Many things in life have unexpected costs that catch people by surprise. These can be anything from direct fees and taxes to hidden costs of ownership like depreciation and maintenance.
This article explores 15 things that cost way more than many people bargain for.
Weddings
A wedding goes beyond simply accounting for a dress, photographer, and venue—there are flowers, insurance, transport, food, drinks, invitations… the list goes on and on. Moreover, many people will experience a ‘wedding tax,’ paying a premium over a comparable service because the occasion is someone’s wedding. Depending on the number of guests, a wedding can easily cost tens or hundreds of thousands of dollars.
Childcare
Childcare, it turns out, is yet another facet of child-rearing that is ‘surprisingly’ expensive. From day-care to schooling and extracurricular activities, the cost of ensuring your child is minded whilst you are out at work can get expensive – and for some people, the cost of early childcare, especially where relatives are not available to step in, can be exorbitant and is a coin toss between a parent giving up work to care for the child vs paying their whole salary for someone else to do so.
Car Ownership
Owning a car is one of the greatest hidden costs of our time – fuel, insurance, consumables, maintenance, storage. This is before you even consider that depreciation will turn your car into a liability rather than an asset, and in some instances, driving your car off the showroom floor will literally wipe thousands of dollars off the value of a car before you’ve even had chance to properly wear it in.
Higher Education
College tuition can cost a small fortune, and a great college tuition is something of a gift that keeps on giving. Moreover, take into account expensive textbooks, hidden fees, and the cost of accommodation (especially if living away from home), and that college degree can end up being a several hundred thousand dollar investment. Add to that the fact that a college degree may not earn as much as expected, and that college degree could end up being a monetary black hole.
Pets
Despite the joy they bring, furry or feathered friends come with their own maladies and affiliations, just like the rest of us. Despite pets generally being diminutive, vet fees, medicines, and insurance can be supersized. Once you consider the proliferation of designer pets with congenital defects and the fact that our pets cannot actually tell us what is wrong with them, expensive medical bills for our pets become an inevitability.
Home Renovations
This one will actually hit home with many of us – pun sadly intended. A renovation can unveil hidden defects that require fixing, higher than expected input costs, that kitchen that you MUST have (‘damn the costs!’), and all of a sudden, your minor facelift becomes a major nip and tuck with a cost to match. Add in notoriously unreliable contractors and unforeseen expenses, and things can get expensive in a hurry.
Utilities
Utility bills are universal, and most people the world over exclaim in perturbance, ‘Huh, that’s more than I thought it would be.’ Indeed, even when there is no cost of living crisis and inflation, the cost of water, electricity, internet, gas, heating, services, municipality fees, waste collection, and the like contributes to homeownership costs.
Dining Out
A simple dinner out can become quite expensive once you factor in taxes, service charges, tips, coverage charges, and corkage fees.
Appliance Repairs
Whilst it is great to try to maintain appliances to avoid waste, some appliances are more trouble than they are worth fixing—if you factor in an inspection fee, labor costs, and replacement parts, for example, repairing some items will cost just as much, if not more, to repair as to replace.
Unexpected or Emergency Expenses
Crucially, planning for unexpected expenses can leave rather large holes in your budget. Ever had to change a set of tires unexpectedly? How about changing a boiler? As is the way with these things, many expenses can be prohibitively expensive to fix if not properly accounted for.
Grocery Shopping
Groceries are one of those things which are decidedly necessary, but can get wildly out of hand if not planned correctly. Have you ever reached the check-out and wondered ‘how did that happen?’. More often than not, it is the cost of those unplanned fancy olives and artisanal pretzels that you had to have which are the culprit.
Student Loans
The cost of education – not only the upfront cost of tuition fees, which can be exorbitant, but the ongoing costs to carry the debt can be more difficult to bear than expected. Fees, high interest rates, and the opportunity cost for not investing the money, can make the cost of education untenable.
Coffee Habits
Coffee is one of those sleeper expenses – excuse the caffeine-related pun. Think about those daily morning flat white from Starbucks, and Frappuccinos after lunch, and those expenses, ostensibly for a few cents worth of coffee if home-made, will rack up hundreds of dollars per month.
Dental Care
Dental care is one of those things that creeps up on you – you can either ignore your teeth entirely and deal with major dental interventions (and fees) periodically to fix the accrued damage, or you can spend a small fortune to maintain your teeth on an ongoing basis. Either way, they add up, and hardly anyone walks away from the dentist saying: ‘two fillings? that was a bargain!’
DIY Landscaping
Along with many other hobbies, DIY landscaping can end up costing much more than expected when taking into account specialist equipment and tools, consumables, and just the sheer amount of time consumed in the pursuit of the hobby.
