Your Bank Account is Like a Storage Locker

Good morning Dinks.  It is no secret that I love the reality TV show Storage Wars.  I can spend hours and hours watching Storage Wars marathons on A&E TV.  I am not sure what makes me love Storage Wars so much, maybe it’s the different cast personalities, maybe it’s the thrill of spending money blindly in hopes of making a profit, or maybe it’s discovering the fact that an old gold leaf horse head is actually worth $2000. It appears that I love everything about the reality TV show Storage Wars, do you watch it? As I sit in my bedroom and watch yet another Storage Wars marathon I have come to realize that our money is a lot like a storage locker.

Use these tips from Storage Wars to help manage your money:

– Let it fill up and keep it safe.  Storage units are (usually) full from the floor to the ceiling with people’s most valuable assets.  This should also be true for your bank account.  Most people don’t furnish their home on the same day they move in and most people don’t save large amounts of money overnight.  It takes time to save money and accumulate personal assets.  You can force yourself to save money on a regular basis by setting up automatic transfers from your checking account to your savings account on a frequency that coincides with your pay.

– Don’t pay fees. The only way that you can be guaranteed to save money is to spend less money than you make, so don’t spend money on unnecessary expenses such as bank fees.  I am always amazed at the fact that people pay hundreds of dollars in storage locker fees then they default on the payments and lose all of their personal belongings. Wouldn’t it just be easier to have a yard sale or sell your items on Craigslist? At least you would be making some money and hopefully be able to keep some of your personal belongings.  I personally don’t like to pay fees for anything unless it is absolutely necessary, so I would be very upset if I paid a fee for a storage locker and lost all of my personal items at the same time.

– Bet big to win big.  Very often the cast of Storage Wars (aka Jarrod, Brandi, Dave, Darryl and Barry) find old furniture, electronics and antique items in their abandoned storage lockers. Sometimes these items are very valuable and sometimes they are just old and dirty.  That is the gamble that people in the storage locker business must take on a daily basis.  I personally couldn’t (and wouldn’t) spend money if I didn’t know what I was buying, but every single day lots of people do it. I know that sometimes the reward is very big and I have seen episode of Storage Wars where the cast members tripled their money, but that is just not me.  They say that you have to bet big if you want to win big and this is why places like Las Vegas are so popular…the temptation of winning can be addicting.

Photo by dustydavidson

Kristina Tahnyak

Tahnya is a Certified Financial Planner and former Investment Advisor turned marketing and communications professional She holds a degree from Concordia University, is debt free and currently works in the field of digital marketing.