicle, purchase those accessories early so you get the maximum lifespan from them. Remember, the shorter amount of time that you spend... When you're calculating the cost of something, the way it works is you calculate the price that you pay for it, then you're going to sell it at the end of your ownership.

You calculate what's that sales price that you're going to get for it, how much money you're going to get for it. It might be zero if the item completely depreciates or it might be if you buy a car and you buy it for $15,000 and you sell it when it's worth five and you take the difference between those things.

That's your cost of depreciation. If you bought a $15,000 car, you owned it for five years and then you sold it for $5,000, that means that that car has cost you $10,000 as measured over that five years or in simple depreciation terms, $2,000 per year. That's how you always calculate the price of something.

If you're buying a phone, what price you pay for it, what price you sell for it, and how long you own it. If you're trying to be frugal with your money and trying to make wise decisions, best thing you can always do is stretch out your length of ownership period.

If you want to make good decisions with a car, you can drive a fancy car. If that's important to you, buy a fancy car, maybe even buy a new car, but own it for a really long time. Now when you're calculating the value of accessories, and this is why when I got a new phone recently and why I've had this philosophy for years, I want to own those accessories for the maximum amount of time possible because that way my per month ownership cost will be the lowest.

It's silly to say I buy a new pickup truck and for three years I really would like to have a topper on this truck. Man, it would be nice to have a topper on the back, but man, that's another $1,500 to get the one that I want. Well, maybe someday, maybe someday.

Then finally after three years I go ahead and get it. I get that topper. Then two years later I sell the vehicle. I'm never going to get the, especially with accessories, you never get the money back for accessories. I'm never going to get the money back or at least that much money back for accessories.

Now my cost per month, my usage cost is tremendously high. When you're buying a vehicle, if you're going to want to change that vehicle, accessorize that vehicle, have the things that make that vehicle really valuable, plan for that. I always chuckle. You see these guys that have big mud trucks.

When I was a kid I was obsessed with big four-wheel drive mud trucks, so I always noticed them. Around here in South Florida we have mud, but I don't live in a farming community where these things are actually used. They're all show trucks. I see these guys have big jacked up pickup trucks with big old mud tires on them, but the tires are completely bald.

Now those mud tires are expensive and I just think, "Why did you go through all this hassle of buying this big fancy mud truck and jacking the thing up, but you don't have enough money to replace your tires?" This was dumb. Not only is it dumb, but it's dangerous because bald tires are extremely dangerous.

First thing you can do with a vehicle is buy a cheap vehicle and put great tires on it. If you have an expensive vehicle and bad tires, you don't get the performance. If you have a high performance vehicle out of it, you're going to get the performance out of it because of the tire, all the horsepower that you have has to go through that tiny little patch of rubber on each tire, a few square inches of contact.

You can have the most powerful engine in the world and if you can't transfer that power to the ground, it does you no good. It's not only if you have a performance vehicle, but if you're worried about safety, which you should be. One really bad financial move is die in some stupid way.

Tires are important and good tires make a huge difference. You should plan for that. Where I live, we get lots of rain. Some of you in the upper northeast, you get lots of rain. It really matters. Some of you face snow. I've never lived in snow country, but from my research, it seems to me that all the data and the experts seem to indicate that if you live in snow country, your tire quality makes a bigger difference to your vehicle performance than does something like having four-wheel drive.

Let's say you go and buy a really nice four-wheel drive Subaru because you're concerned about safety, but if by having to spend more money on the Subaru, you don't have enough money to get proper snow tires to keep your tires in good condition, you didn't have a good plan.

If I lived up north, if I had to choose, I'd rather have a cheaper two-wheel drive car and have a complete set of extra snow tires on extra rims so it's really simple to go out on a Saturday morning when it starts to get snowy and just change all four tires real quick without it being a big hassle.

I'd rather have that than a fancy new four-wheel drive Subaru with bald tires or without the proper snow tires. Even for the cost, whatever the modifications are that you want to make, if you want to swap out the tires, if you want to paint the thing something cooler, if you want to add a topper, add a tonneau cover or change out the seats for racing seats or add a stereo system, plan to do that stuff as quickly as possible once you acquire the vehicle.

Get it installed so you can get the usage of the vehicle over your time of ownership. If you've got to reduce your purchase price in order to get that, I think you'll be happier with that. Many other consumer items in life are similar. If you get a computer, get a proper bag for it.

If you get a nice new laptop, get a bag that fits it, get the chargers that work. Simple thing I've always done that makes a huge difference, have two chargers. Again, one charger that stays on my desk at home, one charger that goes with me. Those of you who spend all your time and you only have one charger and every single time you wrap up the cord, just buy another charger and that way you don't have to wrap up the cord every time.

It's really worth it. Buy an extra mouse, a mouse that stays on your desk and a mouse that goes with you. Those things add, they take away the friction of life and they allow you to have more benefit. Camera gear is one. Photographers know this. In photography or videography, the lens that you have and the quality of the lens is at least as important if not more important than the camera body.

