February Purchase Analysis: “Thrifty” Is My Middle Name

I’m pretty pleased with my conservative (at least compared to January) purchase total this month:  $69 (snicker-snicker)  which is 62% less than I spent in January.    I suppose I should give some of the credit to being extremely busy at work coupled with not being that interested in 2012 Topps.  Not only did I drop my spending by 62%, my purchases were more aligned to my goals.  Here is a comparison of January and February of categories as a percentage of where my money went each month:

Category	January	February	% Change
Set Builder	19.6%	31.6%	61.2%
Vintage	20.3%	28.8%	41.8%
Wax	34.6%	28.8%	-16.8%
Relic/Auto	16.7%	10.8%	-35.3%
Complete Set	1.1%	0.0%	-100.0%
Football	1.6%	0.0%	-100.0%
Misc Lot	6.0%	0.0%	-100.0%
Grand Total	100.0%	100.0%

I’m glad to see wax get scaled back and set builders (anything aimed at my Master Checklist) and Vintage take on a higher percentage of purchases.  I expect there to be months where wax is gets the lion’s share  of my money, like when Gypsy Queen comes out, but I generally don’t have the ability to spend that much on wax and still purchase other aspects of the hobby that give me greater satisfaction.

My pace was a little better this month too, with longer periods of non-spending.

I may have similar results in March.  I’m going to be traveling a bit, which is going to force me to miss a few auctions at Cleve’s.  I’m planning on purchasing a sampling of Heritage, but if it doesn’t do much for me, I may coast cheaply through another month.  I’m guessing that no matter what happens in March, when baseball fever starts to hit me in early April, I’m going to go crazy with purchases.