The True Cost of Ownership: Why I Just Say No to free stuff
No free piles for me.
I once sold a rental property that had been a furnished long-term rental. I needed to quickly clear out all the furniture and kitchen items before the new buyer moved in. So I asked friends and family if they wanted any of the furnishings.
Every single person, when walking through the house, asked “But don’t YOU want these things?”
It was hard to put into words succinctly why I didn’t, beyond “Absolutely not!”
Here I’ll work out a more complete answer.
This week’s post is part of a series I’m calling The True of Ownership. There are hidden costs in all kinds of ownership and we work to unpack that here. Read Part 1 about the true cost of luxury items.
Free things are seductive. People in my city love to leave free stuff on the street corners, and it can be hard to resist looking through what’s on offer.
Free! How can you beat that?
But I’ve learned from decades of falling for “free” that the cost hits you later, and it can be hefty. Here are some of the hidden costs of that free item you just scored:
You have to figure out how to incorporate that item into your home, including finding a place for it to live and possibly get rid of something else to make room
This costs time and effort, both mental and physical
If the item needs refinishing or repair, you’ve now committed to storing it and assigning yourself a future job
Once you’ve picked it up you’ve now created some level of attachment to that item. Getting rid of it later will cause you some amount of inconvenience and discomfort.
Before you encountered this free item, you’d been going about your life not thinking “Gee, if only I could come across X item!” But once you pick it up and bring it home, you now have a task (or a few tasks) you didn’t have before.
So as painful as it can be to pass up the item, it’s often wisest to refrain. Avert your eyes! You’ll probably forget about it quickly and save yourself a lot of headache later.
I have to admit I do make some exceptions to my NO FREE STUFF rule:
If there is premeditated purpose in collecting free things. For instance, my family runs a Free Little Library and are always looking for books to stock it with, so I help myself to any interesting-looking free books I come across. Or say you run a thriving resale business or have an active hobby flipping furniture, then perfect — you have a premeditated purpose for those items.
If I genuinely had been wanting to acquire said item and I see one for free, sweet. I kept a potato masher from my rental property since I’d been contemplating buying one anyhow.
If I can do a painless swap for something I already own. I also saved some drinking glasses from the rental and traded them for the ones I already owned but liked less.
While I have a personal policy against accepting free things, I absolutely have no issue giving stuff away. I’m pro-gifting economy, for the record! My favorite hack is to list something for $10 on Marketplace (it screens out a lot of weirdos) and then just give it away when the person comes. I figure they’ve already paid enough in time and effort. I also love my local Buy Nothing group but try to never browse what’s on offer.
I know it seems like a snobby, privileged thing to turn down free stuff, and some may be offended at this idea, especially if there’s a scarcity mindset or real scarcity. If you want to keep free things and it’s worth the work later, that is totally fine! You do you.
I’m just here to gently point out the costs of that free thing that aren’t immediately visible, and those costs weigh on us all, regardless of income level.
Now You
I’m wondering if I’ve really stepped in it this week and am about to get a pile-on about the virtues of free stuff. Let’s find out, shall we? What’s your policy on accepting free stuff?
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I agree with the spirit of this approach and especially with saying no to free "swag" (I work in higher ed, and free college-branded swag is prolific and hugely wasteful!). It's important to communicate to the business and other entities giving this stuff away that more new stuff is *not* desirable even if it is free (maybe especially if it's free... its free-ness just leads to more accumulation but also to placing less value on it).
But I think differently about free *secondhand* items: if I can repurpose, rehome, or otherwise save an item from the landfill, then I'll do it. I've definitely grabbed perfectly good items from the curb on garbage day (my neighborhood is relatively wealthy and people throw out a lot of things that should be reused) and offered them up on Buy Nothing and if there are no takers held on to them until I make a donation run. I think of this habit as a kind of service. It's a pain but keeping things out of the landfill or incinerator is more important to me than having a Kondo-esque home!
I too avoid free stuff because of all these reasons. I have a question for the group on a niche category of free stuff. I have kids and these kids get invited to birthday parties and at these birthday parties they receive party favor bags loaded with free stuff—annoying, small free stuff. Like temptoos that will be put in a drawer and never used and dollar store fidget spinners that will break upon one use and be thrown away and stickers of dubious quality—so many you could never use them all. I know that loving, creative hard-working moms put so much thought and care into these gift baggies, so I realize I’m revealing myself as an asshole but: I don’t want this shit in my house! Is there a graceful way to bow out? I don’t want to disrespect a party host, or be an obnoxious ingrate. But why must we do this? Does anyone have a strategy for saying “No, thank you” that doesn’t alienate a birthday party host? I’d love to hear your thoughts/experiences.