The accessories contribute hugely to the quality of the end product. If you're buying a camera and you're a new camera person, buy a cheaper camera body and better lenses. You can always upgrade the camera body later on, but the lenses, if you buy quality, you only buy them one time and you get maximum use out of them.

What about toys like jet skis or ATVs or boats? With boats, save the money and lower the purchase price of the boat so you can buy the proper accessories. Buy the safety gear first. When you're boating, make sure that you budget for the proper life jackets. The best thing you can do on a boat is make sure that you buy those nice inflatable life jackets for you and for all the members of your family or anybody who's boating so that when you're out boating, you can wear those things.

The things that the Coast Guard wears, the little suspender looking ones or the fishermen, the little suspender looking ones that have an automatic inflator. If you hit the water, they air up. They're not cheap. They're 75 to 150 bucks a piece, but I'd rather have a little bit cheaper boat and go ahead and have four or five of those so that when I'm out on the boat, everyone on the boat is well cared for and has proper, comfortable life jackets.

Other safety equipment, make sure that you buy something as simple as an E-Purb, an emergency locating beacon. Yeah, it's going to cost you a few hundred bucks, but you never know when things can happen and you'll feel a lot more confident when you're heading out the inlet on your single engine outboard boat if you've got an E-Purb there.

Big boats, big fancy new boats break down too, and having the ability to have a high quality backup radio so you can call the towboat or having that E-Purb there in the worst case scenario, or having a proper lifeboat on the boat. If your boat is of a certain size, make sure you get one of those nice inflatable compact lifeboat systems.

That safety gear is worth it. Now, buy the water toys too. Buy the nice cover that covers the whole boat. Get yourself the trailer. Buy the toys that you need and get them right away so that you can get full use out of them. Don't wait and wait and wait and spend all your money on the boat and not have the accessories for it.

If you don't know what the accessories are, you should probably rent the thing until you figure out what the accessories are and have your shopping list so that when you go to buy, you just buy it all at once. Another simple example, if you're going to buy a boat or another toy like that, make sure that you have, that you budget for the place to put it away, away from damage.

I can't stand to see people who keep their boat out and sitting in the driveway when for a little bit of money, they could put aside a structure in the side yard or backyard and cover the thing. At least install a purchase, a quality custom made cover so you can protect it from the damage of the sun, but better put it, build a little structure because what'll happen is if you build the structure for the boat, here's what you can get.

You can buy a slightly cheaper boat, but the cheaper boat, because it's well cared for and it's not beaten up by the sun and completely destroyed, it'll have a higher resale value. Build the structure, buy the cheaper boat, keep that boat for a few years. You can turn around and sell it for more, put a little bit of money, then you can go buy the fancy boat.

But protect the things that you own, protect the things that you want to have. Think about the use and do those. A couple more examples, guns. People buy guns and they're different. Talking about the use, depending on the use, depending on the gun that we're talking about, you should probably not buy as expensive of a gun as you can afford.

Number one, let's just say your budget is $2,000. Pretend that you don't own a gun, you've never owned a gun and you have a $2,000 budget. You're better off buying, or a $1,000 budget, let's make it more realistic. If I had a $1,000 budget for a gun, I would buy a $200 or $300 gun, I'd buy $300 or $400 worth of ammo, and I'd buy $300 or $400 worth of training.

Because when you buy a gun, you don't just need the appliance, you don't just need the tool, you need the ammo that makes the thing work and you need enough ammo that you can actually shoot it so that when you need it, you know how to shoot it, and you need the training that makes that tool more effective, more useful for you.

Some guns are toys, some guns are tools. I think there's a good place for both. If you're going to buy a gun, buy a gun where the cost of the ammo doesn't intimidate you. A simple thing like saying, "Oh, I want to buy a semi-automatic pistol that shoots .45 ACP." That stuff is expensive when you're buying 1,000 round cases of it.

Compare the price of .45 ACP to 9mm. I'd rather have a 9mm that I've shot a few thousand rounds through so I actually know how to use than the .45 ACP because that seems impressive to the big macho guy at the gun store. Now depending on the application, you need the accessories for it.

If you're talking about something like a concealed carry gun, you need or probably going to want to buy multiple holsters. People forget this and they spend all the money on the gun. They don't buy the ammunition, they don't buy the training, and they don't buy the holster so therefore they can't use it.

But you're going to want to have a variety of different holsters, a shoulder holster for the times when that fits your wardrobe and inside the waistband and outside the waistband, maybe an ankle holster, a deep concealment holster, depending on what your clothing choice is, what the event is, how you need to do that.

Remember, the point is to have the gun and to know how to use it, but if you spend all the money on the gun because you bought the fancy one and you didn't buy the holsters that would work with your various clothing choices in different situations, then you don't have it when you need it.

