Comments on: The Latte Factor and Becoming a Millionaire

By: K.C.

K.C. — Wed, 01 Feb 2012 23:29:54 +0000

Okay, it’s how much you put into savings, not what you spend that counts. But how do you come up with the money to put into savings unless you take a look at your spending? Opportunities to achieve the saving goal lie in what is being spent. For most folks, spending has to be cut somewhere in order to realize their savings goal. Small everyday incidentals that result from what is often called “unconscious spending” provide an opportunity to free-up money for saving without having to make major lifestyle changes. Bach’s point is to make us conscious of those opportunities.

By: Brian

Brian — Sun, 09 Jan 2011 01:57:26 +0000

you can pay $3.50 for a latte…. or you could spend $3.42 – 50c coupon = $2.92 on an 11-oz bag of Eight O’Clock 100% Colombian whole bean coffee, which yields roughly SIXTEEN ultra large 14-oz thermoses of coffee per bag.

Make your coffee with a Bodum french press, adding just a smidgeon of skim milk to the top, and you’ve got a large 14-oz morning coffee that is healthier than the Starbucks and costs a paltry *18 cents* per cup ($2.92/16 = 18.25 cents)

18 cents for a better-tasting, richer, healthier cup of coffee… vs. $3.50 for a wasteful less-healthy lattee from Starbucks. Fewer things in life are as slam-dunk as this…

By: Fru

Fru — Thu, 16 Dec 2010 09:43:54 +0000

The Latte Factor is a real eye opener for me – its not something that ordinarily I would stop and think about but seriously the amount you save by stopping buying unnecessary rubbish is unbelievable.

I now bring coffee filters into work and use them. Price for 10 – circa £2.50. Which is the price of a normal coffee in the shop downstairs.

By: Ed

Ed — Fri, 10 Dec 2010 21:43:32 +0000

I agree doing away with something like a latte a day could add up to a lot of money over a life time, but we not sure how long we will live, so I want to keep at least one bad habit that makes me happy just in case my life time is short. That doesn’t mean I wouldn’t save money though.

By: Richardo

Richardo — Sat, 28 Aug 2010 14:26:06 +0000

I see my daily latte as a necessity. It’s a performance enhancing drug that helps me focus on work. There are medical studies that show that those who drink six cups of coffee per day reduce their risk of getting diabetes by 50 per cent. It is a good source of antioxidants. If you chose to have your coffee with no sugar, it is one of the most healthy drinks available, certainly healthier than soft drink. It is also a humanitarian beverage because most coffee is harvested by poor people. Buying coffee supports the employment of the world’s poorest people.

By: Joe

Joe — Thu, 06 May 2010 21:24:20 +0000

Actually….it was never bach this whole time. It actually came from when Dave Ramsey was a finical planner back when he was young. You can read all about it in “Automatic Millionaire”

By: $$

$$ — Fri, 12 Mar 2010 03:18:07 +0000

Yes. Thank you. The latte factor is complete nonsense. It’s one of the cheapest paid forms of pleasure (since the “best things in life are free”) that you can have. Don’t buy a latte, but go buy a plasma tv (only to switch to a 3d TV two years later)…haha…. The thing that really cracks me up is people that assume they are going to make a constant 10% on the money that they save on latte’s which is completely unrealistic, especially as you age and need to get conservative when close to retirement. I make much more accurate estimations of what skipping that morning latte will do to your retirement account here…

By: Gary

Gary — Wed, 27 Jan 2010 14:36:05 +0000

I get the point. We must pay attention to habit spending….Cigarettes, candy, snacks, drinks, LATTE, etc., and realize the long term expense. Saving $3.50 a day is only part of it……checking the explosive expense such as your gas to get to the latte, and the time you waste, the opportunities you miss, the other values you could have , and the fact that $3.50 saved vs $3.50 spent is a $7.00 turn around for your money. $3.50 could equal over $10.00. Savings is great, but on the need side, one can justify large purchases by matching this latte amount to the item they just bought, and feel good about it.

By: Rex Giga

Rex Giga — Sun, 26 Apr 2009 02:51:56 +0000

I think that saving money by focusing on small things like lattes is a waste. Shouldn’t you focus on big things like car purchases, house purchases, whether or not to have children, etc? Furthermore, lattes may be healthy for you. Medical studies show that those who drink the most coffee have the lower risk of type 2 diabetes, cancer, and heart disease.

By: Hannah

Hannah — Mon, 30 Mar 2009 17:00:50 +0000

Here’s the problem: the Latte Factor idea assumes that you are buying lattes every day. Ok, I know there are people out there who do, in fact, buy lattes every day. But I’m sure it’s already occurred to them that they could save money by cutting the java out. Telling someone to save money by skipping their daily latte is like telling someone to lose weight by taking the stairs instead of the elevator: Duh. Anyone who has ever picked up a magazine or watched the Today Show has heard those ideas before. Read more of my thoughts on this here:

http://monogamoney.wordpress.com/2009/03/30/the-latte-factor/