Reducing Pet Costs: Wrap-Up
Pets are not our whole life, but they make our lives whole. –Roger Caras
For my last Reducing Pet Costs post, I’m turning it over to you! But not before I wax nostalgic about my inaugural Queercents series. I’ve really enjoyed writing these posts, and I’ve learned so much as well. As a re-cap, I’d like to share with you the little tips I’ve taken from each post and applied to my own life.
In the first post of this series, we talked about saving money on pet food. Since writing the post, Grace and I have only bought our pet food in bulk. In addition, a quick call to the vet has us feeding Francie and Hammy only the amount they need, instead of the insane amount we were feeding them before. I had not realized that even if a cat still wants to eat, that doesn’t mean it needs to. If left to their own devices, they would stuff their faces all day and we would be broke.
Researching about pet medical expenses was a little disheartening, especially coming across story after story of people going broke only to have their pet pass away. Grace and I started putting away an extra $75 per month in a high yield savings account to cover a medical emergency for Francie or Hammy. Luckily, there has not been one yet and since they are both young (under 2 years), hopefully it will be a long way off.
It was tons of fun to try out the DIY pet toys for the third post. Hammy particularly liked the obstacle course made up of cups; he chased a shoelace through it until he was panting! Who knew that a solid 30 minutes of amazing adventure for our cats was hidden in our drawers?
Due to the post on pet sitting and boarding, we now have (count them!): Hope, Jen, John, Brian, Sheryl, Leigh and Laura lined up as potential cat sitters. We also know each of their food preferences in order to leave them little treats. And, on the receiving end, I’ve got to know some delicious salsa through my cat-sitting our friends’ cats: Sylvia and Theo. I think they must have read my post!
Another sad post to write was about end-of-life care. Grace and I had a long talk about what our priorities are surrounding their quality of life and I feel assured that we are on the same page. Now I can be confident that we will be able to make those hard decisions and hold each other to our commitments.If my cats wrote this post, I’m sure they would say that the luxury and extras post was the most beneficial for them. They now get brushed every other day, which in addition to reducing my allergies, also is a pleasant and relaxing time for them. They also LOVE the frozen peas in their beds during hot evenings- I just put a dishtowel over the bag so they don’t tear through it. It keeps them cool and it is hilarious to see!
When I first started budgeting for my pets, I estimated it would cost around $50 per month. I was wrong. Now, I have a much better understanding of how much each aspect of pet ownership costs, and I can go into another pet owning decision with much more information. Hopefully, the Thinking Through the Budget post was helpful in doing the same for other people.
I am still unsure how I feel about Tax-Deductable Pets, but Nina made a great point in the comments of the post about the legitimacy of the whole deductions and exemptions part of the tax code. It is the topic of a whole other post, but the complex process of how tax deductions are determined has recently become fascinating to me.
Now it’s your turn- What did YOU take away from this series? Is there something you do differently- big or small- that you learned here? Is there a glaring tip I forgot to mention? In your mind, what is the single most important thing you can do to be a great pet owner? Let’s share!
Thanks for recapping the series, Andrea. After I read your story about buying pet food in bulk, I made the decision to spend $10 on a jumbo bag of cat food that my Cassidy is still working her way through. I was spending $4 a month on her dry food, but this bag will last more than 4 months. Well worth the savings!
Andrea: I’ve started tagging along with Jeanine on her trips to the pet store so we can buy the 40-lb bags of bulk kitty litter. I’m the one doing the heavy lifting.
I don’t recall you mentioning how to save on the cost of litter, so I thought I’d link to a good article here as part of your wrap-up.
Thanks again for this most excellent series!
Part of this week’s Carnival of Personal Finance.
Even before the pet food recalls I fed my little dog organic food. It’s pricey, but I guess that’s one thing I don’t want to cut out.
Our dogs prefer soft treats over crunchy treats – their regular dog food is dry so I guess a milkbone is too much like an everyday meal to them. To save money on the treats we buy soft dog food nuggets and offer them as a goddie…way cheaper than a small bag of snausages.
Has anyone else accepted that there might be a limit on how much they are willing to spend to save a pet’s life? I’m torn on this issue, as I love my dogs, but I don’t think I would spend more than 4k to save either of them. Maybe I’m heartless, but I just can’t imagine going to all that trouble only to watch what would most likely be a very painful recovery and a limited existence for them (assuming that any kind of operation that costs over 3K is for something extremely serious).