What will you pay for?

[Sam_2.0]

The E-Mealz thing got me thinking - there are several things in life where its cheaper to do it on our own. But sometimes it is worth paying for the convenience. Just about any task can be hired out. Apparently for $20/hr you can even hire someone to sleep-train your kids at night!! (http://blogs.babycenter.com/community_buzz/would-you-hire-a-night-nanny/)

For me, its completely worth it to pay $15 to have someone else do the planning & prepare a shopping list for me for three months. It is also worth the $20 to pay someone else to change my oil. We pay DH's little brother to mow our lawn. All are tasks that I could do on my own, but I HATE them so I would rather not.

So for you, what are the things you would rather pay someone else to do?

[salserabarby]

Pedicure. I hate doing it myself, but I'm serious about debt-repayment so I've been doing it myself for the last year and 1/2. And my eyebrows, I just don't know how to do them myself, so I just clean them up a bit and let my bangs hide them. lol.

I pay for oil changes although my BF could do it, for $13 it's just not worth the trouble.

[mizbear]

I pay for all car repairs now after I had a not-so-accident involving drive up ramps. My now ex-husband not-so accidentally pulled my wheel chocks, my emergency brake and put my S-10 in reverse while I was under it changing oil one day.
I was lucky I didn't get killed.
He was lucky he had time to get home while my in laws got me out from under the truck.

Outside of that, I try to do it myself unless it's way out of my baileywick- haircuts, nails (probably why my nails are never done) that sort of thing. I've gotten so cheap I'm willing to try to learn to sew again.

[taz157]

Oil changes - DH refuses to do them now (the new oil collectors aren't that great and more of a pain than it's worth) and the savings aren't worth the effort.

Pedicures - While I was pregnant as towards the end (3rd trimester), I couldn't reach my feet easily and I wanted pretty toes since I wear flip flops alot and I live in Florida. ;D However, I'll return to doing them now as I'm no longer pregnant (my DD is 7.5 weeks old) and it's getting to be winter time and no longer wearing flip flops.

mizbear - WOW about your oil change story. I can see why he is now an ex. I'm glad you are okay.

[MittenKitten]

I have a whole list of things I plan on hiring out when I have all my stars aligned LOL.

I pay to have my DD's hair cut (although I do trim up her bangs a few times between haircuts)
My haircut every other year
Oil Changes (again could also and have done myself but when I can get them for under $20..)

I would love to pay for someone to clean my house and mow the yard/take care of gardens but that won't be happening for quite a while!

[HappyCat]

I would pay to have my yard work and snow removal done. It's just not my thing...especially the snow removal. Mr. Cat takes care of that but he will be going away for six months and I dread shoveling the deep snow at 6 am. while he is gone.
If I could afford it,I would pay to have someone cook healthy meals five nights per week and give private cooking lessons while they are doing it. I'm not a very good cook and I'm also not very good at coming up with new ideas. I would really like to do better in this area.

[dancinmama]

We pay for a gardener because DH has allergies and works too many hours to do it even if he could. In spite of that, I could spend hours working in the garden if I wanted to. We also pay for any car repairs/oil changes cuz DH doesn't work on cars.

[hockeygrl]

I gladly pay to have my house cleaned every two weeks. Before I was married, I cleaned my own house and paid the lawn guy, but now that I have DH, I have $$ freed up for the maid. Yay!
Hair and eyebrows - I shudder to think how I would look if I attempted to do either.
Car maintenance and repairs.
We eat out and/or order in a couple of times a week. We are so busy during the week that we splurge. When Wyatt gets older, I hope to have enough fortitude to cook healthy meals more often - I want him to have healthy habits from the start. We cheat a little now.

[formerroomate99]

Right now, I'm paying for Medifast meals because I can't get SAHD hubby to cook healthy meals on a consistant basis and I don't want to take over cooking. When he complains about the cost of the meals ($300/month) I remind him that the most attractive part of the diet is not having to depend on him. I've lost 20 lbs so far, Yay!

[bluecluessubtlety]

The dog woke me at 330 a.m. and I put the tv on for a few minutes. There was a sitcom I had never seen before and I came in midway. But apparently there had been some budget discussion because the wife had crazy frizz hair going on to show the husband she was on board to save money by not buying expensive beauty products. Nor did she keep her leg waxing appt. Then she offered to go to his job to pick up orange juice since it was a better price there. He offered to go instead and came home with bags of goodies with her expensive hair stuff. He showed what he was willing to pay for. Nice psychology.

