Yipes! Inflation is about to rear its hideous head, or so we’re told. Manufacturers are threatening to raise prices as much as 15 percent between now and this fall. The reason for yet another kick in the ribs to folks who are unemployed, underemployed, and furloughed is the rising cost of commodities from cotton to copper to foodstuffs.
Well, if that’s the case, now may be the time to buy pricey goods such as appliances, especially if you’ve been putting it off until you can afford it. In another couple of months, you’ll be able to afford it even less. 🙄
My dryer has been dead for so long I’ve lost track—running safely only on “Air Dry” for the past year, anyway. Haven’t replaced it because I quickly learned that I’d just as soon hang the clothes on the line. But before I put away the comforters for the summer, I will need to wash them, and that is the one chore that will require a fully functioning dryer. The comforters need to be batted around inside a warm dryer to fluff them up.
At least…umh…I think they do. Maybe I’ll try it on Air Dry before springing for an $850 dryer.
Meanwhile, though, the washer is also about to give up the ghost. It no longer will spin the water out of a load of laundry. Last night I pulled out a wad of sopping wet jeans. Stuffed them back into the washer and ran the spin cycle again, to exactly zero avail.
Annoying.
Think of it: eight hundred and fifty bucks for a $325 appliance! What a flickin’ outrage. Every time we get another energy-efficient, green “improvement” to our lives, it ends up either costing us through the wazoo or, like the infinitely plungeable toilet, just flat not working. According to that article, we can expect Whirlpool (which makes most Sears appliances) to jack up its prices by 8 to 10 percent, as of April 1. That would be a price increase of 68 to 85 dollars, plus the 9.3 percent tax extortion: $74 to $93 all told…before the delivery charge.
That’s probably enough to justify accelerating the purchase of a washer, rather than waiting until the thing stops dead.
I’m thinking I’ll buy the dryer through Craig’s List, since it looks like I’ll hardly ever use it. But the washer is something I’d like to have for its entire lifetime (especially since they’re now designed to crap out in seven years). So I guess I’ll buy that new.
But it frosts my cookies.
How about you? Will you consider buying a big-ticket item sooner than later, knowing the prices are about to jump significantly?