Many a times, we find similar goods and services with a huge price gap. A coffee shop breakfast with 2 half-boiled eggs, kaya toast and tea cost $2.50. A MacDonald breakfast cost around $6 compared to a Four Seasons Hotel Buffet breakfast that cost ten times more at $55++. Are these luxuries worth it? Well personally, my humble opinion is that they are generally not worth the price.
A simple lunch at a hawker centre like chicken rice cost $3. It jumps to $50 for a buffet lunch at Carousel, a café at Hotel Royal Scotts. Though they have huge varieties of salad, western and local food, desert and seafood, my take is can you overload your stomach in one sitting with the huge varieties of food?
Similar for a 3-room HDB flat in Ang Mo Kio that cost $200,000 versus a $2 Million condominium with 2 bedroom in Sentosa. It is sheer madness to buy one house in Sentosa, just because one loves the sea and enjoy the sound of waves. The loan repayment will take at least 30 years and the interest payment will easily amount to millions of dollars. The bankers and agents marketing the properties must be laughing all the way to the banks. The same goes for a car like Toyota versus Bentley. The specifications and quality is similar for travel and the difference is hardly noticeable except to the pundits. The only difference is one is for the flashy and showy people with huge egos and another is for the person with common sense. I hope I have the common sense to do the right thing.
Is it worth paying 10 times the price of a house, a car, a country club membership, an education programme, seminar programme of anther similar product just because you want to impress people?
I hope your answer is no as mine is. Many a times, my girlfriend and I are impressed with low cost food in Malaysia, Singapore hawker centre and utterly disappointed in the expensive 5-star hotel food quality. Go and try it and see if it is true in your situation.
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