How do you save money on clothes and shoes for your family?
"I feel the same way too!  With two kids, I feel like I am spending what it would cost to run a small country just on clothes, shoes, jackets, replacing everything as it is grown out of! A few things I do:  I shop in affordable places and check out sales, and look for the cutest things I can find there in a reasonable price range.  If you aren't browsing in the $60 baby dresses, you aren't tempted by them.  I don't go looking at $60 shirts for my son, he's five and he doesn't need a $60 shirt.  I also really only shop for him two or three times a year for clothing...back to school and early spring are the big ones.  For fall I got him five pairs of jeans, maybe 8 tops, new socks, etc.  I'll add in a couple of heavier sweatshirts, etc as I go, but I really don't browse for him...it's too easy to find something to buy! I look for inexpensive lines for the things that don't really matter...bright T's for my son for summer that just get dirty and spilled on, sleepers, socks, pj's, etc.  Joe Fresh, Walmart, Old Navy, Costco.  Then I choose a few things that I know I want brand name or more stylish options for, and find ways to buy them more cheaply.  These might be things like logo'd fleece tops, trendy jackets, things where the style is actually noticed.  I buy jeans at Old Navy for my son when they are on sale, I buy Gusti/Genevieve LaPierre snowsuits at Sears when they are 40% off in Sept/Oct.  The Childrens' Place has good quality, stylish clothing for kids and if you watch, they always have deals on their jeans or tops...then I stock up.  And for younger kids, Old Navy and The Children's Place jeans have adjustable waistbands.  I've already unrolled cuffs and let out the waist in my son's back to school jeans. I have friends who are starting to take in bags of too-small clothing to consignment shops...if they come away with $100, it's still $100!   For preteen and teen kids who want certain brands, etc, I think it is very reasonable to say ""we will pay x for each pair of jeans, or x for winter boots.  If you want to throw in some babysitting/birthday money and go buy something more expensive, you are welcome to do so!""  That way, you are still paying for basics, but they can feel like they aren't stuck wearing things they don't like.  Tell them...you can buy 5 tops at $x each for back to school, or 10 tops at $x.   And lastly, and most sadly of all:  buy less..and stop shopping.  There, I said it out loud.  I try to be careful of what I buy, but I still find things I bought that were never worn.  Now I keep a return basket in laundry/mudroom...if I don't love it, if it seems impractical now that I got it home, if I wanted it just in case item #1 didn't work...it goes in the basket.  And I return them.  I suck it up, I take it with me and go get my money back.  Mistakes can be fixed if the items haven't been worn or washed." "I'm all for thrift stores and yard sales. When they're littler they're more into comfort, perhaps insisting on certain colors, but somewhere around 13 they start to become more fashion conscious. If you want name brand clothes for kids, hit yard sales or consignment stores in better neighborhoods. Other places are Ross's or Marshall's. Both carry name brands. It's just you never know what they'll have. Another stategy is to buy fewer clothes. If you do laundry twice a week, you just don't need as much. Aim for mix and match. Also have play clothes for rough and tumble wear and ""good"" clothes for school and church. All these help keep costs down. My sister and I maintained an informal exchange between the cousins. This helped a good deal. A church in our neighborhood has a yearly clothing giveaway. That kind of thing may be an option for you as well. Or you could request needed items on Yahoo's freecycle. I see alot of clothes being given or requested on that site. I had one son who ripped out knees. Double kneed pants were a great investment. It looked like a rather large patch of fusible interfacing attached to the inside knee area. So it might work if you tried that on exisitng pants. Hope these help." I speak as a person without kids, but I'll give this a shot anyway, using my memory of the perspective I had when I was a kid.  My advice is, if the kids are young enough to not care much, don't be afraid of the thrift store.  My parents got a bunch of clothes from the thrift store as I was growing up (around elementary school age) and I didn't care at all.  When I got to be older, (middle school age) shopping at Target and K-mart didn't seem bad either.  By the time the kids are old enough to really care beyond, they are probably old enough to get their own part-time jobs and get their own clothing. I however, am probably naive, as I still care little for such things, and judging from popular culture, most care about them a great deal. "I look ahead for sizes.  I was at the thrift store and saw a good condition, good brand winter coat that will likely fit my daughter next year, so I bought it.  I also bought a snowsuit my baby can wear when he's 6 months (~5 months pregnant now).  When it starts getting cold next fall, I'll be set, rather than wasting time and money running around town trying to find winter gear.  This applies for any regular stores you visit (Costco, thrift stores, kids resale stores, etc): look for clearance/discounted kids clothes in the next few sizes up, even off-season.   This works especially well for basics you need lots of (PJs, socks, etc) and more expensive things where you don't want to be desperate when shopping for them. You're always ""buying low."""
