10 things under £100 that add heaps of value to my life

I came across a YouTube creator called struthless and went down the rabbit hole with his videos in the past few days.

You should check him out – he’s funny and honest, talks about time, productivity, art, creativity and mental health. Lots of boxes ticked in terms of what I enjoy, perhaps you’d like the videos too.

But one in particular stood out to me.

He took Tim Ferriss’ concept of asking each guest on his podcast about an item or purchase that cost under $100 that changed their life.

For his video, struthless decided to do a list of ten such low-cost investments that added far more value to his life than the price tag would suggest.

I really enjoyed the video and thought rather than just throw my ten into the comments section – why not turn it into a blog post?

So here are ten buys under £100 (currency swapped for my UK location) that have added heaps of value to my life:

1. Rice cooker

Rice features heavily in my diet because I love it and you can easily batch cook it for convenience throughout the week.

A dedicated rice cooker lets you get nice fluffy rice easily and quickly compared to a pan on the hob.

A Google search or YouTube video will give you instructions. You then just throw the right ratio of rice to water in and aside from a few stirs you forget about it until you hear the click telling you it’s ready.

The one I use also came with a steamer basket which is a speedy and healthy way to cook meat and veggies as well.

Without getting too soppy, this item is also tied to a very happy memory – my first phone call with my partner.

I was on the fence about purchasing a rice cooker but spotted one on sale in the Lidl supermarket up the road from me.

We were still in the early days of dating after matching on Hinge, but I knew she had one and raved about it as she loved cooking Asian cuisine.

So I bit the bullet and used the rice cooker decision as an excuse to gather the courage to call her and ask her opinion.

I know this is a personal story but my point in telling it is that some items have value of their own (delicious easy rice) but can also bring a smile to your face because there’s a story or memory attached to them.

2. Pen: Pilot v5 RT

I first picked one of these up in 2015 during an internship in New Mexico over the pond in the USA.

I’d grown to expect rubbish stationery because it had been a staple at all the offices I’d worked in to date. But this pen was something else, a breath of fresh air.

Maybe the person in charge of ordering office supplies had more refined tastes in pens or someone higher up the food chain preferred them.

I’ll confess that when I left the internship I slowly acquired four of them from the stationery cupboard as a leaving present to myself.

The state of New Mexico was admittedly in a budget crisis at the time...

But I figured that four pens would make very little difference in the grand scheme of things.

I have used those pens ever since, ordering the ink refills from the US whenever they ran out, I loved using them so much.

Sadly the grips on them bubbled away from the pens eventually so I threw them out – but I got seven years of use from them.

The pen has since changed name I think (or the ones you can buy in UK have different branding) so I have just bought three more which you can see here. They’re basically the same as far as I can tell.

But these pens are an absolute pleasure to write with especially if you’ve got some decent paper underneath it.

Speaking of which…

3. Moleskine journal

I know I know, you can write in or on anything – it’s the words and habit that matter more than where they take place or appear.

But I’m a sucker for the paper quality in a Moleskine journal.

Its velvety and thick so the process of writing feels more luxurious.

I use an A5 for my personal journal and a bigger one for work because it makes me enjoy jotting things down more than a regular notebook.

Subconsciously it also makes me think longer about what I write, adding more weight to the words somehow.

I choose plain page versions so if I want to embrace a bit of creativity in my journaling I can doodle or play about with my entries without ruled lines getting in the way.

4. Cheap wireless bluetooth headphones

Now these are specifically for exercise – I use them when I run or head to the gym.

I don’t know about you but I hate tangled wires, the mild irritation of the cord running under your clothes and needing to keep your phone in your pocket when you work out.

I noticed this even more when I started running more consistently a couple of years ago.

All of these factors came together and nudged me towards wanting some Bluetooth ear buds that didn’t cost a fortune, because then if they broke due to sweat or rain damage I wouldn’t feel too bad about it.

After some research I bought these Haylou GT2 bluetooth headphones because they had positive reviews and ticked all the boxes.

Wireless headphones meant I could leave my phone safely out of the way if I was in the gym or put it into my running belt, removing the fear of cracking the screen when I lifted dumbbells up onto my lap or that it would leap out of my pocket when I jogged.

They removed irritation from my workouts which made me more likely to stay consistent with them – a big bonus for limited financial outlay.

5. Audible subscription

At £7.99 per month, Audible costs £95.88 per year so just under the magic £100 number for this blog post.

Still, I have enjoyed a membership for over a year so technically I have spent more on Audible than £100…

But I’m bending the rules here because it’s a low-cost investment that has added way more enjoyment to my life than I expected.

I picked up an Audible subscription on a whim after my partner encouraged me to give it a whirl. There was a month’s free trial running at the time so I thought ‘Why not?’

Timing was key here.

