Time is Money, & Money is More Time!

Contrary to what you might think and what you have probably always heard, the old adage, “Time is Money,” is actually wrong.

Now before you exit the browser, just hear me out on this. Because if you can flip this concept on it's head you can actually create both more time and money for yourself!

If you adopt the philosophy that “Money is Time,” and truly embrace the idea that more money provides you with more time – you will increase your productivity, lifestyle, and overall happiness.

Just trust me on this!

Why Money is Time – Not Time is Money:

OK, I have to be brutally honest… I have a confession to make.

Since 2014 when we got our dog, my wife and I have used a cleaning service for our home.

We have also taken advantage of meal delivery services, ordered groceries online and paid for a dog walker.

Now, to most, this might not seem too outlandish. BUT considering we did this even with $300,000 in student loans, and I write about being fiscally responsible on MLW, having a monthly cleaning service sorta goes against everything I say.

Or does it?

I saw a few stats in crafting this that the average person spends somewhere around 13 minutes a day just in the kitchen cleaning. Other stats said anywhere from 1.5 to 4.5 years worth of a lifetime cleaning.

To me that is just crazy.

Truth be told, delaying gratification, making lifestyle adjustments and working super hard to generate a positive monthly income has allowed us to payoff tons of student loans.

But my point in telling you all this is because we kept the main thing, the main thing, we now have options.

Options to pay for services that honestly take a lot of our time.

And that my friends is what we are all about.

$100 and my sanity, thanks home cleaning service.

I recently put something out on social media stating that things we will pay for are anything that makes our life easier and gives us more TIME.

Time on planet earth is limited, and how limited it is, well that is not up to us. So if Lauren and I can find ways to increase our quality time we will. That includes paying for services.

1. Necessary Bills Needed for Survival
2. Everything Else

Things like rent, car insurance, cell phone (is necessary in my opinion these days), food, student loans, etc are things that are sorta required if you owe on them.

Everything else, like my cleaning service or dry cleaned clothes, are not really necessary, but they help with the quality of life.

Over the last month, we have paid $120 in dog walking fees, $100 to have our house cleaned, and I paid my little brother $50 to aerate and seed my yard.

But all of that was after delaying for 2.5 years like it was our job. We also did things like canceling Direct TV in 2016, pay off our cars in 2016 and focus on making sure we were wise with our dollars.

The dog walker is necessary in our personal opinion because after going back to teaching I lost the flexibility in my former position to let my dog out midday. So we found a trusted person in our community who walks dogs around the neighborhood!

Pick 3 things you wish you didn’t have to do. 

So if you are having trouble finding the motivation to maybe get yourself in a better financial place here is my challenge for you.

Pick 3 things you really just don’t enjoy doing. For example, my top 3 would be laundry, cleaning our house, and cooking.

(If you said your job then I would read my side hustle or start a blog post – there is never an ideal time to start anything, you just got to start!)

Someone else might say they enjoy cooking but hate mowing grass, which I happen to enjoy. So those three things happen to be my least three favorites just because they occupy so much time.

Now, you got your three. Write them down.

Next, whatever they are is it possible to have these services paid for?

For example, could someone mow your grass if you really don’t like doing that?

Or could someone cook dinners for you or meal prep?

Start to conjure up ways to make it happen. And look at the costs. My top three would probably be somewhere around the neighborhood of $1000 if not higher to have our house cleaned monthly, laundry done weekly, and dinners cooked 20x a month or prepared.

But could you imagine if you had the option to just not have to do that?

How much extra time would you now have to do the things you really enjoy?

Life is all about options.

I know I just hit you with about 86 question marks but what it be like to wake up on Monday morning knowing that all the laundry is done, you don’t have to worry about cleaning up and you got dinner for the week coming in a few hours?

That is lifestyle, that is choice, and that is life options.

BUT THAT ONLY HAPPENS with positive monthly income and little to no debt. And I bet if you knew that you were 1-4 years from having that you would be willing to delay on some things in the meantime.

I allude to it often, but we didn’t start with $261,000 in Nov. 2016 and get to $123,000 in Oct. 2018 by doing everything we used to.

We cut out some things.

We stopped wasting money on things that didn’t matter in the long run.

And we made long term choices.

But now hiring a monthly cleaning service, having our kitchen painted (because I can’t paint or drywall apparently) and just having peace of mind as we progress on our journey are not even after thoughts.

Are we where we want to be? No, not even close. But we are slowly getting there and we are slowly making more choices on merit and not dollars.

And that is my wish for you and everyone! So I hope you enjoyed and if you did feel free to share with someone.

Just imagine how much time you will spend cleaning in your life!

What are your top 3 things you wish you could pay someone else to do?