How much do you spend a year?

@ScoutingDad posted:

@AlanRail  That's a fine statement until the attorney finds the second accounting book. What trouble we make for ourselves.  ; )  Jeff

That's why you keep it somewhere other than at home and have a shredder or metal garbage can with lighter fluid close at hand

Bryce

@Keith k posted:

  However I am able to ease my conscience by balancing my spending on trains and my charitable contributions to worthy organizations.

My approach is spending on trains and a proportional amount on gifts to my wife. My wife never ever complains about how much I spend on trains.

Welll some train guy in Illinois just won over a billion dollars     Hobby looking up  LOL

@marty track posted:

I quit smoking over 30 years ago two packs A-day  . I spend only what I would have spent for cigarettes on trains .Today I don't have any problems breathing and I have something to show . And I've had years and years of great enjoyment

I quit in October, 1998, which was just a year or two into my trains/toys hobby. I smoked 2-3 packs a day, so I would drop $5.00 into a can every day. When a train show came around, I could just grab some cash and go. If it was a Greenberg show, I’d grab it all. Those were some great days.

@bluelinec4 posted:

Welll some train guy in Illinois just won over a billion dollars     Hobby looking up  LOL

This train guy in Wisconsin spent $9 of my train money on Mega tickets and got only 1 number total chosen in 3 games.  The good news is $9 doesn't buy anything in O Gauge

About the equivalent of a couple of 18 hole golf games a week and new clubs every few years.

400 or less

which i hope changes for the better . i'm so tied to o gauge that i have never been able to push myself to switch to HO even though i have tried numerous times but i am spineless and proto sounds and railsounds are like a siren song plus O has heft like a real train.

i have always had the dream of a big layout with massive freight trains with DPU engines and odd diesel lash ups like a sd40t-2 , f7b , gp9 and sd40 pulling a gatx tank train with 2 RF16 B units and a tier 4 as mid train helpers and 2 gp9s as pushers in the rear.

yes i know a consist like that would look odd and unrealistic but i like massive trains with odd power

but my hope is growing thin as i'm barely making it through college with over 18 grand of debt. because of my disability my options for a career are limited. i also have autism which makes the world even scarier. i plan on being a film maker but hollywood is evil and would probably destroy me and with the fear of a collapsing economy and climate change it often looks as if i have no future.

@OGR CEO-PUBLISHER posted:

This has certainly been an interesting read.  Sure would be nice if ALL of you would budget a subscription to O Gauge Railroading magazine!  One year of the digital subscription gets you ALL issues ever published plus dozens of FREE videos in our library. Think of it...all for a fraction of what one new modern boxcar costs today.

Alan:

Already have with auto renewal  on both I believe.

@RJT posted:

Alan:

Already have with auto renewal  on both I believe.

Thanks so much and thanks to all of you that have either Supporting Memberships, subscriptions, and/or sponsors/advertisers!

@paigetrain - well I could do a lash up of GPs, SDs and F3s. I probably have enough engines to the point where they will be nose to tail completely around my 9x13 layout. Just my intermodals go half way around and the 7 passenger cars with ABA also are close to 1/2 way around. That might be an interesting project, but each draws about an amp so probably can realistically run no more than 10 in a lash up.

@OGR CEO-PUBLISHER  if i add supporting membership to the e-magazine will I stop getting pop ups asking me to contribute? Regardless - you are very right on with the comment about spending - supporting the forum is trivial in cost to a single new car let alone an engine. 

Here is the only thing I remember from college.  The average person fallacy.  This had to do with design, but frankly it applies to anything. 

If you state, "the Average Person", you only hit 5% of the population.  The other 95% is either above or below the average.

So 47.5% of you are spending obscene amounts of cash and other 47.5% of you are spending just enough not to get you into trouble on the home front.

Have Fun!

Ron

Having taught statistics for years discussions about "average" (which is a term avoided in correct discourse) tend to be meaningless.

I highly recommend "How to Lie with Statistics" by Huff. First published in 1954 and in print for years is both hilarious and informative.

@ScoutingDad posted:

@paigetrain - well I could do a lash up of GPs, SDs and F3s. I probably have enough engines to the point where they will be nose to tail completely around my 9x13 layout. Just my intermodals go half way around and the 7 passenger cars with ABA also are close to 1/2 way around. That might be an interesting project, but each draws about an amp so probably can realistically run no more than 10 in a lash up.

@OGR CEO-PUBLISHER  if i add supporting membership to the e-magazine will I stop getting pop ups asking me to contribute? Regardless - you are very right on with the comment about spending - supporting the forum is trivial in cost to a single new car let alone an engine.

To be honest, I don't know.  I will have to ask my IT guru.  Regardless, I hope that is not a requirement in order for you to purchase a digital subscription ...

@OGR CEO-PUBLISHER  done !   I was always thinking this was an "either,  or"  support choice given the wording on the  subscriptions.  Happy to support the forum, lots of wonderful things going on.  Jeff

Like several others who have posted here I have not spent a penny on trains over the last three or four years.  Thank God I finally ran out of room even with extensive shelving.  That being said even during my peak earning years before retirement my highest financial output for trains amounted to around 2 or 3 thousand dollars and I only did that once or twice.  I tried to limit myself to 1 thousand per year for the most part.  The bulk of my collection is post-war stuff and a good deal of command control TMCC equipment.  I bought into Legacy when it came out but then stopped after one or two purchases but even those were blow out specials well under a thousand per piece.  I have more trains than I ever dreamed of having when I was younger although I will admit that most of my post-war motive power and rolling stock is operator class.  I must say that at this point I am more than content with what I have and have actually begun to think about selling off the lion's share of my collection.  It's been a great hobby for me.