Growing up in Maine means you are taught be careful with your personal spending.

From the proverbial knee high to a grasshopper stage of life and on, parents, grandparents, everyone you work with in Maine points out value of everything. Resources, protect those lakes, preserve that woodlot to give it to your kids in better shape than you got it. Shopping for a deal is an art. Major difference between frugal and down right cheap too with spending. Maine is 46th lowest in the nation for foreclosure, short sale, reposession for a reason. We don’t like debt. Not how we roll.

To become better at handling money and getting value when you do let go of it, maybe having less money helps in getting good at the sport. And working as a kid for your “discretionary spending” hot wires a loud sharp signal to the kid’s wallet the real value of what each item, expenditure costs, translates and really boils down to. When Maine kids pick potatoes, hoe for clams, haul in lobsters or rake blueberries, they literally know what the term three dollars means, took to make, the effort feels like.

The translation of the price tag figure and the twinge in their lower back from earning that figure, the time it takes to make that much is considered in the spending process. If the kid deduces that much money for that much work to create it is not an even trade, the money stays in their pocket. They keep walking. Maybe still wanting the item, but not at that price. Needing it now, got to have it no matter what the cost means the money to buy it was not earned by you . Came from someone else. Or you were drunk. That is a dangerous habit, pattern, dependency, weakness.

Excitement from getting two new dress shirts from Mardens for five dollar each may make a blog reader say big deal, big spender. In Maine when you get in the pattern of get value, or wait until you do, everyone around you does business that way.

Maine businesses offer what the customers want, what it takes to make you to trade with them. Simple.

When you go out to eat in Maine, it is not designer teenie weenie sandwiches, servings. Or being still hungry after the sliver of cheese cake when a three digit meal bill arrives on a silver platter with a mint. Mainers save money, live below their means to be ready when they need, not just want something.

Home cooked food does not have to be garnished with a sprig of parsley and on a fancy platter with crystal water glasses containing 28% lead. It has to be plentiful, servings big enough to get the guy or gal at the table to the next meal hours away. And to make that diner come back for another meal knowing what it cost was within the range limits of a local value offering norm. Unless the once a year anniversary event, birthday or Valentines outing when customary local spending gets stretched a bit in the celebration hooplah. Maine, lots of money not needed to enjoy the four season beauty, friendlier local folks and community spirit of our vibrant small towns.

I’m Maine REALTOR Andrew Mooers, Brokers
Own Maine Real Estate
207.532.6573
info@mooersrealty.com