A little over four years ago, it occurred to me that my wife Jet and I had essentially experienced what modern physics would tell us is not possible:
At the very moment that my wife and I were enjoying the scenery during our relaxing, unhurried walk with our dogs, the hard water stains in our bathrooms were being removed, our laundry was being washed, folded and put away, our floors were being mopped, and the weeds in our yard were being pulled.
How could this happen without my wife and me actually doing it? Had my wife and I somehow mastered “simultaneity” or found a quirk in the space-time continuum in order to be in two places at once?
Hardly. What we had accomplished hadn’t required any metaphysical breakthroughs, but for us, it was almost as impactful. It was so impactful that, by my calculations at the time, what we had done was the equivalent of effectively adding more than 36 very happy years of free time to the combination of my wife and my lives.
I’ll show you how it worked.
When we moved to Mexico, we rented a house. Included with the rental (which was ridiculously inexpensive by North of the Border standards), and at no additional charge, we were told almost as an afterthought after the rental agreement was signed that along with the rental, we received the services of a housekeeper for four hours a week and a gardener for about nine hours a week. When you rent in Mexico, this type of arrangement is not unusual, even though, when we first learned that we were the beneficiary of it in the property manager’s office, Jet and I exchanged sideways glances, complete with expressions that were first confused and then, quite content.
It was reasonable (but not mandatory) to hire the housekeeper for an additional four hours per week for what at that time was 200 Mexican pesos, which was about US $10. Even though I’m not one to spend money easily (just ask my wife), this seemed to be a very good value, so I coughed up the additional $10.
If you add it up, you’ll see that my wife and I were receiving 17 hours of services per week. This was 17 hours per week of someone else doing the stuff my wife and I would otherwise have to do, and that’s exactly why we were on our walk that morning and enjoying the scenery, as opposed to scraping hard water spots with razor blades, dumping Clorox into a bucket, battling bugs and digging holes in the garden, etc.
If you live in the US or Canada and unless you are fairly wealthy, you can’t afford to pay for the 17 hours per week of household and gardening services we received here in Mexico for an additional $10, so I’ll explain to you how we feel about it.
It’s really nice.
The best way I can think of illustrating how nice it was is by asking you to remember your early teenage years, but with some crucial differences. Having a housekeeper is like being the teenager you were and living in a world in which the mother you always wanted took care of you, but with mom doing all the chores (yours included!) with a genuine smile and not making you feel guilty about anything. Having a gardener is like you living in that same world as a teenager but with your dad telling you “Go out and have a good time,” while he pulls the weeds. I know that probably none of us have experienced anything like that, so it may be hard to imagine, but please take some time, try, and then just let the possibility wash over you and sink in. Pretty nice, isn’t it?
Back to reality.
Not Doing Chores Freedom Butterfly
Jet Metier
Our housekeeper at the time was named Yolanda. Just prior to my revelation, Yolanda re-arranged the shirts in my closet because, in her opinion, they were beginning to get a bit messy, and she’s constantly putting what she considers to be my randomly dispersed things back where they belong. She even sewed a tear on my wife’s blouse and on two pillowcases. Yolanda takes personal responsibility for how the house looks and functions, and has justifiable pride in the result.
Our gardener at the time, Pablo, also took personal responsibility, and not only acted as a gardener, but also as a general repairman. All we had to do was to mention that something needed to be done or ask Pablo’s opinion, and before you could say “gracias,” he would be out fixing it. After sourcing and buying all the materials, Pablo had a few days earlier installed new parts into a sink and put up a fence for us.
Having Yolanda and Pablo do these kinds of things was very unnatural for Jet and me, because for 30+ years of home ownership, it had always been me who had been the one responsible for any repairs and maintenance, while Jet was always responsible for cleaning and general garden care. As a result, we found it to be a transition to have others do this for us, but we suppose we’ll have to get used to it. At least we’re trying.
In defense of our old, chores-laden lifestyle, I should add that we were never really that upset about having to do chores when we lived in the US for two reasons: 1) we generally act as adults; and 2) we couldn’t conceive of any alternative.
While we still do generally act as adults, now we can conceive of an alternative, for the simple reason that we’re living in that alternative.
The first person to open my eyes to the wonder of not having to do chores was Mike Cobb, who is an expert in living abroad. When I spoke with Mike many years earlier, before we moved to Mexico, about the advantages of him living in Nicaragua, I expected to hear about the low of cost of living, the great beaches, etc., but he surprised me by continuously bringing up how he and his wife, Carol, didn’t have to do chores, and telling me how much free time this opened for the things they valued most, like spending more time together as a couple and with their young girls.
