The Novelty of Lay Away

Everywhere I go, I see stores offering Layaway Plans - something that almost vanished until the economy started to go south. What a novel idea. We have to regularly put some money against the item we want to purchase rather than just shoving it on a credit card.

When I was down in Mexico a few years ago, my husband and I got sucked into listening to a very convincing sales pitch for a time share at a five star resort. We asked if we could return to North Carolina and think about it and were told 'no'. The sales person was even transparent enough to mention that 95% of their sales were made on the spot and that if potential customers went away to think about it, they inevitably decided against buying it. After a mere 30 seconds of second thoughts, we went ahead anyway. Put it down to the sun and a couple of tasty margeritas. Oh well.

If you apply the same dynamic to the difference between layaway and credit, we all would probably buy 50% less stuff. Shopping is often a slightly frenzied activity of seeing something and feeling like you have to have it - right now! Putting it on a credit card allows you to have it right now and worry about the credit card statement later. Putting something on layaway means that you have to adopt a sense of discipline and recognize that you are not going to get the item for quite a while - or at least until you have done some serious saving.

I think that stores are smart to offer layaway again now that everyone is feeling the economic pinch. However, I wouldn't be surprised to find that they aren't selling as much, now that people have the chance to go away and think about whether they really need the item that they are planning to purchase. Defaulting on the layaway is probably cheaper than paying off the credit card bill and accompanied with a few bonus 'that was a lucky break' emotions.

I wish I could have put that time share on layaway because then we could have had a moment to regain our sanity when we returned home.