Great question raised this morning at the Birmingham Social Media Cafe – “Do you value your time?”

It sparked an interesting debate about the perceived value of your time. Do you give it away freely? Do you calculate free-time in terms of lost opportunity? Is your time worth more or less to you than to your clients?

In a service sector, time is what I sell. If I am not charging for it then by default I am giving it away. How much can I afford to give away before I start to devalue it?

As ever, it’s a compromise. I need to give a bit away to “show what I’m selling”. The time that I choose to invest in networking needs to have some ROI.

I was reminded today that time spent with some people is priceless.

Two contrasting experiences yesterday.

The first was a conversation with an ex-colleague, who told me with glee how she had just bought a house for £205k that only a few months ago was on the market at over £270k. With a little jiggling of her personal finances and a good mortgage broker she had clinched the deal. Knowing the area I think she has bought something between a bargain and a fair price (the property prices had been unreasonably high).

The second was while watching the news and being “told” how the public is increasingly reluctant to pay for large items, choosing to wait until the price falls further, creating deflation.

Of course, the trick is to spot the bottom of the curve. But how material is the potential saving between now and the bottom of the curve? Is the idea of a bargain always more attractive than the actual saving achieved?

Is there a cost for your time and profit/pleasure foregone you need to factor in while waiting for a deal?