On an intellectual level, I knew that what Mike was telling me was similar in other countries, but it was still hard to internalize or ever imagine that this phenomenon would happen to me, for the simple reason that, until you experience not having to do chores for yourself, you don’t really appreciate how great it is.
Now, I do.
Here’s how I calculated that not having to do chores would add more than 36 years of free time to Jet and my lives. Here was our daily average breakdown of things we do, adding up to 24 hours:
Hours Spent Doing Chores Infographic
Jet Metier
Work- and work-related activities for Best Mexico Movers: 8.0
Sleep: 7.5
Eating: 1.5
Shopping, driving, doing errands, etc.: 1.0
Personal activities like showering; exercising; talking to each other, family and friends; taking care of the dogs, etc.: 2.5
Reading a book, magazine, or newspaper or watching TV: 1.5
Unallocated time that would have included doing chores: 2.0
When you look at this, you can see how small a percentage of our lives is really free time. I’ll bet your breakdown is similar.
If we multiply our daily unallocated time that would have included doing chores of two hours by the seven days a week for the two of us, we end up with a total unallocated weekly time for chores of about 28 hours. Our housekeeper and gardener spend an average 17 hours per week doing their portion of the chores Jet and I would otherwise do, which is over 60% of our previous total unallocated time for doing chores. That’s just like getting back 60% of your allotted average daily time in order to do what you want.
If Jet and I each live another 30 years, we would have 60 years total. Sixty percent of 60 years is 36 years of average, unallocated time put right back in our “use as you want” pile. Therefore, having Yolanda and Pablo do what we otherwise would have to do is like getting the equivalent of 36 years of free time added to our lives.
Our only regret is that we didn’t do this when we were younger. Then, we could have had more years.
Here’s some notes to my article:
· For most couples, the woman would do the bulk of the chores discussed above, so one could argue that it would be the woman who would gain the most from having household help. For example, using my numbers, Jet did about 70% of the chores above, which would mean that she would receive the majority of the gain, so in this case, she would benefit from 25 years of happiness without chores, while I, on the other hand, would receive 11 years of additional non-chore happiness. To men who would see this as a problem, I would ask, “How happy are you when your wife is cleaning toilets?” and furthermore, “What’s it worth to your happiness to have your wife not cleaning toilets, and as a result, have her happier?” I suspect that the answer would be compelling.
· I know that we will not be working until we’re in our 90s (or at least I hope not), so the math I did was to illustrate the point. You may want to do your own calculations to see where you come out.
Jet Metier Spending Time With Friends As Opposed To Doing Chores
Chuck Bolotin
· You may wonder how it is that housekeepers in Mexico can survive on the equivalent of USD $2.50 per hour. The answer is that “the equivalent of” only has meaning if you make US dollars and live in the US. Our housekeepers live in Mexico and spend Mexican pesos, where 50 pesos will buy a lot more in Mexico than will $2.50 in the US. (This is the main reason why, if you have US dollars, it is so inexpensive to live in Mexico.)
· The reason why people in places such as Mexico are willing to work for expats for less than if they were both located in the US or Canada is the subject of a different article. Suffice it to say that those of us fortunate enough to be from North of the Border have hit the “Where You’re From Jackpot” through no particular virtue of our own. We were just lucky to be born in the US, Canada, etc., and to be able to use US or Canadian dollars to pay housekeepers and gardeners in Mexico less than we would have to pay them if both you and your housekeeper and gardener were located in Chicago or Toronto. My only comment on this phenomenon for this article is that, for reasons that include because we have been so fortunate, we have a moral obligation to treat those working for us with respect, dignity, and generosity. Also, as part of that, just like the dental hygienist who tries to put herself out of work by striving to keep your teeth healthy, we should all use at least part of our gift of where we were born to raise the living standards and wages of those not so fortunate.
· The complete truth is, when all is said and done, we do pay our housekeepers more than 50 pesos an hour. We do so not on an hourly wage, but in many, many other ways. The math above is used just to illustrate the phenomenon. If you do the same as us, the concept still works, and as an additional benefit, you get satisfaction from genuinely helping others because you will more easily be able to afford it. Not a bad tradeoff at all, wouldn’t you agree?