{"id":3002,"date":"2020-02-11T15:31:34","date_gmt":"2020-02-11T15:31:34","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.inboxdollars.com\/blog\/?p=3002"},"modified":"2020-07-30T14:25:24","modified_gmt":"2020-07-30T14:25:24","slug":"how-much-it-really-costs-to-find-true-love-on-free-dating-apps","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.inboxdollars.com\/blog\/how-much-it-really-costs-to-find-true-love-on-free-dating-apps\/","title":{"rendered":"How Much It Really Costs to Find True Love on Free Dating Apps"},"content":{"rendered":"

Do Free Dating Apps Really Mean \"Free\" Dating?<\/h1>\nFree dating apps and websites are everywhere. Which is great for our money-saving sensibilities. Why \u201cpay for\u201d true love when you find it for free, right? No sense using a paid dating service when you can find true love (or casual love) on a free one.\u00a0<\/span>\n\nBut just like there\u2019s no such thing as a \u201cfree lunch\u201d, I was pretty sure that there\u2019s no such thing as a \u201cfree date\u201d.\u00a0<\/span>\n\nAnd it turns out that\u2019s true. Everything costs. I did some online sleuthing (dating site blogs, Pew Research polls, surveys)\u00a0 and found the true cost of finding \u201cfree true love\u201d with a free dating app.\u00a0<\/span>\n

1. Grooming and Beauty Rituals that Rival Harvard Tuition Costs -- $313 a month<\/h2>\nWhen you want to put yourself out there, you want to look your best. Especially when most romantic encounters start with a photo swipe.\u00a0<\/span>\n\nThe average woman (age 18-78) spends $313 month on maintaining her appearance<\/span><\/a>: haircuts and colors, waxes, makeup, manicures, pedicures, clothing, facials, monthly beauty boxes, and more. And this is for all women; single women looking for love are shelling out even more. At $313 a month throughout most of your adult life, that adds up to $225,360, rivaling the price tag of <\/span>4-year college tuition at Harvard<\/span><\/a>.\u00a0\u00a0<\/span>\n\nMen spend $244 month on average, indulging in pedicures, manicures, manscaping, facials, and more.\u00a0\u00a0<\/span>\n\nLooking good has never looked so expensive.\u00a0<\/span>\n

2. Hitting the Town with Friends to \u201cPut Yourself Out There\u201d -- $150 a month<\/h2>\nIf you\u2019re looking for love, you need to put yourself out there. This means actually accepting some of your friends\u2019 invitations for a night out vs staying in to binge-watch BoJack Horseman with your cat.\u00a0<\/span>\n\nGoing out 3-4 a month, including food, drinks, entertainment, parking, and transportation, gets spendy, averaging around $100-$200 a month.\u00a0<\/span>\n

3. One Cheap First Date per Week -- $45 a month<\/h2>\nMost of us can find cheap first dates<\/a> (coffee, splitting an appetizer) where we end up shelling out around $10 or less per outing. But if you go on just one date per week, that can add up to nearly $45 a month.\u00a0<\/span>\n\nEven a \u201cfree\u201d date to the museum has hidden costs lurking around every corner. Parking. Small donation so you don\u2019t look cheap. A cup of coffee or tea.\u00a0<\/span>\n\nAs a tip: coupons could come off looking cheap, but using Starbucks gift cards could help cut costs. Your date doesn't have to know if you got the Starbucks gift card for free<\/a> or at a discounted price.\n

4. Giving In To Your Urge to Cyber Stalk -- $3 a month<\/h2>\nWhile there are plenty of \u201cfree\u201d dating apps, there are always hidden triggers to get you to spend more. For example, if you want proof positive, timestamp and all, that Jane has definitely read or not read your message\u2026 Well, you\u2019ll have to shell out and upgrade to a premium level of membership.\u00a0<\/span>\n\nSimilarly, you may invest a significant amount of time \u201cresearching\u201d your date before you meet them. With InboxDollars Search<\/a>, you can do all your cyberstalking while earning about $0.10 or more a day. You'll also earn a $0.05 bonus any week you search for four or more days - so search away, honey. Keep it up and you'll be earning\u00a0 $3.00 or more a month.<\/span>\n

