Another Thing to Consider

[beauanderos]

There are many in this forum, I read, who are of the opinion that they will "wait for a pullback" to buy more metals. The level varies from person to person. While there may be wisdom to this approach, one thing to consider is this. Your discretionary income will vary dramatically going forward. As inflation makes every day expenses more costly, your disposable income will disproportionately shrink. If you have money now, think twice about waiting for lower level entry points... you may not be able to afford the metals you are thinking of purchasing now later... when other "have to pay" bills crowd them out of your budget.

[68Camaro]

Blue Bell ice cream, yet another case in point regarding the inflation that doesn't get much press.

One of the few brands that has kept a half gallon at a half gallon (instead of these 1-1/2 quart packages that are now popular). Last year a half gallon was $4.99. Tuesday evening I splurged on way home from work, stopped at the same regular discounting (not premium) grocery store that I had bought at $4.99 last year. $7.29 - GASP! 46% increase...

[rsk1963]

Blue Bell ice cream, yet another case in point regarding the inflation that doesn't get much press.

One of the few brands that has kept a half gallon at a half gallon (instead of these 1-1/2 quart packages that are now popular). Last year a half gallon was $4.99. Tuesday evening I splurged on way home from work, stopped at the same regular discounting (not premium) grocery store that I had bought at $4.99 last year. $7.29 - GASP! 46% increase...

I have seen a fair amount of inflationary price changes in my dtd life. I generally do not eat ice cream (literally maybe once in a few years).

But holy#$#! are you !@$#ing kidding $7.29 a 1/2 gallon? This (unfortunately) was the one that made my head pop!

There are many in this forum, I read, who are of the opinion that they will "wait for a pullback" to buy more metals. The level varies from person to person. While there may be wisdom to this approach, one thing to consider is this. Your discretionary income will vary dramatically going forward. As inflation makes every day expenses more costly, your disposable income will disproportionately shrink. If you have money now, think twice about waiting for lower level entry points... you may not be able to afford the metals you are thinking of purchasing now later... when other "have to pay" bills crowd them out of your budget.

+1

Stack an average amount per week/month, on the dips if you got extra, buy extra.

[beauanderos]

Blue Bell ice cream, yet another case in point regarding the inflation that doesn't get much press.

One of the few brands that has kept a half gallon at a half gallon (instead of these 1-1/2 quart packages that are now popular). Last year a half gallon was $4.99. Tuesday evening I splurged on way home from work, stopped at the same regular discounting (not premium) grocery store that I had bought at $4.99 last year. $7.29 - GASP! 46% increase...

For me it's staying away from the large Jamba Juice drinks (fruit smoothies). Suckers went up from $5.10 to $5.60. I can buy the 1.5 qt sherbet for $1.98 and it tastes almost the same. Ahhhh... the compromises we make as our standards of living decrease. At least I was never a Starbuck's person.

[Oakair]

Blue Bell ice cream, yet another case in point regarding the inflation that doesn't get much press.

One of the few brands that has kept a half gallon at a half gallon (instead of these 1-1/2 quart packages that are now popular). Last year a half gallon was $4.99. Tuesday evening I splurged on way home from work, stopped at the same regular discounting (not premium) grocery store that I had bought at $4.99 last year. $7.29 - GASP! 46% increase...

Wow...We really have to disband that bovine union, how much are we paying those udder fools!

[Hawkeye]

Blue Bell ice cream, yet another case in point regarding the inflation that doesn't get much press.

One of the few brands that has kept a half gallon at a half gallon (instead of these 1-1/2 quart packages that are now popular). Last year a half gallon was $4.99. Tuesday evening I splurged on way home from work, stopped at the same regular discounting (not premium) grocery store that I had bought at $4.99 last year. $7.29 - GASP! 46% increase...

For me it's staying away from the large Jamba Juice drinks (fruit smoothies). Suckers went up from $5.10 to $5.60. I can buy the 1.5 qt sherbet for $1.98 and it tastes almost the same. Ahhhh... the compromises we make as our standards of living decrease. At least I was never a Starbuck's person.

Ahhh Jamba Juice. I miss that place; wish we had one around here.

Cadbury eggs hit me the other day. I always get a couple of them around this time of year. Last year, I was whining about paying $1.99 for a 4 pack. This year, I had to pass when I saw they were $3.18 for 4.

[Hawkeye]

I saw Jamba Juice and ice cream and got distracted from the point of the thread.

I would love to be able to "buy the dips," but I would rather just pick up a little at a time as my supply of FRNs allows it. I never seem to have the right timing, and I figure that I'm in this for the long haul, not just trying to make a quick buck. Even if I pay a couple of extra dollars for some silver by "missing the dip," I will still have silver and not paper. And that's always a good thing.

[Diggin4copper]

your right...I spent 700 bucks on gas last month...

[jesse1111]

Don't waste your money on the Cadbury eggs anyway, since they were bought out a few years ago they are not as good and around here they are .39 at local walgreens.

[knibloe]

This year, pay off morgage, new roof on back of house and maybe some other smaller repairs.

