This is a question I ask myself a lot when it comes to dealing with other people

What’s their interest?

What’s their motivation?

A good example is a financial advisor selling you mutual funds.

Off the top of my head, I ask:

• Are they salaried employees or commission-based?
• If commission-based, do they make any money off the actual sale, or the final amount of what they sell?
• Do they get more money pushing certain funds over others?
• What is the cost to me?
• How is the cost calculated? In what scenarios?

Not all interests or motivations are bad, and sometimes people have an interest in just being good.

Just understanding what someone is getting out of the situation is always helpful, even if you don’t use the info.

You can contact me here or find me on Twitter via @brokeinthecity.

Come and visit my other blog: The Everyday Minimalist where I am living with less, but only the best!

© FB @ FabulouslyBroke.com for Fabulously Broke in the City, 2012. |
| Permalink | 3 comments |

It is universally accepted that French women in general are achingly chic, but they don’t spend a lot of money to achieve that look.

(Although if you read The Essence of Style — How the French invented High Fashion and Fine Food, you’d come to different conclusions about how often hairstyles and fashion changed in the past and how many husbands went into debt for their wives’ shopping habits)

Seriously, how can someone achieve looking chic without spending $$$ on designer duds? Or updating every season?

Here’s how they do it:

• They don’t follow trends that don’t fit — Skinny jeans make you look less than skinny? They’ll pass on that, s’il vous plaît.
• They don’t spend $$ on anything that isn’t going to be classic — Harem pants are cute for one season, but they’ll pass if they’re on a budget and wait for something like a chic sweater to come into vogue
• They save their money & spend it sparingly — If they’ll wear a certain coat for years and years to come, they’ll shell out good money for that one item and milk cost-per-use out of it
• They don’t accept cheap substitutes — Sure, H&M is fun for trends, but if they’re looking for a nice leather bag, they won’t buy 10 fake leather ones before they realize it doesn’t fill the void of what they really wanted
• They don’t save their Sunday best — If they have a lovely silk shirt, they’re up for wearing it any day of the week, not just for special occasions
• They know what their style is — It’s usually pretty modern, but they know what makes their style their style
• They invests in the basic luxuries of their style — They may not spend $25 on a cheap bag, but they’ll spend it on the perfect red lipstick that they’ll wear day in and day out

Luckily, I follow most of the rules above (I am still caught in the trap of buying more than I should and more than my wardrobe needs), and I’ve noticed these changes:

• I spend less money — Mais oui! I spend less money because I am buying less
• …but not significantly less — Need I remind you that I shelled out $1900 for a wool coat from Burberry that I have actually slept in?? I was willing to pay that price because it’s a quality piece I know I will wear constantly, love wearing and it is not another cheap wool substitute (I had 3 of those before I realized that $100 will not give me that silky soft feeling I crave)
• I have a more organized wardrobe — I know how many tops and pants I have, and so on because I catalogue everything in my wardrobe now!
• I know where the gaps are for my shopping list — I am starting to see where I missed certain key pieces, like skinny jeans to tuck into boots, when I was fooling myself that I could do that with bootcut jeans wrapped tightly around my legs and held in place with socks
• I have less to agonize over — Less stuff = less choices = less headaches, although I don’t have anything like my ideal and BASIC minimalist wardrobe of 30 pieces, in fact I have more like 100 pieces…
• I have what fits and looks good on me — As an inverted triangle, I stay away from halter-anything & I try to get more voluminous items for my bottom half
  
• I have streamlined down to my style essentials — I am realizing that I don’t really enjoy fussy clothing, and I have a few fussy pieces with ruffles and bows, but not many, because it is just isn’t me

Related Posts

 

Where I shop in Toronto: An Overview

 

How I am Shopping Smarter: Cataloguing my clothing onto my iPod Touch

 

Wardrobe Essentials (Clothing only)

 

Shopping your closet: Mixing styles and making pieces work double-duty

You can contact me here or find me on Twitter via @brokeinthecity.

Come and visit my other blog: The Everyday Minimalist where I am living with less, but only the best!

© FB @ FabulouslyBroke.com for Fabulously Broke in the City, 2012. |
| Permalink | 12 comments |

You know how when you open your closet you think: I have nothing to wear!?

Well I get that way sometimes. Yes this can be hard to believe coming from a girl who owns 20+ dresses but it’s true.

So what do I do? Here are some of the ways I make old clothing feel like new again.

LAYER YOUR CLOTHES

Try a top with a ruffled neckline for something different peeking out underneath a sweater, or a longer top in a brighter colour paired underneath a sweater for a pop of colour.

This sounds like such silly advice, but layering your clothes can create some really pretty results, and you’d be surprised how something old can look new again, paired underneath what you already own.

