Or Goren About Love and Money

Hey guys and gals. If you have been here recently, you will know that we have been featuring some money bloggers who have given us their take on love and money. This is an interesting series we think because, well for one, its Valentines period, the time of love! At this time, most people spend time and money on their loved ones. So what do money bloggers think? I’m as intrigued as I think you must be, so let’s find out.

Today’s featured guest is Or Goren who blogs at Savvylondoner. He has own take on the commercialization of Valentines Day and I found it interesting.

 

He believes that children should be educated on the meaning of Valentines but he thinks it should be primarily celebrated by adults. He does not have any children at present. It would be interesting to see if he would still hold this view later if he has children of his own.

So remember, Or blogs about being savvy with money. So what do you think he would do on Valentine’s day with his significant other? Well here’s what he said: We celebrate so many days on the calendar – each other’s birthdays, our wedding day, our first date, Valentine’s day… it’s a long list. So buying gifts for each of these dates would drive us to bankruptcy. Therefore we tend to just have a fun meal together (preferably something sweet on Valentine’s Day), and at most would probably give each other chocolates or something similar.

 

He does not think people should just spend on a whim and in fact, he and his partner have been living with a monthly budget for years now, So EVERYTHING sort of has a spending limit. But each one of us also has some “Fun” money in the budget, which we can use without discussing first, so a small gift would usually come out of that. That’s a cool idea huh? Fun money! I’ve never heard of that but I quite like the idea!

Now I’m no sexist. I do know however that people often complain that their valentines gifts given by their partner are usually rubbish. Some people are of the view that men usually give rubbish gifts so we asked Or what his take was on that. He thinks it depends on the man in question… It’s less about choosing the proper gift, and more about knowing your partner and what sort of things could make him/her happy. After 14 years together, I believe I’m a good judge of what would make my husband happy… (Well, for the most part!)

He does embarrassingly confess, however, that he gave what he thinks was a ‘rubbish’ gift – it was a bubble gum shaped like a CD, inside a plastic CD box. It was pink, and the shop assistant recommended it (probably to get rid of it!), so for some reason, I thought it would be an amusing/romantic gift. It wasn’t. All I can say is lol. That’s really funny. I wonder what the recipient’s thoughts were on receiving the gift.

 

Now we all dream of some exciting thing that we would love as a gift for Valentines. A few of us, I suppose, think of something big that we wish we could afford to give to our loved one for Valentines. We put this to Or and being a true romantic at heart, here’s what he thinks: Perhaps a trip to Paris. I haven’t been there in more than 20 years, and there’s such a romantic atmosphere in the air there. Maybe it’s the language…

Ahh! Or is the true romantic. I suppose that is a dream for most of us, especially those of us who have never been before. In fact, I’m going to add a trip to Paris on my list of places I need to visit before I die.

Wishing you all a lovely thrifty Valentines. Oh, one last thing before you go, there is a chance to take away a prize in our Valentine’s giveaway so check out this post and enter. You might just win yourself this amazing gift for yourself or for someone you love.

Thanks so much to Or Goren for sharing with us today. Do check out his blog, won’t you?