Friends Criticizing My Frugality

**Wooly Milk** · 01-19-2010, 05:03 AM

I save because I like to feel financially secure. I like to have money in case things go wrong. The money saved up makes me feel secure.

In order to save as much as possible, I have set myself an ambitious savings target of 80 per cent of net pay. I am normally able to meet this goal. However, over Christmas I got a bit greedy and purchased a new suit and new sunglasses, and my savings rate has fallen below 80 per cent. Because of this I aim to over-save now to make up for my under-saving in the past.

I don't have many friends but the friends I do have are really putting pressure on me to spend more. They want me to buy a $2000 Tag Heuer wristwatch because I may have told them earlier that I thought it looked nice. But I do not want to buy this watch because it is not essential and it will make me fail my 80 per cent savings goal.

My friends tell me that I am a hypocrite because I purchased a new suit but won't buy a new watch. I then told them that just because I have purchased a luxury item before it doesn't mean I should continue to purchase luxury items. Then I told them about my 80 per cent savings goal and then they criticized me, saying that 80 per cent comes from nowhere and the figure is plucked out of thin air. They claim that I should spend money on the wristwatch because it is an investment that you make to buy something that can give you a lot of pleasure in the future because it can make you feel proud. They all have reasonably expensive wristwatches and claim that they get a lot of satisfaction from it and that I need to try it before I criticize it. They claim that because I have never purchased an expensive wristwatch before that I don't know what I'm missing out on and I have the potential to get a lot of pleasure from purchasing the wristwatch.

I feel like my religion (of thriftiness) is being trampled on! I feel like I am being interrogated and abused for what I believe in, which is thriftiness. Do you think I should just stick to my 80 per cent savings goal? It is an arbitrary goal but aren't all goals arbitrary? I am thinking that I should just get better friends but because I am so thrifty I don't make friends easily, so what should I do? Are the arguments my friends giving logical?

**ladykemma2** · 01-19-2010, 05:26 AM

a 2000 watch? are they nuts?

i dropped a 1000 dollar watch on a cold hard tile floor once.... never again will i buy an expensive watch!

**Lady_V** · 01-19-2010, 05:35 AM

Stand your ground... and welcome to The Frugalista Chapel!!!

They have nice watches... do they have $2000.00 watches? Why do YOU have to be the one who buys it?

I have mentioned I liked the hotel in Bermuda, but I'll never buy it. I also mentioned I loved my Bvlgari... but I will never buy another one. When the Bvlgari was destroyed (yes, destroyed) I learned a valuable lesson. My Timex can tell time too!

As far as it bringing you pleasure? Stress is not pleasure. Neither is disappointment or guilt.

When you're all too old to care about the Jones and living off pensions and retirement... how much more pleasure will you have by knowing your ends are met?

**ladykemma2** · 01-19-2010, 05:37 AM

Originally Posted by Lady_V

I also mentioned I loved my Bvlgari... but I will never buy another one. When the Bvlgari was destroyed (yes, destroyed) I learned a valuable lesson. My Timex can tell time too!

you too, eh? timex for me too!

**Nada.Leona** · 01-19-2010, 06:32 AM

This, my dear, is what happens in a consumer-driven society. When I was growing up, I got made fun of because we wore second-hand or handmade clothes. I never understood it as a child. Basically, your "friends" are telling you that you will derive pleasure from spending a rediculous amount of money on a watch.

Several points come to mind when I read this post:

- what kind of friends are these people that they would discourage you from such an admitable goal?

- why would they feel it's their responsibility to make you spend so much money on a wristwatch?

- what is ther financial situation?

- how long does the temporary pleasure of an expensive wristwatch last, really?

- why are they disrespecting your beliefs?

- whose money is this, anyway?

Seriously, I would invest the money it would take to buy that wristwatch into an opportunity to meet new people and make new friends. Now THAT would be an investment that you would take great pleasure from!

**Lora88** · 01-19-2010, 07:12 AM

Expensive things will only give you pleasure if its what you want to own I recently purchased a mink coat (sorry animal lovers) and I adore it I feel great when I wear it someone else might feel the total opposite way. Itseems your friends are overly fixated on your finances If doing without expensive luxuries is what you want do not justify yourself to anyone. Part of frugality is living life on your own terms Save away and enjoy yourself

**Siebrie** · 01-19-2010, 08:05 AM

Maybe you can invest those $2000 in a watch company's shares?