USE ACCESSORIES

The best minimalist trick in the book. When I travel for business, I take the minimal number of tops, sweaters, pants and a dress or two. To keep such a monotonous wardrobe fresh, I wear different necklaces (sometimes layering necklaces) and rings.

Not only is jewellery easier to tote around in a suitcase, it is also cheaper than a new outfit.

USE A BELT

Belting something, anything, makes it look different. I do this all the time, seeing as I have a very slim frame, and I have to work at getting a waist to appear.

Experiment with widths of belts, colours, and the placement of those belts on your body.

PIN BROOCHES & OTHER THINGS TO YOUR CLOTHES

Brooches are so underrated.

If you pair a whole bunch of pins and brooches, clustered together on the side of your sweater, you can create some interesting visual interest in an otherwise boring sweater.

SWITCH OUT THE BUTTONS

This is where it’s going to start to get interesting for updating new clothes. If you are handy with a needle and thread, cut off the buttons on a sweater and sew on new ones. You can make a boring sweater a lot more interesting if it has sparkly buttons on it.

Just make sure the buttons are the same size as the old ones, so they can still fit into the buttonholes.

SEW ON FUN DETAILS OR DYE YOUR CLOTHES

I am not a fan of dying clothing because it creates a huge mess and isn’t so hot for the environment. But it’s an idea.

If you are even craftier than your most basic seamstress, sewing on flowers, beads and other decorations can add a little Anthropologie-like flair to an otherwise neutral item.

Check out what you can do to a plain ol’ sweater via Beautiful Mess – Sweeten your Sweater:

It may be too sweet for you and not at all your taste (it isn’t mine) but the idea still holds true, just choose different shapes, beads, accents and whatever else to fit your own sensibilities.

There are some pretty amazing YouTube videos to teach you how to DIY EVERYTHING from fabric flowers to cutting up old T-shirts, to making necklaces or flowers out of zippers.

Me, I’m not very crafty, so the best I can do are things with felt, glue, some quick hand sewing and pins. Very basic items.

Related Posts

 

How I am Shopping Smarter: Cataloguing my clothing onto my iPod Touch

 

Wardrobe Essentials (Clothing only)

 

Professional Clothing in a Casual Marketplace

 

How to make laundry more enjoyable

 

My General Want List

 

Does eating out make it taste better?

You can contact me here or find me on Twitter via @brokeinthecity.

Come and visit my other blog: The Everyday Minimalist where I am living with less, but only the best!

© FB @ FabulouslyBroke.com for Fabulously Broke in the City, 2012. |
| Permalink | 5 comments |

Warning: This is a personal post, and a mini rant on dating in general. This has nothing to do with finance.

Why is dating so tricky?

Is it because they really are tricky, or are we just over analyzing and making it trickier than it should be?

I was thinking about this the other day when I was on the phone with my sister (who is having a hell of a guy “problem” that I think is imagined), and I thanked my lucky stars I found BF and have to look no more.

I was always of the belief that the simplest way was the most honest and direct way for both guys AND girls.

For instance, if a guy says he likes me on Facebook, or friends tell me he likes me, or there’s a like-something chemistry going on but he never followed through with a formal date, time and place with just the two of us, I write him off.

Then predictably, I’d hear: Oh wait! Hey! I liked you. I thought we were going to have something.

Me: When? In this millennium? Or when humans become extinct?
Them: I was taking it slow, trying not to get rejected, didn’t want to push you, bla bla bla (whatever reason they want to make up for lack of direct action)
Me: Sorry. Too little, too late. (I say something along those lines, but not those words exactly.)

I really loathe ambiguity.

I am not talking about being tactful or trying to be respectful, I am talking about not being clear and using simple words strung together in a sentence that can be comprehended by others.

SISTER’S SITUATION

Basically, they’ve been beating around the bush for 2 months.

They’re both to blame, and they only Facebook or Facebook Chat each other.

He doesn’t call her, she doesn’t call him, they only hang out in group situations where he gets jealous if she talks to a guy and vice versa but they aren’t dating.

But nothing. ever. comes. of. it.

She gives him mixed signals when she tells him she’s down for “whatever” but doesn’t clearly state that she wants one-on-one time with him and not in a group. So the guy is probably wondering WTF is going on.

It’s frustrating to have been part of this conversation:

(Note: Yes I am very blunt with her, because she is the type that cannot deal with being coddled because it just encourages her neuroses.)

Sister: But I don’t want to put myself out there!
Me: So you want to stay single then, is that it?
Sister: No, but I want HIM to ask ME.
Me: What kind of stupid mind game is that? You don’t have to formally ask him out if you’re scared.