5.\u00a0 Kissing \u201cFrogs\u201d in Search of Your Prince(ss) -- $15 a month<\/h2>\nMost dating app users don\u2019t strike it lucky on their first outing. According to elitedaily.com, dating as few as only six people before finding your partner is rare. <\/span>Most of us date dozens and dozens of people before finding that long-term click<\/span><\/a>.\u00a0<\/span>\n\nNot completely surprising, given some of the frivolous reasons given for wanting to be in a relationship. For example, 20% of millennials say that they start relationships for tactical, rather than romantic reasons, like looking good on Instagram<\/a> or being included in couples-only fun.\u00a0<\/span>\n\nAssuming you date 6 other people until you find your boyfriend\/girlfriend\/spouse\/partner\/significant other, that\u2019s a lot of heartbreak you\u2019ve got to fund. Breakups, like \u201cfree\u201d dating apps, should be free. But savethestudent.org did a study on how much money we spend to get over breakups.\u00a0<\/span>\n\nThe average young adult (18-25), will spend $1,505 on a break-up. That\u2019s the figure spent on \u201cself-care\u201d in the way of drinks, event tickets, new clothes, comfort eating, and beauty treatments.\u00a0<\/span>\n\nFor older adults, those expenses multiply when you factor in moving out, finding a new place to live, dividing possessions, legal fees, and more.\u00a0<\/span>\n\nAssuming $10,000 in total breakup \u201ccosts\u201d amortized over 60 years of adult life, that\u2019s roughly $15 a month. (Hah! Build that figure into your monthly budget<\/a> and bring it to your financial planner.)\u00a0<\/span>\u00a0<\/span>\n

<\/h2>\n

It All Adds Up<\/h2>\nAdd up all these monthly expenses in the pursuit of \u201cfree true love\u201d and they reach a staggering $573 a month. Yow!\u00a0<\/span>\n\nAnd once you do find true love, it doesn\u2019t get any cheaper. <\/span>According to a recent study, 89% of people spend more money when they\u2019re in a relationship<\/span><\/a> vs when they\u2019re single.\u00a0\u00a0<\/span>\n\nTake heart though. Spending decreases with age. 84% of people 18-34 spend more when they\u2019re in a relationship, even with cheap date nights<\/a>. By age 65, that figure drops to only 53%. With age, we become wiser, and cheaper, at navigating true love.\u00a0<\/span>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Free dating apps are far from free. Find out how much we’re spending to find our “free” true love. ","protected":false},"author":6,"featured_media":3004,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[331,693],"tags":[705,709,707,706,708,697,701,703,704,702,711,710,696,698,694,31,30,695,699,700],"class_list":["post-3002","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-trending-now","category-weird-money-diaries","tag-beauty-rituals","tag-cheaper-single","tag-cyber-stalking","tag-cyber-stalking-your-date","tag-do-people-spend-more-in-relationship","tag-free-dates","tag-free-dating-apps","tag-grooming","tag-grooming-costs","tag-heartbreak","tag-hidden-costs-of-free-dating-apps","tag-hidden-costs-of-true-love","tag-how-much-do-people-spend-dating","tag-how-much-it-costs-to-find-your-partner","tag-how-much-true-love-costs","tag-inbox-dollars","tag-inboxdollars","tag-real-cost-of-free-dating-apps","tag-real-cost-of-true-love","tag-romance"],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.inboxdollars.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3002","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.inboxdollars.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.inboxdollars.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.inboxdollars.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/6"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.inboxdollars.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=3002"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.inboxdollars.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3002\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.inboxdollars.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/3004"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.inboxdollars.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=3002"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.inboxdollars.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=3002"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.inboxdollars.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=3002"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}