Things like magazines, having extra magazines. Again, depending on the context, there's a difference between buying a hunting rifle where you're going to buy a bolt action scoped hunting rifle versus an AR-15 sporting rifle. If you're buying an AR-15, little tip, buying an AR-15, why are you buying the AR-15?

Think about that. If you are just buying it to have around the house, you need to have training and that's where you should focus. As far as I'm worried about some intruder and I've chosen an AR-15 as my home defense weapon of choice, fine. But buy training so that you're confident with it.

If you're buying an AR-15 for the end of the world as we know it, the zombie apocalypse, don't buy a $2,000 AR-15, buy a $500 AR-15 and $1,500 worth of magazines and bullets. Somebody who knows how to have ... I'd rather have a cheap gun, I mean the AR-15 world, I'd rather have a cheap gun and 30 magazines and 3,000 rounds than an expensive gun, three magazines and 300 rounds in that context.

Think about why you're buying something, what's the use that you have for it and plan accordingly and don't throw all your money into the initial purchase. Another toy, RVs and then we'll get to houses and we're done for today. This was supposed to be a short and here we are at 32 minutes.

RV, if you're going to buy an RV, buy an RV and then accessorize it how you want it. Store it properly. Make sure that you have the cover for it if you need that, if you're buying a newer one so you get more resale value. But the big thing about an RV as an example, save enough money to put gas through it.

If you have a $30,000 budget for camping and RVing, spend $10,000 on the RV and $20,000 traveling. It's a shame to spend all your money on the vehicle and not have any money to put gas through it and be sitting at home fretting because gas is $3.40 a gallon.

So plan your budget based upon the use. Remember, the point of the RV is to get you out on the road, not to sit in your driveway and impress your neighbors. Talk about a house. Many people make the mistake of buying flashy, gaudy houses to impress people they don't particularly like because they think that's somehow how they can show their self-worth.

Consider what the basic functions are that you want from your house and make sure that you're either setting aside the money for the accessories and amenities in advance or that you're seriously considering the house based upon those accessories and amenities. The amenities are more important than the size or flashiness of your house.

Where in your house do you spend the most time? Think about that right now. Where? In this particular spot in your house, do you spend the most time? If you think about it, you should come up with the answer, my bed. For some of us, it might be my office.

I might spend more time in my office since I work in my house than my bed, but most of us, it's our bed. You spend seven, six, hopefully at least seven, six, seven, eight, nine hours a day, seven days a week, 365 days a year in your bed. How much money have you spent on your sleeping experience?

It's a little tacky and trashy to buy a big, fancy, flashy house and have some cheap thrift store or budget mattress store mattress. Not a good use of money. Better if you have to choose and have to budget, and we all do. Better to buy the cheaper house and buy the best bed that you can afford.

That comfortable sleep and that high quality bed and sleeping experience will be your probably most important valuable accessory of your house. Have a junky looking couch, but have a comfortable bed. You should own the best, most comfortable bed that you can find that fits within the scale of your budget.

That bed should be outfitted with comfortable, luxurious sheets or a comforter that is very comfortable for you. Other things that affect your sleep, the proper temperature. Temperature, all the sleep studies, having a proper cool temperature makes a significant difference proven on your sleep quality. Better to spend a little extra money cranking your AC down a little bit, if you're in the culture like I am, so you have great sleep than having a fancy looking front door.

Better if you're going to spend a lot of time in your bed, make your bedroom an attractive place. Make it soothing. Make it beautiful. Make it somewhere that you want to be. Your standards are the standard you should follow. You shouldn't follow the housing magazine, but don't bypass that as a worthwhile investment.

If you can spend a little bit of money on your housing, don't immediately run out and upgrade your house by buying a new one. Perhaps you should just simply go out and upgrade your house by improving your current one. Might be a very good use of money. Continue that train of thought.

Figure out where else in your house do you spend the most time. Is it in your office? Is it sitting in front of your TV? Is it sitting in your reading chair? Buy a high quality reading chair. Buy a comfortable desk chair. Is it in your kitchen? Well, upgrade the kitchen.

Make that a beautiful experience. Is it your back deck? Make that beautiful. You can improve the functionality of the house and get a lot of benefit of it if you start to look at it. And that's what I mean by focusing on budgeting for the accessories. I believe it's valuable to develop and practice the habit of frugality.

But frugality does not mean never spending money or always getting the cheapest thing that you can. Frugality means spending wisely on the areas that are important. And I think a key part of that is this concept that I've outlined here for you today. The next time you're buying a major option, major purchase, whether it's a new gadget, a new piece of gear, exploring a new hobby, think carefully about the accessories that you want for that hobby.

Think carefully about how you can put together a complete kit from the beginning and plan your budget so that you get full and maximum use of your purchase. Thank you for listening to this episode of Radical Personal Finance. If you're interested in building financial freedom for yourself and your family, please subscribe to the podcast with our free mobile app so you don't miss a single episode.

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