Just write: Hey, how’s it going, what are your plans for the weekend?
Sister: But I gave him my number and he knows I’m on Facebook, why isn’t he calling or asking me out?
Me: Because you’ve been giving him mixed signals by not affirmatively saying: Yes I’d like to date you one-on-one.

Ask him what he’s doing this weekend.
Sister: *HORRIFIED* NO! I can’t just write and ask him what he’s doing, that’s WAY too direct.
Me: Oh so you want him to mind read then?
Sister: Well NO, but maybe he just doesn’t like me.
Me: He told you that you were very attractive, he was interested in you, that he is TOTALLY INTO you two being together, and you’re telling me that’s not clear enough for you?
Sister: Are you sure? What if he is just saying that because he does it to all the girls? So why hasn’t he asked me out?
Me: Why are you making this so complicated for yourself?

He hasn’t done it because you are BOTH shy and you were giving him mixed signals on whether or not to go ahead and ask you out.
Sister: He just wants to “chill”. He also didn’t take a cab with me that night, what was up with that?
Me: …..a cab? Is that all you’ve got?
Sister: Well maybe it’s because I didn’t sleep with him yet
Me: … oh good. So now the reason is that you’re not the town slut.
Sister: That’s what _____ said. She said if I don’t keep them interested with sex, he’ll lose interest.
Me: …. I cannot believe we are having this exact conversation in this day and age.

Wash. Rinse. Repeat.

1. ISSUE: NOT BEING CLEAR AND DIRECT

I know guys might find this bizarre but girls actually like honesty, directness and tact. Hate the bush beating. HATE.
I usually wrote people like that off as: flaky, not committed, full of baggage, unsure of self and not ready to date.
I don’t want a wishy-washy person to date, I want to know that they can act like an adult and I don’t need to babysit or mother them when it comes to bigger issues if we stay together.

Hinting doesn’t work. “We SHOULD go out to that burrito place” is not the same was “Let’s go out to that burrito place tomorrow.”

2. ISSUE: NO FIRM DATE OR TIME

If you want to just “chill” with me “anytime” and “anywhere”, I call BS.

Ask me on a formal date, next Friday and let’s go to coffee or dinner or whatever, but don’t just leave it so ambiguous and say you want to “chill”. If I wanted to “chill”, I’d call a friend or do it by myself. If I am single, I don’t need another friend to chill with.

3. ISSUE: USING IMPROPER COMMUNICATION

Facebooking me, Facebook Chatting me, Messaging me (Blackberry, MSN, iPhone, or other sorts of BS) and any other bloody thing but talking to me in person, or emailing me with a “Hello, I think you’re nice and I’d like to take you out on a date. Are you free this weekend?” makes me roll my eyes.

Whatever happened to the simple channels of calling up a girl and saying: Hey this is Billy from ______. Are you free this weekend to go out on a date with me? Or talking to them in person?

Ambiguity, gone.

Instead, we’re trying to figure out if taking a cab with us rather than taking a cab with his friend, or the way he orders drinks for you, or WHATEVER ELSE we make up in our heads by over analyzing every action someone takes, rather than just being clear and direct.

4. ISSUE: NOTING EVERY LITTLE ACTION AS A SIGN

So he didn’t take a cab with you. Maybe he wanted to share with his friend.

Maybe he wasn’t sure if you wanted to cab with him.

Maybe he just doesn’t have the money but would rather owe his friend than you.

The point is that it’s just a cab ride, and it isn’t like he grabbed a cab with another girl and started making out with her.

Who cares?

It’s a cab ride. It isn’t a “sign” that he hates you.

So he handed you a used ticket from the club. It isn’t a sign that he’s in love with you either.

Stop reading into that crap.

Here are some direct questions you can ask:

• Do you want to go out this weekend?
• Are you free tonight for a date/to go out with me?
• Do you want to go bowling with me?
• How about a movie together?
• Want to go grab a coffee together?
• Do you want to go to dinner some time?

Just ask. It’s just words. It isn’t life or death.

Somebody explain this to dating wishy-washy-ness to me. I just don’t get it.

You can contact me here or find me on Twitter via @brokeinthecity.

Come and visit my other blog: The Everyday Minimalist where I am living with less, but only the best!

© FB @ FabulouslyBroke.com for Fabulously Broke in the City, 2012. |
| Permalink | 18 comments |

This post on Charlie’s Blog about blue collar jobs versus white collar jobs got me thinking (I love that!) about working classes and the stereotypes.

Somewhere in a high rise office is an executive.

He quaffs a Scotch and loosens his tie. He has risen far in the company, but he can’t tell you exactly what it is that he does.