I don't think I would tell my friends how much I was saving, they don't need to know. My dh, yes, my parents, maybe, my sis, no, my relatives and friends, no.

**Trishagirl** · 01-19-2010, 08:14 AM

Don't let your friends influence your decisions of any kind! It's your money and you decide how and what to spend it on!!!!
Are they really your friends if they do that to you???

**NewLeaf** · 01-19-2010, 08:19 AM

I don't know why some friends discourage fugal ways. I have friends/family members like that too. When I go shopping w/them they tend to say buy this or buy that and I overspend. Why do we want to please them anyway? Our goals that we set for ourselves are individual. I want to save $50/pay period for vacation spending. Is that an arbitrary figure - not to me. It is the most I can stretch to save and it is a goal I want to try hard to reach. It will make me proud if I can do it.

It is hard to make friends - maybe you just need to take a break for awhile. When you next get back together set some clear boundaries. Tell them you just don't want to discuss finances at all. In the meantime, keep comeing here to chat and get support from your frugal friends.

**Bachelor** · 01-19-2010, 08:30 AM

It almost sounds like your friends are a bit insecure themselves. Perhaps having the discipline to achieve such a financial goal when everyone else equates spending to happiness is threatening to your friends?

**shortstack** · 01-19-2010, 08:32 AM

I agree with everything that was said thus far.
I don't even own a watch. I use my cell phone to tell me what time it is

I took something different away from your post though. I worry for you that saving is causing you so much anxiety. It is great to save for security but is saving so much isolating you? Are you doing with out to an extreme in order to meet your goal? I agree that our society is consumer and materialistically driven but there comes a point when cutting back effects your quality of life.

**wjcalderon** · 01-19-2010, 08:39 AM

The company I used to work for gave me an expensive watch (about $2500) after I had been there 20 years.
That was 16 years ago - I wear the watch every day and I absolutely love it.
BUT - when it dies, there in no way in he** I would spend over $100 on a new watch.
Tell your friends you are NOT going to spend that much money on a watch and they are wasting their time - and yours - even talking about any more.

**sabrelvssammy** · 01-19-2010, 08:46 AM

I think some people act the way they do because it makes it easier to justify their own behaviors. If everyone around them is buying $2000 watches then it must be the 'norm' to do. It just makes THEM feel better.

Stick to your guns. What you are doing is admirable and your commitments are worthy of alot more praise than if you were sporting items that you really did not care about in the first place but felt an 'obligation to society' to partake in.

Personally i don't feel ANY watch is worth $2000. Unless it can substain your life in some way (besides selling it) i find the prices of this kind of 'crap' (sorry to those who feel differently)...absolutely ludicrous. While i could myself go out and buy one of these ridiculous items cows falling from the sky would be happening first. I just don't feel the need to impress others...a watch was made to tell the time and one that can tell time is all i need, be it a $10 watch or one i got out of a gumball machine for .25.

I don't think you have to abandon all your friends. They are who they are, as you are who you are. Just tell them "enough..! This is how it is. Get over yourselves, and if you want to wear $2000 watches, $8000 suits and drive $110,000 cars...go for it...'I', however will live my own life as i choose fit...and this is how i plan to do it...and if you are VERY lucky, maybe in our old age...i will invite you to spend a week in my villa in spain"...

**NikoSan999** · 01-19-2010, 08:47 AM

I wouldn't discuss finances with them again. Period. Change the subject or just plain tell them you don't care to. They may be taking pleasure at getting to you doing this.

A $2000 watch dosen't tell time any better than one bought at Walmart. 5:00 PM is 5:00 PM.

**frugal-fannie** · 01-19-2010, 08:52 AM

I would tell them you are saving for a house purchase or other investment and you will feel much better with that house than a blasted watch. Also tell them the subject isn't up for discussion. Your decision is made in stone and you are tired of hearing about it. I would try and get additional friends that are more in synch with you.