"One big thing you have to worry about is tax penalties and accrued interest.  You don't want $1000 to turn into $3000 because of interest. IRS does not play around when it comes to being owed money.  CPA is a certified public accountant who should be savvy enough with your local/state laws to know how much taxes  you owe.  Usually, if your taxes are simple, they charge about $100-$500 to do your taxes (you'll have to look around).   Also, I'd look around /r/personalfinance.  If I were in your shoes, I'd take the money and invest in something relatively passive so that when you do graduate college, you'll have a good amount of money to start your ""adult"" life with." I'll still only probably buy in stores. Who wants to keep sending shit back? Even within the same brand you have two shirts/shorts/shoes/jeans that are pretty much the same but different sizes.   Puma is great at having similar style shoes that are the same size but one will run big or small. Its ridiculous. They don't even bother to tell you on their site a shoe runs big or small.   With clothes, you want it to look good on you even though it fits. I try on a bunch of shirts and pants and might buy 1 or 2 of each. I would need to order and return a ton of clothes if I were to buy online. I still do with some things like gym shorts, underwear, etc... but not with everything. "The suggestions towards retirement and emergency savings outlined by the other posters are absolute must-dos.  The donations towards charitable causes are also extremely valuable considerations. If you are concerned about your savings, consider making some goals.  If you plan on staying in an area long term (at least five years), consider beginning to save for a down payment to own a home.  A rent-versus-buy calculator can help you figure out how long you'd need to stay in an area to make owning a home cost effective, but five years is usually a minimum to cover closing costs and such compared to rending. Other goals that might be worthwhile are a fully funded new car fund for when you need new wheels, the ability to take a longer or nicer vacation, a future wedding if you'd like to get married some day, and so on.  Think of your savings not as a slush fund of money sitting around doing nothing, but as the seed of something worthwhile. Yes, you will only be young once.  However being young does not mean you have to be Carrie from Sex in the City buying extremely expensive designer shoes or live like a rapper on Cribs.  Dave Ramsey is attributed as saying something like, ""Live like no one else so that you can live like no one else.""  Many people in their 30s and 40s are struggling under mortgages, perhaps long-left-over student loan debt, credit card debt, auto loans, and not enough retirement savings because they had ""fun"" while they were young.  Do you have any remaining debt?  Pay it off early instead of saving so much. Perhaps you'll find that you prefer to hit that age with a fully paid off home and car, savings for your future goals (kids' college tuitions, early retirement, etc.).  Maybe you want to be able to afford some land or a place in a very high cost of living city. In other words - now is the time to set your dreams and allocate your spare cash towards them.  Life's only going to get more expensive if you choose to have a family, so save what you can as early as possible." Yes, you should be saving for retirement. There are a million ideas out there on how much is a reasonable amount, but I think most advisor would say at least 6 to 10% of your income, which in your case is around $15,000 per year. You give amounts in dollars. Are you in the U.S.? If so, there are at least two very good reasons to put money into a 401k or IRA rather than ordinary savings or investments: (a) Often your employer will make matching contributions. 50% up to 6% of your salary is pretty common, i.e. if you put in 6% they put in 3%. If either of your employers has such a plan, that's an instant 50% profit on your investment. (b) Any profits on money invested in an IRA or 401k are tax free. (Effectively, the mechanics differ depending on the type of account.) So if you put $100,000 into an IRA today and left it there until you retire 30 years later, it would likely earn something like  $600,000 over that time (assuming 7% per year growth). So you'd pay takes on your initial $100,000 but none on the $600,000. With your income you are likely in a high tax bracket, that would make a huge difference. If you're saying that you just can't find a way to put money away for retirement, may I suggest that you cut back on your spending. I understand that the average American family makes about $45,000 per year and somehow manages to live on that. If you were to put 10% of your income toward retirement, then you would be living on the remaining $171,000, which is still almost 4 times what the average family has. Yeah, I make more than $45,000 a year too and there are times when I think, How could anyone possibly live on that? But then I think about what I spend my money on. Did I really need to buy two new computer printers the last couple of months? I certainly could do my own cleaning rather than hiring a cleaning lady to come in twice a month. Etc. A tough decision to make can be paying off debt versus putting money into an investment account. If the likely return on investment is less than the interest rate on the loan, you should certainly concentrate on paying off the loan. But if the reverse is true, then you need to decide between likely returns and risk. "The answer is, there are a lot of answers! It always seems so daunting to start saving when you're living paycheck to paycheck and anticipate more bills on the way (kids are expensive!!). Start small, and make it automatic if you can. If you can take $25 out of every paycheck and put it into a savings account, and do this automatically using your bank's Bill Pay system, that will go a long way. It's about setting up a new habit for yourself, and increasing as you can. One way I've heard it phrased is ""Pay yourself first"".  