Next year (in theory) more disposable income for PM.

[reddirtcoins]

....Your discretionary income will vary .... If you have money now, think twice about waiting for lower level entry points... you may not be able to afford the metals you are thinking of purchasing now later... when other "have to pay" bills crowd them out of your budget.

Agree, I have been on a major spree this year both sorting, flipping and buying. Time to dig more holes!!

[theo]

Just to play devil's advocate, some prices have remained stable. Canned Tuna and Salmon seem to be about where they were a few years ago; the same with canned soups and vegetables. However; coffee, peanut butter and sugar have all increased by 20% to 40%. My best inflation example is the 8 pack of fun size candy bars that sold last year at my local discount grocer for $1.00 (Snickers is my favorite!). Now we only get 6 bars for our dollar and, on top of that, I'm pretty sure that the bars themselves are about 10% smaller. This represents a price increase (assuming the decreased bar size) of at least 35%.

When I look at the recent campaign against our newest "toxic" substance, sugar; the conspiratorial part of me thinks that the goal, at least in part, is to hold down demand so as to make inflation less noticable. The 60 Minutes piece specifically mentioned peanut butter as having a lot of sugar. While I think the report was somewhat disenginuous in using the loaded term "toxic," I do agree that too much sugar along with carbs is not healthy. I just think that the timing is an interesting coincidence. Is the anything in these reports that we didn't know 5 or 10 years ago?

Going back to original theme of the thread, I agree that timing the market is simply too risky. Who knows how long we will have the option of buying physical for cash. Dollar cost average people!

[exbingoaddict]

There are many in this forum, I read, who are of the opinion that they will "wait for a pullback" to buy more metals. The level varies from person to person. While there may be wisdom to this approach, one thing to consider is this. Your discretionary income will vary dramatically going forward. As inflation makes every day expenses more costly, your disposable income will disproportionately shrink. If you have money now, think twice about waiting for lower level entry points... you may not be able to afford the metals you are thinking of purchasing now later... when other "have to pay" bills crowd them out of your budget.

Some interesting points you raise beauanderos. I'm a huge advocate of the "pay yourself first" method. When money comes your way, take X % or figure off the top and save and/or invest it. Be it rainy day FRNs, an IRA, or PMs. Make a habbit of taking money off the top before paying the bills.

A wise old banker told me, you never find money to save. You'll always find money to pay the bills though.

[neilgin1]

There are many in this forum, I read, who are of the opinion that they will "wait for a pullback" to buy more metals. The level varies from person to person. While there may be wisdom to this approach, one thing to consider is this. Your discretionary income will vary dramatically going forward. As inflation makes every day expenses more costly, your disposable income will disproportionately shrink. If you have money now, think twice about waiting for lower level entry points... you may not be able to afford the metals you are thinking of purchasing now later... when other "have to pay" bills crowd them out of your budget.

good word. i been laying back, coz i had to spend FRN's buying 3k of breaker rock and gravel, my mud up here is greasy sticky red and thick.....gotta lay down the rock, and since i dont wanna get caught high and dry when the grid goes down, i spending FRNs putting in an 8kw LP genny tied to my 1000 gal LP tank, and after that, before election, there's a few goodies i wanna lay in...after and during that, i'm gonna ramp some Ag....biding and biding mean.

[fansubs_ca]

A wise old banker told me, you never find money to save. You'll always find money to pay the bills though.

I always _used to_ find left over money to save for most of my adult life, only the last
few years has been the exception where it's been tighter. Some is attributable to
inflation but also some things weren't invented before. (For instance my internet bill
was $0/yr before 1997. ^_-) Also the current job has varying hours of work, previous
jobs had mostly been either highly regular schedules or so crazy busy I could just decide
to work more and do it. OK, current job used to be like that. Though I always do seem
to make enough to get by so far.

As for waiting for a dip, I am guilty of doing that. Was really annoying in 2008 having
a screaming deal on silver that was blatently obvious but had existing savings already
all tied up and that was about when "new" savings was failing to materialize. I found
I was prepared for inflation but not stagflation. So I tend to sit on a certain amount of
cash incase of a repeat.

2009 was a good year but most of that year's extra went into doing things that got put
off in 2008 and getting out of living on the "grace period" float of my credit cards. I
always stayed one step ahead of the due date to avoid interest on the credit cards
but it was just getting annoying to keep track of. ^_-

2010 and 2011 were pretty much break even years.

[beauanderos]

I read somewhere that real hourly wages have fallen something like 70% since the early 70's, which is why it takes two earners to attempt to keep up with what one parent from that decade could provide bringing home the bacon. Also just heard that real inflation for food this past year was 34%. It won't take long at that rate for discretionary income (for a lot of us) to be a thing of the past. I use my sales each weekend as a indication of how much buying power our members are sitting on (I know, lots of problems with that) but consider this... over a thousand members and I usually only get two to three nibbles each weekend.

[SoFa]

I'm waiting for a dip. In just a month of or two the writers will be reminding us how summer is traditionally a slow time for PMs.