He doesn’t know from one day to the next if he will be promoted, forgotten, or terminated. All his coworkers are enemies looking to plunge a dagger in his back at the first opportunity. He maintains the facade, but he hates his job. The perks are nice, but he realizes they are merely sugar on shit.

He gazes at a building under construction and sees iron workers putting together rebar.

They don’t even make a third of what he makes, but he envies them. Without men such as this, his office would not exist. There would be no chair to sit in or desk to write on. It is men such as these that make the world work.

They make the world livable. They deal with iron and concrete. What they do matters.

His PowerPoint from a month ago is now ancient corporate history. The company is paying a consulting outfit $250K to help craft a new mission statement. 250 smackers to write a goddamn sentence. Madness.

The above rant of Charlie’s is very Office Space when Ron (at the end) finally ends up getting an “honest” construction job where he just clocks in his time, works, comes home, has a beer and relaxes.

Compared to his other white collar former colleagues, they’re stuck in an office, stressed out, working on weekends and trying to figure out a stupid printer’s settings.

In case you are unfamiliar with the terms:

Blue Collar: Manual Labour

• Line cooks
• Construction workers
• Street sweepers
• Mechanics
• Repairmen
• Cleaners (maids, office cleaners)
• Factory workers
• Plumbers
• Electricians

White Collar: Salaried Professionals

• Office dwellers
• Accountants
• Bankers
• Consultants
• Teachers

By all rights, I am in the white collar category as a consultant, but that doesn’t mean I look down on blue collar workers, the way some might expect.

I just happen to like doing what I do, and it is classified as “white collar” work.

I have a great respect for people on the front line (the blue collar jobs), and just recently I had a conversation with a colleague that went like this:

FB: Well it’s just frustrating that I can’t get the information I need from them [factory workers]. I need those stats.

Colleague: *whispers* Well they’re blue collar workers, so you know, they aren’t professionals. You can’t expect too much out of them.

FB: *blinks* Well I think it’s just a question of them not knowing how to get the information, seeing as it isn’t readily available. I mean, they don’t time themselves or record that stuff, so they can’t give me what’s not there.

Colleague: That’s what I mean. They weren’t bright enough to even record that stuff in the first place.

FB: How could they have guessed? Never mind. I’ll find the info another way.

If you weren’t taught how to do something like fix a car, you wouldn’t be expected to know how to do it off the bat!

So why would you expect someone to know o record what bits of information seeing as they don’t know what someone in my job might need?

I couldn’t do their jobs — manual labour that is. Putting cars together on the line is no easy task. I saw how hard they grunt and sweat, and at the end they can see a row of shiny cars for their efforts.

SO WHY DO BLUE COLLAR JOBS GET A BAD RAP?

Because it’s manual labour. People think that working on a spreadsheet is far better than working on a machine as a job.

They think they make more money than someone getting dirty and fixing a car, and it is more ‘prestigious’ to say you work at So-and-So, than saying you’re a mechanic.

This is where I have a story: I know a woman who cleans stores at night and makes $150,000 a year.

She works for 3-4 hours of the 8 that she is there, and she isn’t let out of the store until the next morning by the manager.

By all rights, she’s a blue collar worker, but the difference between her and some of my friends with fancy titles is:

• she loves her job — she actually gets a kick out of cleaning
• she works by the job, not by the hour, so if it takes 4 hours, it takes 4 hours
• she makes double what my analyst friends make

Blue collar jobs are seen as dirty, disgusting and unattractive to white collar workers… but there can be a lot of satisfaction in doing a basic task with your hands.

I like to cook, so seeing (and eating!) the end result is satisfying, so I can understand when you fix up an old car to make it run, how satisfying it must be to hear the purr.

SIMILARLY, WHY DO WHITE COLLAR JOBS GET A BAD RAP?

White collar jobs are seen as lifeless, dull, drone-like sets of tasks and responsibilities.

• Clean up that spreadsheet.
• Make a powerpoint presentation.
• Go through these numbers and find a trend.

“Yawn”, right?

Where I think white collar jobs get a bad rap from blue collar workers who thinks that they don’t do anything. The spreadsheets, the organization, the presentations for a mission statement for a company — it all seems like fluffy BS, doesn’t it?

This is where I think my bias comes in.

What I do matters, even if I don’t deal in iron and concrete.

I think that as a white collar worker, I can see that if I didn’t organize statistics into spreadsheets, the factory workers would never know that they were wasting 15% of their raw materials just by not having the right timing down for the factory to run at an optimal speed.

Or that they can shave an hour off their workday just by having a process to enter information in an efficient manner, as not to waste time re-calculating and erasing numbers to get to the end result.

What I do can have a real impact on the front lines. Not always, but sometimes it makes their lives so much easier.

