Home gym or the Gym? Which one to choose.

July 10, 12:47 PMTampa Home Fitness ExaminerTJ Hunter

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The fight continues between local and national gym chains and home fitness retailers for customers in a struggling economy. Both offer you benefits and the ability to get in better shape. Both offer as much or as little of what you want and need to reach your goals. Which one do you prefer?

The argument is strong on the gym side, as anyone that is selling memberships will tell you. It’s all about convenience, its all about selection, and it’s all about low cost per month. Gyms will give you many choices in memberships, payment plans and equipment. Gyms offer you flexible time frames to fit your schedule and they offer you guidance of personal trainers at your finger tips. These are very appealing features to draw you in, but do they stack up to actually having a home gym in your home.

First, let's look at cost.  You might be surprised to find it may actually be cheaper to have a gym in your home. Now it’s not the initial cost that we look at here, just like when you buy a car, you want to invest in something that will give you a good return on your money. A gym membership will cost you between $25 for the key clubs to $100 plus for the huge brand name gyms. Multiply this by 12 months and your cost can land anywhere between $300 and $1200 a year, per person. Take that and multiply again by say 8 years and your cost now becomes $2400 to $9600. Let’s now look at the cost of building a home gym to suit your needs. If you are like most of us, you do one to two different cardiovascular exercises, one of which is almost always the treadmill. From there you probably do a basic circuit of machines and dumbbells for strength. You finish up with some stretching, well you should anyways and you’re done.

 If you take what you actually do, put it into a good quality product in your home, you can spend a total of $ 6-10k. You can spend far more ofcourse, as well as far less. The point is that ownership in equipment will last between 7-10 years, so going off the 8 year time frame you have almost saved your money just within those years. Go to the fact that you are also saving gas, time and effort to get up and hit the gym, only to have to come home and get ready for your day. Couple that with time away from family, the inconvenience of waiting for a sweaty bench or chest press machine and you have yourself many great reasons to put a home gym in your house. Not to mention the cost of a babysitter, or the fee a gym will charge for daycare services.

 You will also have to factor in preferences; some people like the atmosphere of the gym and some do not. You also have to factor in what you are training for and what you have to train on. You may find the cost too high for your home to accomplish the goals you have set. The Gym, with its plethora of equipment, may be your best bet. When you have taken all of these factors into account, its no wonder the fight for your business continues. We say that the best workout is the workout, no matter if it’s at the home or at the gym.

 
For more info: check me out on twitter at www.twitter.com/tj_hunter and feel free to email me at tjhunter.fitness@gmail.com