In 2020 I fell out of love with reading hard copies of books – something I came to term Reader’s Block, with a little help from Nigella Lawson.

At a similar time, I finished the NHS Couch to 5k running programme after wanting to incorporate more cardio into my exercise routine, which was convenient because national lockdowns had closed my gym anyway.

The free running programme has 8 weeks of guided runs and I purchased some cheap headphones for running (see above) to listen to them as I ran.

But after I finished the guided runs I wanted to replace them with something that I could enjoy in the background.

In stepped my free trial of Audible at just the right moment.

I started listening to non-fiction audiobooks – the first free book I downloaded was Can’t Hurt Me by David Goggins.

It’s an absolute corker and I’d highly recommend it if you’re interested in running, fitness, self-improvement or overcoming life’s obstacles.

I had enjoyed seeing my fitness improve and pace increase but the running was also doing wonders for my mental health.

It was a time for exercise but I was also carving some time in my day to listen to audiobooks, learning a little bit along the way.

I came to look forward to my runs as much for the post-exercise endorphin high as the chance to listen to these books.

6. Silicone ice cube trays

Cold drinks always taste better with some ice in them, right?

I love having loads of ice on standby for anything from squash and iced coffee to gin and tonics or other boozy beverages.

My hardworking little fridge sadly lacks any icemaking facilities and my freezer is also small so I can’t justify storing big bags of ice in there because they take up too much space.

So, I just use ice trays that I empty into a takeaway tupperware to keep lots available at any given time.

But when you pop the cubes out, I find the old-school hard plastic trays a bit annoying. You have to warm them under the tap to empty them easily and if you bend them too soon it can feel like they are going to break.

When I realised you could get silicone ice cube trays where the ice cubes pop out much easier and without needing to run them under the hot tap, I was delighted.

Since I get such joy from ice in my drinks this small improvement to the process meant the few quid I splashed out on them have paid out big time in their return on investment.

The ones I bought are no longer available but these might as well be carbon copies from what I cant tell.

7. Pour over coffee maker

A 30-year-old man with a big beard talking about elaborate ways he makes black coffee? Who’d have thought it, someone call the hipster police.

Jokes aside I drink less caffeine than I used to but I still love a strong cup of coffee.

Making instant coffee is fine and serves a purpose when you’re on the fly or at work.

[[Especially if you buy Azera Americano – seriously, try it (when it’s on offer, £6.50 full RRP is a bit steep when you can almost always find it for £3.50 somewhere). You’ll never look at other instant coffees the same way. Consider this item 7.5 on the list.]]

But for me it ultimately doesn’t taste quite as good and, more than this, it’s also the ritual around brewing coffee slowly that I enjoy.

I received a Bodum pour over coffee maker as a Christmas gift that cost about £20 and I use it every day.

You can make large amounts of coffee then top up or reheat it when you want.

Or if you enjoy iced coffee like me, you can brew the coffee extra strong so when it cools you can make iced coffee with it.

The benefit is that when brewing it extra strong – easily done with the pour over method – your coffee isn’t diluted to the point of being watery by the slowly melting ice cubes.

Plus, when you make coffee with something like this you feel like a wizard making some kind of magic energy potion – it looks so cool.

8. High-quality water bottle

Hydration is key, right?

I like to have water on hand so I can stay topped up on H2O throughout the day.

It saves multiple trips to and from the water fountain at work or kitchen sink if you’re at home and using cups.

I picked up a Thermos-style Sistema water bottle from TK Maxx for £12 and it keeps water nice and cool – again nodding to my preference for really cold drinks.

Sometimes I put this in the fridge overnight, so my first batch of water is really cold the next morning – future me is always grateful to past me when I remember to do so.

9. Wireless mouse with navigation buttons

I have used a Tecknet wireless mouse for years - I must have bought five of them.

The first benefit is its one less wire to worry about. You won’t get it tangled on other items in your workspace or knock bits over if it wraps around them.

But the best feature I like is the back and forward buttons on the side.

This is particularly useful if you use browsers or software where you need to navigate back and forth between pages quickly.

Rather than move the mouse cursor up and over to the back/forward buttons on the screen, you simply drop your thumb down and voila – easy navigation awaits.

Small investment, time saved, convenience increased – what’s not to love?

10. Socktopus

Do you ever run out of pegs when you hang your washing to dry?

I used to, all the time.

And I blame socks.

Even if you get two to a peg, they take up way more pegs than they should.

Whew, rant done – but what’s the solution?

A socktopus!

I don’t know if this is a legitimate product name because most I found on Amazon were simply called sock dryers – but this is what I call them. And I’m sticking to it.

Hang a socktopus on your line and you can get loads of socks dried at once, plus they won’t take up valuable drying space – all for under a tenner.

Conclusion

I hope you enjoyed blog post about the ten things I have spent less than £100 on that added heaps of value to my life.

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