Someone in accounting would set up analyses and have presentations to say “Yes, go ahead with building that new factory, it is worth it“, and then blue collar workers come in with their iron and concrete.

If they said “No, wait a year or two, or never“, there would be no building. No blue collared workers. No jobs. No work.

Everything is intertwined, and no one job can say that one or another is worthless or not as “real”.

There is a lot of merit in white collar jobs, and I have never felt like I don’t do anything, although I have said to myself: I can’t believe I get paid to do this!

This is all because I love my job and I’m good at it. I’m passionate about seeing things done right, saving people time and money and helping them do their jobs better on the front line.

It can be easy to brush off a mission statement, but sometimes remembering why you started a company can help bring your future vision back on the right track so you make the right decisions and can create more jobs for both white and blue collared workers.

Blue collared jobs do the work on the front line, and without them, there is no company. They do the work, they get the job done, and they are the ones who are considered ‘valuable resources’.

White collared jobs create and improve blue collared jobs. The more a company sells, the more money it has, and the more people they can hire to expand the business. You also need white collared workers to keep a company running — accounting, selling, buying, organizing projects, hiring resources; there is a lot more to a working company than just the job itself or the building it’s in.

It is very symbiotic, not parasitic.

Without one, the other doesn’t exist.

You can contact me here or find me on Twitter via @brokeinthecity.

Come and visit my other blog: The Everyday Minimalist where I am living with less, but only the best!

© FB @ FabulouslyBroke.com for Fabulously Broke in the City, 2012. |
| Permalink | 9 comments |

If you’re nice, are you getting screwed, financially?

Perhaps.

…men who measured below average on agreeableness earned about 18% more—or $9,772 more annually in their sample—than nicer guys.

Ruder women, meanwhile, earned about 5% or $1,828 more than their agreeable counterparts.

– Human Resource Studies at Cornell University’s School of Industrial and Labor Relations

Read more on WSJ and via bakadesuyo

I should note that ‘ruder’ or ‘meaner’ women can mean many things.

People I negotiate with probably think that I’m ‘rude’ and ‘mean’, but it’s all perception, because it’s business and it’s MY money I’m negotiating for (remember? one of my rules is that no one has more interest in your money than yourself).

I remember with my first job, they wanted to offer me $50k, which is a very decent salary… but I asked for more, and I got an extra $15k.

Imagine if I had just accepted it without even trying to get more money? I would be at a $15k loss each year.

In fact, each of my co-workers who had accepted at $50k, would have never reached my starting salary in less than 7 years, with the way salary raises were going ($2k max a year). In contrast, I was making the extra $15k and earning an additional $2k in salary raises per year.

I see it as being ahead of the game right off the bat.

So if it means that I am called ‘rude’, ‘bitchy’ or ‘mean’ behind my back but I get the money I deserve, then I am all for it.

For the record, I still think I’m a nice, friendly, laid back sort of person (just not when it comes to companies (and their managers/whoever) trying to lowball me by using dirty tactics by using my age as a negative, or calling me ‘mean’ or whatever suits them to get me to work for less money).

READ:

• For every 5 men who earn a 6-figure salary, there is 1 woman
• Negotiating: Why you can only win if you ask for more money
• Wage gaps between genders: Who is supposed to fix it?
• If I were a Boy (series about women in male-dominated industries)

You can contact me here or find me on Twitter via @brokeinthecity.

Come and visit my other blog: The Everyday Minimalist where I am living with less, but only the best!

© FB @ FabulouslyBroke.com for Fabulously Broke in the City, 2012. |
| Permalink | 14 comments |

When I had a job with a set paycheque every 2 weeks, I’d spend HOURS imagining what I would do with that money.

I make up spreadsheets upon spreadsheets of dreams, and play with the numbers and cells for many hours.

And I still find this a lot of FUN.

Most of it was dreams of how fast I could use the money to clear my debt, but it got to the point where the MINUTE the money deposited into my account, I’d have paid all my bills and allocated the cash in 3 minutes, tops.

There was no agonizing, or wondering what I should pay or do.

I had already spent hours (of fun not torture) doing that before.

I just like playing with numbers I guess.

It feels slightly obsessive, but if this is my idea of fun and I am actually enjoying it.. I’m going for it!

You can contact me here or find me on Twitter via @brokeinthecity.

Come and visit my other blog: The Everyday Minimalist where I am living with less, but only the best!

© FB @ FabulouslyBroke.com for Fabulously Broke in the City, 2012. |
| Permalink | 37 comments |

The most amazing thing I’ve ever done with my money is…

To use it to clear my $60,000 student debt.

Cheesy but true.

Here are some other amazing things:

• Paying $1800 for a used car and having it be a great vehicle that does its job
• Using it to travel to countries I’ve always wanted to visit

And the stupidest thing I’ve ever done with my money?

