The cost of finding what you want. The economic cost of buying something is not simply the price you pay. Finding what you want and ensuring that it is competitively priced can be expensive, be it the financial cost of physically getting to a marketplace or the opportunity cost of time spent fact-finding. Search costs mean that people often take decisions without all the relevant information, which can result in inefficiency. Technological changes such as the internet may sharply reduce search costs, and thus lead to more efficient decision making.