Rainy Day Pennies | Debt Free Living and Personal Finance

For the past year, I’ve been trying to follow the one-in one-out rule.  If I buy something, I have to take something old and throw it out or donate.  Pair of shoes in, old pair of shoes out.  An area that I make the most progress on is books. 

I used to be proud of filling my bookshelves with as many books as possible.  I dreamed of having a study/library packed with books.  Then I had to move across the country.  Packing and moving my books became the most dreaded part.  There were so many heavy boxes to move!  Especially the tech books.  How many of those books have I gone back and reread?  Very few.

I very rarely buy brand new books anymore.  I have a rule for movies and books:

if read/watched more than twice, buy (used if possible);

else rent/borrow

I still have stacks and stacks of fiction books from my past.  There are specialty books that are hard to find at the library or used book store, and have to be bought new.   Current programming and technology books, for example, are rotated in and out most frequently.

Thus, if I want to buy a new book, I try to sell my old ones on Amazon.  This usually works out to about a 3 to 1 ratio.  At that rate, I make rapid progress on decluttering my bookshelf.

I’m not quite there yet.  My goal is to fit only the essential books that I need in a couple of book boxes.  I try not to buy fiction books anymore, and opt for the library when I can.

I doubt I could be a true monetary monk minimalist, but I’m sure I can have a neat desk and bookshelf with items that I truly need.

Filed under:
Life Management, Selling by Cathy