August-erity

Wow, I spent way too much on cards in July.  The two culprits were Fanfest in Kansas City and Bowman Platinum releasing this month.    I don't feel too bad about the Fanfest purchases, since that was kind of my National.  But those Platinum rack packs add up pretty quickly, and I need to settle down in August.

It felt like I was spending money on cards every day towards the end of July, and, turns out I was:

I know by comparison I am a small time spender.  I haven't bought a pricey hobby box in years, and my purchases are pretty modest,  but this is still more than I feel comfortable spending in a mont's time.

I spread my purchases around pretty evenly by category too:

Again, Bowman Platinum explains why 2012 Wax was the heaviest category.  "Set Builder" is anything that I bought to work on the sets on my master checklist.  The complete set was the 2012 Topps Factory Set I got at Fanfest.

I really need to move the needle to where Cleve's is getting the lion's share of my card purchases.  Purchases from his auctions are always more satisfying than rack packs at Walmart. 

I'm not making any big promises to completely stop spending in August (sorry lovely wife, I know you are reading this) but I'm going to make it a point to dramatically slow down. 

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.

Hey Big Spender- January Wrap Up

In an effort to better understand and control my spending on cards this year, I decided to keep detailed records on where my money goes.  Not only is it helpful to me from a budget standpoint, it gives me some blog material as well!

Each month I am going to track where I spend my money (Cleve’s, Wal-Mart, eBay, etc.) as well as on what I spend my money (vintage, wax, etc.).  I wish I had done this last year when eTopps was still making new cards.

First, let’s look at January overall and see how many days of the month I spent money on cards.

Yep, that’s the purchase cadence of a guy with a problem.  Sure, it’s not much money each shot, but I bought something on average almost every other day.   That needs to improve.  I sure ended the month with a bang too (Cleve’s auction, 2012 Topps Blaster, eBay purchase all on the 31st).

So, where did I spend my money?

Value packs going on sales for $11 at Walmart was a big reason for them getting 35% of my card money in January.  I’m done with those, and I’m not all that hot on 2012 Topps, so I should be able to control myself on wax purchases in February and the lion’s share of my purchases should go to Cleve’s.  I’ve got a lot of travel planned in Feb/March so I might be forced to be good those two months anyway.

What did I spend this money on?

It's no surprise that wax was the biggest category, again due to the value packs.  I’d like to get that percent down and spread it out more to vintage and set completion (sets listed on my master checklist).    Relic cards is a category that I don’t plan out in advance, but I know what I want when I see it so it's a little unpredictable.

When all is said and done, I spent $182 on cards in January.  Considering what some folks drop on a single box, that’s not too bad.  For February, my goal is to get spending down to $120, and then my average per month would be $150 year to date, which I think is reasonable for a mediocre collector like me.