Don't set unrealistic expectations for yourself, either. You need to start building a savings account to cover emergencies, not just future purchases. If something happens and you can't get a paycheck for a week, a month, 2 months, how will you pay your bills? Set up a savings account just for that purpose and don't touch it unless it's a true emergency. There are several banks out there that will let you set up multiple savings accounts and mark them for specific purposes, like CapitalOne's 360 accounts. Set one up for the emergency account that gets your automatic per-paycheck deposit, then set up another one for ""fun money"" or ""new home fund"" or whatever else you want to save up for.  Starting the savings process is hard, no doubt about it. You need to learn how to budget with the money you have after ""paying yourself first"". But the important part is to stick with it. Consider your savings account as another ""mandatory"" utility. You have to pay it $25/mo or risk...I don't know...a smack on the back of the head. If you wait until the end of the month to see what you have left after everything else, you'll find you don't have anything left. If you can set it up through your bank so when you get your paycheck it automatically puts $25 into a savings account, then you'll never have that $25 burning a hole in your pocket. If your paychecks aren't direct deposit, and you're physically cashing them when you receive them, then tell the bank teller to put $25 into your savings account.  You can do it! Make sure your wife is on board and you communicate the importance of setting up a savings account and work together to make it happen. Be patient, and realize that $25 may seem like a trivial amount to put away now, but after 24 paychecks (1 year depending on pay schedule), that's $600! (Plus interest but rates are too low now to worth noting that)." You need a budget. You need to know how much you make and how much you spend.  How much you earn and what you choose to spend you money on is your choice.  You have your own tolerance for risk and your own taste and style, so lifestyle and what you own isn't something that we can answer. The key to your budget is to really understand where you money goes.  Maybe you are the sort of person who needs to know down to the penny, maybe you are a person who rounds off.  Either way you should have some idea. How should I make a budget? and How can I come up with a good personal (daily) budget? Once you know what you budget is, here are some pretty standard steps to get started.  Each point is a full question in of itself, but these are to give you a place to start thinking and learning. You might have other priorities like a charity or other organizations that go into your priority like. Regardless of your career path and salary, you will need a budget to understand where you money is, where it goes, and how you can reach your goals and which goals are reasonable to have. "@pyb is right - you should put an hourly dollar value on your time.  Calculate a realistic number and keep it in the back of your mind. Then when you're looking for a discount or a saving, estimate the maximum amount that you'd be able to save.  This should be a realistic proportion of the value of the item.  From those figures you can get the maximum amount of time that you should spend on looking for that discount. Spend any more than that amount of time and you lose money even if you get the discount.  So then you can end up with a few rules-of-thumb like ""don't spend more than x minutes of time per dollar of possible savings"".  Then you can spend the spare time you've created on looking for savings on big-ticket items where the time is more efficiently used... or on studying to upgrade your earning potential... or on taking some time out to enjoy the world and sniff the flowers. :)" "There's an aspect to this question that I really love. In general, it's a question about consumer behavior that can be expanded to inquire about the purchasing profile of any luxury good. Who buys $500 pocketbooks, $1000 wristwatches, etc? I can offer one observation regarding the car. Two close neighbors, both couples drive cars valued well above what my wife and I drive. Both families moved, and shared with us that they failed to save for their kid's college tuition. My response was to feel that this was a choice they made. As I commented to my daughter, ""We can afford anything, we just can't afford everything."" Our budget started with saving both for retirement and college. Very little eating out, and modest vacations, cars, and clothing. This story is getting more common for us as our peers have high school age children.  As others have mentioned, the millionaire next door does not drive a Ferrari or wear a Rolex. To some extent, if you were able to peek at the budgets of these car buyers, you'll find what members here would consider at best, an interesting set of priorities."