Getting into debt in the first place.

Does that count? I could have probably pinched to have only been $30,000 – $40,000 in debt, but I wasn’t very frugal in college.

Okay, if that doesn’t count I have plenty of other stupid things:

• Paying for an apartment I never used – I was traveling all the time, so I finally gave it up after paying $19,200 in total for a year
• Paying for parasitic people in my life – This stopped after I realized they’d never change and I cut them out of my life

What are some of the most amazing and stupidest things you’ve ever done with your money?

Related Posts

 

There is such a thing as being too frugal

 

Is there ever such a thing as being too rich?

 

Everybody* has money

 

Are you suffering from frugal or debt fatigue?

 

Would I change my view on money if I made less?

 

Re-commit and start your money goals: Keeping yourself in check, and on track

You can contact me here or find me on Twitter via @brokeinthecity.

Come and visit my other blog: The Everyday Minimalist where I am living with less, but only the best!

© FB @ FabulouslyBroke.com for Fabulously Broke in the City, 2012. |
| Permalink | 26 comments |

THE COST

Women spend $7 billion a year on makeup, around $100 each (although that’s not true, some of us *cough* spend more than others) (The Gloss).

Vanity Fare says in the U.S. alone, 68% of the 70 million women in the country (48 million) work and have money to spend on beauty, and $17 billion dollars is spent on makeup in the U.S. alone.

Women purchase 2-3 times on average more makeup than they need or use.

The average woman owns:

• 7 Lipsticks but use only 2.6 of them on rotation
• 12 Eyeshadows but only use 5 of them on rotation <– the biggest category!
• 2-3 Mascaras but only uses 1 daily
• 3 forms of blush in various shades but only uses 1 daily
• 2 foundations and they use one or both daily

So we own more than we need (no surprise) and there’s always a demand to look and stay beautiful.

QUALITY FACTORS IN THE COST

The cost also matters in terms of quality and how picky you are with it.

If you want, you can spend only $7 on foundation or concealer, but for the most part, it won’t be as good as if you shell out for other more expensive brands.

This is from experience by the way… I’ve worn very cheap to very expensive, and I find the mid-range brands (mostly available at Sephora) are the best.

Let’s break down what a basic kit would have:

BASIC MAKEUP KIT

• Foundation or Concealer – $50
• Eyeliner – $10
• Mascara – $10
• Eyeshadow – $15
• Blush – $15
• Lip Colour – $15
• Subtotal = $115

EXTRAS TO ROUND OUT A MAKEUP KIT

• Makeup primer – $50
• Eyeshadow primer – $30
• Bronzer – $20
• Concealer or Foundation – $50
• Brushes – $50
• Subtotal = $230

Total = $315

Then imagine variations of colour on blush, lip colour, eyeshadow, foundation, concealer… and you can see how and why women spend so much on makeup.

Granted, the above can last me a good 5 years, so it’s really $295 / 5 years or $59/year, but they tell you to change your makeup every year or so.

THE QUEST

It took me a while to find the right products, and it was just a question of cost.

Spend where it makes sense and save on the rest.

Funny, but true.

I’m not talking about spending $100 on a designer foundation, but if you can afford to splurge, go up to the mid-range costs of makeup products. The extra $20 per tube or compact is worth it, trust me! I cringe every time I pay, but I can’t go back to the cheaper drugstore brands for certain items like foundation, concealer and blush.

The rest, like eyeliner or eyeshadow, can be found in lower-end drugstore products such as Annabelle (which is amazing!), and there’s no need to pay $20 for a great eyeliner unless you want to.

THE HOLY GRAILS

• Foundation: Powder CoverFX covers beautifully and is SPF15
• Concealer: Time Balm TheBalm or CoverFX covers everything with SPF15
• Eyeliner: Marcelle or Annabelle has amazingly soft eyeliners
• Mascara: Covergirl or Maybelline
• Eyeshadow: Annabelle Mono Eyeshadows (Gleam is beautiful)
• Blush: Cargo Blush
• Lip Colour: Rosebud Salve Lip Balm
• Makeup Primer: Tarte Clean Slate
• Eyeshadow Primer: Too Faced Eyeshadow Insurance
• Bronzer: Annabelle Zebra Glow Bronzer works on all skin tones
• Brushes: The Body Shop, Quo or Sephora

The TOTAL? Around $250

Naturally, I have more than what I am listing above, but that would be my current Holy Grail of makeup items and how much it would cost to replace everything.

Want to learn more makeup facts?

Read: The Argument for Wearing and Using Less Makeup (The Everyday Minimalist)

What about you?

How much do you own in makeup and what’s in your essential kit?