[qofcc]

Pumping gas/checking the fluids. There are a couple of local gas stations that still don't have self-service pumps and they will do all of that for an average of $1.00 more per fill-up than the self-service station down the road. Ever see that Cathy cartoon where she spends a lot of time washing her hair with scented shampoo, putting on perfume, deodorant, etc, then fills up her car on the way to a date and the guy hugs her and all he smells is unleaded gasoline?

If I could get someone to clean out the cat litter for a few bucks/week, I'd pay for that too. Now that there aren't any kids at home needing allowance, I'm stuck doing it... maybe in a few more years when DG is old enough for chores and wants allowance.

[Jake 48]

Lawn/ yard work, I am tired of doing it.

[taz157]

I also forgot to mention hair cuts. I do trim my bangs when they need it, but for the rest of my hair, I'll gladly pay when I think I need it done. Granted, I'll probably get it done 4-6 times a year, and that's a generous amount. When my hair was longer, I got it cut probably 1-2 a year.

Off topic - Jake, I love your avatar! ;D

[startsmart]

I'll pay for a lot of services if they improve my business and help me get more clients and income. Some include:
*e-signing documents
*online resource storage
*web hosting and domains
*marketing coaching

Personally I have fewer things, mainly my gym membership and the occasional oil change. When business improves I'll be adding food prep/shopping help because that's what I hate doing the most.

[mourningcloak]

Right now I pay for hair cuts once every six months. Looking forward to make that time span shorter some day! At the moment my fiancee isn't working so he keeps the house clean, but if when he goes to work it becomes too much for us to keep up with I will definitely hire help. I'm ADD to the max and cleaning takes me three times as long as a normal person and I swear it's still not done as well The time it would save and the comfort of the house being clean will be well worth the cost! Haven't tried cleaning while using the meds, since I've just been recently diagnosed but that will be attempted when I get the opportunity to see if it makes the task easier. That would be cheaper than hiring help if I can manage to get the house clean that way.

[raeoflyte]

I'm so lazy....my goal is to make enough money to hire out just about everything. DH is a dreamer and just not great at the mundane parts of life and I'm pretty much over chores.

I love my housekeeper and really want her back once a week. Mowing the lawn and shoveling during winter, fall/spring yard clean up, cleaning the gutters, handyman work, laundry, dog walker, oh and litter box duty!!!

I really want to hire a personal organizer too. Someone that could come into my house and actually teach me how to set up systems so that things stayed organized without having to do a giant project a couple times a year.

[twinmama85]

we pay for hair cuts and oil changes and we do everything else. i go on every 2 weeks and look up recipes and make shopping lists, maintain my own eyebrows (cant have em waxed anyway, allergic to the wax) and if i can do the car repairs myself, i will (i have to install a EGR valve in my car) and i do this because i would rather save the money and its not really that much of a hassle to take care of stuff myself.

[lilyofcourse]

If I can do it myself I will. I cant see spending perfectly good money on something I can do myself. And that includes changing my oil. Now I havent had to for a while because my dad does it but that's one of the first things he showed me how to do when I started driving.

I wash my own car or have the kids do it. We mow our own lawn, bathe our own dog, do our own nails, clean our own house, cook our own food that we shopped for, we just do it.

I'll pay for doctors and medical needs. Other than that we do it ourselves if we can at all.

[fuzzylumpkins]

Twice a year I pay a groomer to bathe the dog. She gets her fuzz all brushed out, ears cleaned and, toenails trimmed.

Everything else we do ourselves.
Plumbing, electric work, gardening (Boyfriend and I put together a garden this year and have had a fairly decent crop except for the Corn, which failed us), yard work, cleaning. We change our own fluids in the cars (I just taught myself a month ago how to change the transmission fluid).

Shoot, we research ways to re-purpose items too. It's kinda fun. We re-purposed an old fence on the back end of the property to build raised beds for the garden and the dog's puppy house. We re-purposed 44 gallon soap barrels from the local car wash to catch rain water to water the garden during dry spells and have collected wine bottles and syrup bottles from the nearby coffee shop (where I work) to clean and fill with homebrew beer and mead. (Why pay for booze when you can make your own?)

[megera]

I would pay someone to potty train my kids. Pay DEARLY.