I’m curious, what’s an item, tool, or purchase you own that you feel has completely justified its cost over time? Could be anything from a gadget to a piece of furniture or even software. What made it worth it for you?
Ditched gaming chairs, got an ergonomic office chair with several adjustment points.
It’s mesh seat and back, so its breathable in summer, gentle and supportive. I sit upright with no back pain. I lock it in place upright if I’m not using the armrests (eg: controller). Comfortable enough you quickly forget its even there, which is what you actually want in your practical furniture.
Every ‘gaming’ chair I’ve used cost almost as much, was a sticky pleather mess that flaked within months, pneumatics shot within a year, weird ‘racecar’ leaning back, fucked up my neck. But hey, at least it was in garish pointless colours? (Also, fuck those chairs that have the little ‘edges’, are they supposed to cup me in my seat Luke a cot? Because they get in the way).
I will never game in a gaming chair again. Quality ergonomic office chairs are DESIGNED for sitting in for hours at a time, and it shows. I’ve converted several others now.
Safety razor
Blades are extremely cheap and always gives a great shave.
Elliptical and dumbbells
Gym memberships add up quick so went with a cheaper elliptical and a nice set of adjustable dumbbells.
Kobo ereader
As I get more into reading I’ve come to appreciate that this one allows loading my own ebooks from my PC which can save a ton depending on use case.
I have priced out gym equipment, because I live 100 miles from the nearest “city” (…which is, like 20,000 people).
At $30/mo for a gym membership, it would take me >15 years to pay for a decent, mid-range power rack, Olympic bars, and bench. And that’s not including the weights themselves, which are usually $2-5/pound. A decent elliptical machine from eBay? Another 2 years, plus a year and a half for shipping.
If you’re serious about weights, and not independently wealthy, it almost always makes more sense to have a gym membership.
Safety razor was a game changer for me. Although I do find that some brands of blades irritate my skin and some don’t, might be worth trying multiple if you get one.
I bought a Kobo as well, after having a ton of DRM issues with books I’ve bought on kindle. I love the Kobo!
I have a kegerator that isn’t seeing much use as I don’t really get full kegs of beer anymore these days. We were buying cans of seltzer by the case and I figured I could just make my own. So I got a new 5 gallon keg for around $100 and some connectors and stuff. Got my co2 tank filled. Filled the keg with water and cranked the pressure up. After a day or two I had decently carbonated water. Pour a glass like you would a beer, add a little lemon or lime juice for flavor and boom. Seltzer. Been doing that a few years now. Between the co2 fills and the water from my tap it probably costs me $2-3 per 5 gallon “batch”. Compare that to $10-15 for a case of twenty four 12oz cans.
A book. Teach yourself Perl in 30 days.
I bought it around 25-30 years ago. I have dyslexia and autism and have had problems learning from books in the past, but something about the way that was written just clicked for me.
It allowed me to write some pretty cool software, including a huge system that ran a large animal charity for a very long time, tons of automation software and scripts, and several full webuis. Indirectly it led me to a new career where I write perl every day.
(I can write in many other languages now, but that was the keystone of everything for me)
My 3d printer(s). I bought my first one used for $100 ~10 years ago and offered to print a small model for someone’s college capstone project. People learned I had a printer and started coming to me for all sorts of small things. I would only charge for substantial jobs but people would end up paying me anyway. I quickly got a resin printer and started selling miniatures for friends. I eventually got contacted by one of the major manufacturers who would send me return units and replacement parts so I could repair and tell them what was broken, if anything, then I could keep or sell them.
Everything I have done with 3d printing has been subsidized by side jobs. It’s a super fun hobby because 3d printing sits at the nexus point of basically every other hobby. I have done jobs for people building rat rods, model trains, cosplay, interior designers, hydroponics, brewing, architects, drones, and more.My robot vacuum! My robot vacuum with the little home dock tower thing that lets it dump its load and keep vacuuming! I had the original robot vacuums that didn’t have a dock to dump their garbage in and it helped some but mostly it needed to be cleaned more often than I would have vacuumed my house without it, the newer ones with big receptacles are so worth it, once a week I dump his container and change his filters and maybe give him a little wipe down with a dust rag and he’s happy as a clam. I bought a set of replacement filters so that I can take the old filters out and use my big vacuum on them to get most of the dust and then chuck them in the washing machine, once they’re clean they go in the filter drawer and I just rotate filters once a week.
Robot vacuum. We have pets and children and our floors used to be disgusting all the time. But then my partner had the smarts to buy a cheap robot vacuum and now our floors are mostly clean most of the time.
Cheap Chinese diamond grindstones. I can have razor sharp knives any time I want now, it makes cooking so much more enjoyable.
I have two 10,000 liter water tanks in my basement that I use to harvest rainwater, and another 2,000 liter tank on my roof. From October to around May I close the city water and use only rainwater. I’ve been doing that for a bit more than 10 years now, and it paid for the installation cost in about 4 or 5 years. I also have solar water heaters, but it’s hard to tell how long they took to pay for themselves because I also have on-grid photovoltaic panels for energy generation. My energy bill is about 1/6 of my neighbors’, and the photovoltaic panels paid for themselves in about 5 years as well.
