What is the worst money mistake you have ever made?

31 comments

  3. Having a kid and not budgeting/impulsively buying shit we don’t need. How we purchase/waste food is related and a very close second.

  4. I joined the military, at 22, and because “I’m an adult now hurdur” I opened like 5-8 credit cards and spent it like it was real money. it didn’t help that I was an E3 and my entire work section was filled with E5/E6 “sergeants” , some of them even “dual military” married…so they HAD money.

    so I figured, I wanna fit in, so I gotta act like them. be like them. *spend* like them. new tires/rims on my camry, because why not. new computer stuff. any video game i wanted. jewelry for my GF back home. plane tickets to fly her out.

    all in all, I racked up about 25-30k in CC debt. this was 2014/2015. by 2019, when I met my now fiance, I was paying the absolute minimums on the cards, and then taking her on dates before the interest would hit, and essentially “overdrafting” the credit card so they kept raising the limit little by little. example: the credit limit was 5k, the minimum would be 100, I would pay 100, and before the interest came in at 150, I would spend that $100 to take my GF to dinner.

    she’s extremely conservative financially. eventually I told her, 6 months in, how much debt I was in. I also promoted to every rank, the first time. so through the pandemic, we moved in together and split rent, plus stim checks, plus literally just throwing every penny I could possibly afford from late 2019 to early 2022, I paid off all of my CC debt.

    got out this year, make well over 6 figures, and now I have no debt and while i still have all of those credit cards ( and a big ass like 800 score) I have 1 daily driver credit card and I pay it off every month and at the absolute worst its only about 1k a month.

    ​

    ​

    thats it. thats the worst money mistake I have ever made.

  5. Not one big, major mistake, but many small ones. I have gotten burned so many times trying to stay on top of trends and buying the new cool thing when it comes out. It’s not that it costs a ton of money, but it’s the most damned annoying thing ever.

    To spend a chunk of money on the new cool thing and later realize that it’s a useless piece of shit that doesn’t work as well as the old thing and is certainly due to be replaced in a year by a newer thing that works ten times better. So now I own this piece of shit that’s useless but too expensive to throw away. And it just sits on the shelf and stares at me.

    I have saved much money and gained much peace of mind by deciding to remain about two years behind the cutting edge. It gives the cream a chance to rise to the top.

    (See also: Hearing a hot new song, rushing out to buy the CD, and discovering that the hot new song is the only good song that artist will ever write and the rest of the CD is filler. I did that so many times back in the day.)

  6. Trying to start a business back in 2008. Lost everything. Prior to that, I had perfect credit and a nice little nest egg put aside. I still don’t feel like I’ve recovered from it fully as I still dwell on it quite a bit and I’m hesitant to try again even though I hate my job with a passion.

  9. Sold stock to buy a $200k house

    If I kept renting and kept that stock, today it’d be worth $1.9M

  10. i got money out of the ATM and never grabbed it as you can imagine it wasnt there when i realized what i did

  12. Bought a house to flip without fully investigating all the cost that would be incurred. Didn’t loose $ but I wouldn’t do it again.

  17. Didn’t try harder buy Bitcoin when it first came out. It seemed interesting, and I was trying to just figure out how to buy it, but was so confusing that I just gave up.

    I was only going to put $100 in and then just see what happens. Still think back to that time.

  21. Giving a stripper $60 one night when I was young and broke. But she was talented and I like to think she put that into furthering a higher education degree.

  22. I went to a very expensive private college for a couple years cause my parents told me it would be fine if I just took out student loans.

    I’m gonna be 55 before that shit is paid off.

  23. a $12k engagement ring.

    I’m still madly in love w her, it was fully paid off (no interest) before proposing and I budgeted/make enough money that it wasn’t a wallet buster. but now between our relationship, financial goals, etc. – I realize that our relationship wouldn’t have changed one bit if I spent $5k – $10k less to invest instead.

    save your bread fellas. if you know she’ll say YES, the amount you spend really doesn’t* matter.

  24. At 26 I bought one of the first flat screen TVs, a plasma for a little more than $3000. The next week I was laid off. That would have been enough cash to pay 3 months rent and I blew it in one shot. It was 2004..

  25. Leasing a brand new car with my ex in both of our names. We had just had my son, and the car she had was not big enough for our family (Ford Fusion). Blinded by the excitement of having my little boy, and the idea of having a new car, I went along with it and leased a decked out Odyssey.

    Everything was great until the relationship fell apart 1.5 years later. Went through hell making payments on a car I didn’t even own anymore (because her name was on it and she wouldn’t make payments which would have destroyed my credit I worked hard on).

    Court decided during our custody battle that we would each be required to make 50% of the payment until lease was out (another 1.5 years). So at least she was legally bound to make half the payment at that point.

    Problem was she used the van to do Uber/Lyft without me knowing, and she racked up almost 3x the allotted mileage for the lease. Thank god at the time the lease ended, the dealer was low on cars and was giving crazy amounts to buy out leases…and we were able to walk away clean and clear thanks to me sitting at the dealer for 4 hours negotiating and basically begging, pleading my story to them.

  26. I turned down a 100k bonus army contract as a nuclear sub technician which would of set me up to make 100k minimum yearly once I got out. Now I’m working for minimum wage.

  27. When I was 4 or 5 I took 1 dollar out of my moms purse to buy cookies.

    I remember vividly not having any guilt.Because the concept of stealing and all that wasnt even learned.

    Anyway, 25 years later my mom still called me a thief for it.

  28. I have so many……

    I should have bought that condo when I had the cash. It’s worth quadruple what I would have paid for it.

    I should have saved more and partied less when I was younger.

    I should have started that 401k sooner, same with the IRA.

  29. Bought that one shitty dog crypto for shits and giggles, before the whole musk thing. Sold it (for a slight loss) when a friend told me it was stupid.

    A few months later, i’d have become a millionaire.

  31. 1986. NOT buying a house in a new development in Jackson Hole, Wyoming. $260K then, millions now. Grand Teton views. Rental chalet handled by property managers for winter skiers & summer tourists. Dick Cheney & other retired BigWigs living there now. Ouch !!!

Leave a Reply
You May Also Like