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True Cost of Watching & Owning a TV

You can contact me here or find me on Twitter via @brokeinthecity.

Come and visit my other blog: The Everyday Minimalist where I am living with less, but only the best!

© FB @ FabulouslyBroke.com for Fabulously Broke in the City, 2012. |
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Note: This post is for guys too. I know that there are some of you out there that actually like to have nice skin, contrary to popular belief, but don’t want to look like you get facials or to wear makeup This is apparently a big-seller for men, and a lot of guys buy the device and buy a second one for their wives or girlfriends!

I am a huge skeptic of devices like microdermabrasion facials at home and other devices for the skin, particularly because I loathe carrying that stuff around if I rarely use it and I only do it because I spent a fortune on it.

I also don’t get a lot of acne from my earlier years, mostly due to the fact that my diet has changed drastically — I try to eat as natural foods and as unprocessed as possible, cooking from scratch and avoiding things in a frozen box or can.

I’m thinking of never going to a restaurant again.. or at least, only going to sushi places from now on where the food is raw.

I rarely get acne now, and when I do, I know it’s because something I ate outside somewhere, had some additive in there that gave me essentially what is an allergic reaction in the form of a pimple, because my body couldn’t process it.

So when I heard about the Clarisonic At-Home Facial brushes, I was thinking:

PFFFT! $100 – $200 for a device that is nothing more than a glorified washcloth? You’ve got to be joking.

….until I bought it.

My reasons for buying it was unrelated to my face, and more that my body was starting to experience some throwbacks to eczema problems.

I was seeing a lot of layers of dead skin pile up, and using scrubs or brushes were either not doing enough for my skin, or scrubbing them red and raw (also not good for my skin).

When I heard about this Clarisonic brush that could be used on the body and on the face in the shower, I was curious.

I don’t believe in that “sonic cleansing power” stuff, but I tested it in Sephora, and I liked that there was a moving, whirring section in the middle of the brush so that I don’t have to try and move a static brush around in a circle to mimic its effects.

WHAT CLARISONIC MODELS ARE AVAILABLE

• Clarisonic Plus = $225
• Clarisonic Classic = $195
• Clarisonic Mia 2 = $149
• Clarisonic Mia = $119    <— the one I chose of obvious reasons

WHAT ARE THE OTHER DIFFERENCES?

• Clarisonic Plus = 3 speeds, not as portable as it comes with a charging stand, can use the Body Brush head
• Clarisonic Classic = 2 speeds, not as portable as it comes with a charging stand, can use the Body Brush head
• Clarisonic Mia 2 = 2 speeds, portable, cannot use the Body Brush head
• Clarisonic Mia = 1 speed, portable, cannot use the Body Brush head

WHY I CHOSE THE CLARISONIC MIA (ORIGINAL)

1. It was $119 and the cheapest of the bunch
2. The brushes are the same as on the higher-end Classic & Plus models (I felt them up)
3. The motors are the same too (sometimes smaller models are made with cheaper parts)
4. The ‘Mia’ is quite portable and travel friendly (the higher-end models have a huge charging stand)
5. It’s slightly smaller than the higher-end models, but only in the length of the handle, not much else
6. It only has one speed, but frankly, Fast vs. Normal vs. Slow felt the same to me
7. I didn’t need extras like timers, speeds and so on, if it would be $50 – $106 more expensive (ouch!)
8. Any brush can be used with it except the body brush, but the ‘normal’ brush head works fine on the body

The brush is pretty compact, as pictured beside my compact digital camera case:

This is the brush on the device itself. The little black bristles and the white section in the middle, rotate. The outer bristles don’t, which keeps in the water from spraying all over your bathroom and face.

THE COSTS OF A CLARISONIC MIA (UP-FRONT & FOREVER)

It costs $119 USD to buy it, plus taxes, but it doesn’t stop there!

The brushes are around $25 each, to be replaced every 3-4 months (like my electric toothbrush), but you can buy them in twin-pack deals for $40, which works out to $20 per brush head.

Now, each brush head has to be separate. One for the face, one for the body (makes sense, actually… I’d use ‘sensitive’ on my face, ‘normal’ on my body).

They recommend using the facial brush twice a day and replace it every 4 months. I plan on using it once daily at night, and replacing it every 8 months, then.

They recommend using the body brush every day and replacing it every 2 months (twice as long to cover your body). I plan on using it every other day (or less as not to irritate my skin), and replacing it every 6 months.

I am not a fan of being obsessively clean.

Read: The Great Unwashed and our Obsessive Cleanliness

So $20 per brush head, because I like deals and if I can stock up when they go on sale or discount or something, I will.