Wow. Thats very cool. I’m planning on getting a solar system installed this winter too (costs less in the winter). Here power supply is not reliable but solar is fairly cheap thanks to China. Infact I’m pretty sure we have a very impressive solar system for a country of our status. (Pakistan)
It’s been more than a decade since I installed mine, so there are probably more options today, but when I did, you were either on-grid or off-grid. On-grid means you “sell” your energy production to the energy company, but if the city power goes out, so does yours. Off-grid means you don’t use city energy at all, but it was much more expensive because it required batteries for storing energy… however, I remember recently reading about people using their electric car batteries to power their houses when the electricity was out, and I’m sure batteries are much more affordable nowadays because of how much electric car technology has developed.
I’ve got a 5kw battery/solar system for my little off the grid trailer home. Batteries were at $1000 a piece, at 2.5 kw a piece, last year. They are currently $800 each so prices are dropping year over year
Bit different here. You can be on grid or off grid too. But the government has limits. They don’t want to buy all the power lol. Despite the fact that they don’t produce enough themselves.
You are put on a waitlist first. Now we do have one side of the house under solar already for a year. But thats my uncles side, and they are on grid by now plus have have batteries. And yep batteries are the expensive part here too. But you can manage a combination too.
You drink the rainwater?
Not directly, but I probably could. I have nets in my gutters so insects and leaves don’t fall on it and I have another filter before the tanks in my basement. I regularly do tests to check levels of pH, chlorine and other stuff. The chlorine tablets I use says it’s used to make water drinkable, and I use the rainwater to cook and make coffee (so I only consume rainwater that was treated and boiled).
My city is in the middle of mountains and it rains a lot and it also has tons of public water fountains, so every weekend I just go to a natural water spring at the bottom of a mountain and fill some bottles to drink through the week - the city’s water company do weekly tests on the fountains and every fountain has a QR code for you to check that fountain status.Filters, hommie.
I mean, I know, but wouldn’t those also increase the cost?
I pay $200 a month for water in the seattle suburbs, plus $180 for city drainage, and a one time $25k fee for hook up to the water system. So yeah filters might be a cost.
Instant pot is a game changer appliance in my kitchen. On days where I’m too tired to cook I can throw whatever in there for 15 minutes and get a meal out of it. Makes yogurt, hydrates dry beans, cooks an entire chicken in 20 minutes.
Hair clippers. I started with a $25 cordless rechargeable one that I got on sale during the pandemic when everything closed down. I recently upgraded to a much better and more powerful corded variant. Looking at how much haircuts are these days plus tips, it definitely has paid for itself multiple times over.
Robot mower. I bought one on sale 4 months ago. It hasn’t paid for itself yet because I’ve only had it for a short while, but I believe within a year it will, with how much time and effort I save for myself. That and my knees and back are thanking it.
Stainless steel cookware. Spend the extra money to avoid shitty non-stick and aluminum. Steel heats evenly and maintains temperature. My food has improved a lot just with this change
Related: a good knife. Get a good santoku and you’ll be prepared for the vast majority of kitchen tasks.
Related: Scotch Brite pads for scrubbing stainless steel
I’ll vouch for this, though. After trying ask the best anti stick nonsense, I finally gave up and switched to stainless steel and have been content with the switch
My Sodastream has saved me a lot of money—with some cheap syrups I just make very inexpensive nice drinks. Especially considering I got mine second-hand and refill it through a local guy who fills the cylinders for half the price. I suppose I could save even more money if I figure out how to refill the cylinders myself.
I have one and used it for a long time but the fact is it just can’t generate as much carbonation as drinks you buy commercially.
Mmm, that is true. But honestly, the amount of carbonation I do get is enough, for me. Just enough to make it taste a bit fancier.
Boring answer but my hair clippers.
Ain’t been to the professionals for years.
I do look like the wild man of the woods though
It takes a bit of learning and help, but you can get good at doing a gradient.
I’ve been doing a #1 or #0 all over for ages. Clippers work out great for me. No skill required.
Hadn’t even though of this. I don’t think I’ve seen a barber in 2 years. I’m glad my partner had experience shaving their dad’s head though, they do a nice job
My system goes like this:
Summer arrives and it’s hot, time to clean shave my head and beard and look like a nazi skinhead.
By the time winter comes I’m looking like a hobo but my hair is nicely covering my ears and my face and neck are protected by my beard so I don’t feel so cold.
Summer arrives again, time to clean shave again.
My power tools. I’m not a professional but doing all the diy home repairs myself with the right tools for the job has probably saved me tens of thousands of dollars in contractors. And believe me when I say get the right tools for the job, it’s worth it. You can fight with the wrong tool for hours trying to get a job done poorly or do it right in minutes with the right tools for the job. Not only is your time valuable but having the project done correctly the first time means you don’t have to pay to fix it a second time. Even if you’re the one doing it the second time, you still have to spend the time ripping out the garbage you put in and pay for the materials to do it right the second time.
This 100%
I do my own renovations and build some simple furniture etc.; my drill and miter saw in particular have been invaluable.
My AF makes it hard to go poo, so I guess me having to get surgery for it means it forced me to pay something for it… ?