• For the face: Replace every 8 months= ~$30/year
• For the body: Replace every 6 months = ~$40/year

I am looking for a final upkeep cost of about a maximum cost of $70/year in brush heads, if my assumptions above are correct.

I’ll have to try it for a year and keep track of my expenses in my budget.

WHAT COMES IN A CLARISONIC MIA BOX

• The Mia
• Charger
• Small bottle of some face polish stuff (you can use any cleanser you have, however)

I think the higher end ones look sexier because they come with different face polishes in larger sizes, but all that frou-frou for extra money is not my cup of tea. Couldn’t care less, I don’t bother with the products given, I only want the brush.

I haven’t even used this face polish thing..

DID THE CLARISONIC MIA COME IN ANY OTHER COLOURS?

Yes. In these ones below:

The classic/standard pastels looked ugly, so I just chose plain ol’ white.

It looked the most normal.

CAUTION: Do not buy the black or grey ones in the store, if you ever come across them.

I know for a fact that they use different dyes in the plastics for the colour black (and very dark grey), which compromises the plastic and makes it more brittle/vulnerable.

Stick to any colour but the very darkest like black or grey.

They also had patterns (leopard at the time), but it was another $10 extra on top of the $119. I think the other darker colours (above) are ‘limited editions’, and must cost more money.

I was NOT (and still am not) willing to pay $10 more for another colour or pattern. Who is really going to see it?

USING IT

Waiting 24 hours for it to fully charge was agony, but absolutely necessary to make sure the battery doesn’t get ruined (ALWAYS fully charge your electronics properly before using it).

On the very first day of using it, I felt immediate results. My skin was softer, the layer of dead skin was sloughed off and by the end of the week, I was hooked.

One minute sounds like a long time to be rubbing stuff on your face, but frankly, it isn’t. It goes by so quick, sometimes you think: wait, I needed another 30 seconds!

I just lightly swipe it across my forehead, down the sides, onto my cheeks, on my nose, ending at my chin. By the end of that, depending on how slow or fast I go, I am pretty much done.

Then I just rinse my face, pat dry with a towel and apply my moisturizer.

To clean the brush, I run it under water, hold the handle tight and flick it dry.

One thing I will say is that you must use the brush twice a day.

I stopped for a day or so (only used it at night for 2 nights), and my skin was really unhappy. I broke out a little, and it was like my skin got used to using the brush in cleaning it, that if I stopped, my skin got angry.

Now, I just use it twice a day and my skin has never looked or felt better. I’m amazed and I’m not convinced a washcloth and rubbing it in circles on my face would have done the same thing in the same amount of time.

I could definitely use a washcloth, but I’d take 3 minutes longer to try and mimic the inner rotating brush.

ALL of my moisturizers, serums and lotions absorb a lot better now.

The minute I put on two drops of my argan oil on my face, it disappears almost instantly. That has NEVER happened before, I usually have time to rub it all over my face from one place and spread it around, but now, I have to dab oil on every part of my face before rubbing it in.

As for the body, you can do the test I did. I put the Normal brush head (Body Brush won’t fit, it’s too larger for the Mia), and you scrub one arm. Then you wash both arms and apply lotion to both.

Immediately, I could see the arm that was brushed, absorbed everything immediately. Even BF felt a difference when I tested him (he’s a super skeptic) and told me immediately which arm wasn’t absorbing the lotion as well.

MY QUICK PROS & CONS

PROS

1. It actually works and my skin feels much better with all those dead cells sloughed off
2. It is only 1 minute to wash my face really effectively
3. My products work better — my lotions absorb better rather than sitting on my face like a layer

CONS

1. Replacing the brush I really hate removing and replacing the brush because it’s unwieldy. You have to snap it on and twist, and the twisting part is hard because there seems to be nothing to grip on the brush to get it on the brush body itself.

2. The charger falls off easily because it isn’t snapped on or a cup of any kind. It’s two little connectors that you have to place carefully on the device, and make sure you don’t touch or move it accidentally.

3. Obviously, PRICE. Ick to the pricetag, but I am not willing to compromise on quality to be cheap, because I heard lots of reviews that the other imitation brushes DO NOT WORK as well as the Clarisonic and people waste $30 – $50 more by trying to be too cheap.

 RECOMMENDATION

BUY. IT. (Preferably on sale if you can score that some how)

The hype is to be believed.

I spent the money, choked on spending it, and am still not loving the price tag, but now I am not going to spas to get my face scrubbed, exfoliated and cleaned.

I’m going to use this brush twice a day, forever.

You can contact me here or find me on Twitter via @brokeinthecity.

Come and visit my other blog: The Everyday Minimalist where I am living with less, but only the best!

© FB @ FabulouslyBroke.com for Fabulously Broke in the City, 2012. |
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