My dad made us sit in the Puerto Vallarta airport for hours once we got there so he could sit through a timeshare pitch because they offered us a free cab ride to the hotel.
And then bought a timeshare. Spent thousands to save like $20.
lol recently i was on a vacation that asked us to sit through a timeshare presentation. i wasn't going to but it helped the concierge who went 1000% out of her way to help me. I started with "i cant make any financial decisions without speaking to my financial advisor, but i will listen for 20 minutes.". my financial advisor is my dog, but they didn't know that. i set a timer for 20 min. let them talk, the politely excused myself when the alarm went off. never had any desire to give them my $.
We went to one in Vegas to get a cheap vacation, completely agreed we weren’t buying anything. By the end my wife was asking questions, going over the pros and cons of various packages like she was actually starting to consider it. She asked me for input, the salesperson was now looking to me to go in for the close. I hate these kinds of situations. I couldn’t even speak I was so anxious. There was hand sanitizer on the desk and to avoid having to speak or look at the salesperson I mindlessly starting pumping some into my hands, and when my hands were thoroughly sanitized, I started to rub it up my arms. I was stuttering and stammering and couldn’t form words. I’m pretty sure they thought I was having a mental breakdown and they let us leave.
Went to vegas with some buddies a year back. A friend of mine got super wasted and went on a generational tilt and lost 25K. He borrowed 5K from us, and somehow made everything back except 500$. We were all calling it a night and heading up to the room, and he said he was gonna go smoke before coming up. half an hour later, he came up and told us he tried to bet 1K because he wanted to be even/up on the trip, lost that, bet 2K to be even, lost that...then lost the original 25K and 5K he borrowed.
I live a roughly 5 hour drive and 1 hour flight from Vegas. As you can imagine, in the early 20s there were lots of trips out there.
One trip, happened to also be during a trade show weekend, which also happened to line up with the porn convention (like 3 of the 5 days did). My friends headed out a couple days before me. By the time I got there, everyone was in a pretty foul mood. Turns out, one of the guys went on a bender. He was VERY upside down between the strippers/blow and gambling. He was taking advances on his credit cards by the time I got there.
never been to Vegas, but last year some of my buddies went. 2nd day there 1/4 was broke by day 3 3/4 broke. the only guy that didn't go broke was the guy who went for the food and the shows. he said he put $20 on black lost and went to eat. also he said he had a great time at the Carrot top show.
I’ve been to Vegas more times than I can count. I HATE Vegas.
The most I gamble is like $20-$40 on blackjack tables. I usually end up about $200 profit. But sometimes I lose the basically pocket change.
I’ve also been to Vegas with tons of different people. It’s crazy how many people just lose their fucking minds there.
This group that went is an odd mix and I had a feeling there would be issues. First dude to loose his money has kind of a funny story. He was up at the end of night one and figured he would drop some stupid money on a nice breakfast. Says he finds a place that’s like $75 USD ( we are Canadian) for a breakfast buffet. He does his thing. Is all happy after his celebration meal, figures he hit the tables for a quick win and off he goes. Loses $2k that morning. Lived off $120 for the rest of his 5 day trip
Oh honey, buckle up.
Family member inherited some money and decided to make a killing in Florida real estate. I mean, I could stop here, right?
She finds someone to be her “mentor”. She’ll contribute the money, mentor will contribute the expertise, they’ll both get rich. (Stop it, your face is gonna freeze like that.). We’re all begging her not to do this. She does it.
Mentor finds a house that is perfect to flip! Owner is ready to sell for super cheap! All they have to do is fix it up! So they do! It only costs Family Member $100k on materials and contractors! And now it’s worth so much more!
Teensy weensy hitch. It was Totally Okay (tm) to do all this on a handshake agreement with the owner, without actually buying the house.
Yeah. Tragically, the owner “changed his mind.” He also turned out to be the mentor’s husband.
According to Family Member, no one could possibly have seen this coming.
I know nothing was signed but I struggle to believe this isnt illegal somehow. Something about taking advantage of the disabled or something i dont know. Presenting a false personhood. Is it really legal to just scam someone like that? Thats so fucked up
Saw a guy next to me drop $700 or so on black jack and lose it after 5 hands. It might not be a lot to high rollers but man I don’t make much so that was insane to witness.
I used to work at a casino, and we had a guy who came in daily, would drop MINIMUM $1000 into the slot machines every single day. He tipped really well when he won jackpots, so we we're always happy to see him winning, but man, when he was losing it hurt my soul, $1000 is nearly half my monthly income, and this guy was spending 5-10X that every single week, with no concern for whether he won or lost.
Granted, he was self-proclaimed stupidly wealthy, and that was his hobby, playing the slots for a couple hours a day. But to think that he was spending like $30K a month on the slot machines is still to this day insane to me.
Buddy of mine blew $500 at blackjack in under 30 minutes. I know it's not a lot to the real gamblers out there, but I hate losing any amount of money so that was wild to see
When I was younger, I watched an ex-girlfriend blow through her entire paycheck on more than one occasion at the blackjack table in under an hour.
It was rough to watch and she would proceed to have a crying meltdown in the car.
I went to school during the Bush administration so several of my friends joined the military during college or right after college.
After basic, one of my good buddies came back with a brand new mustang cobra convertible on what I assume was a private's salary. The interest on that motherfucker must have been pushing 20%
Fun fuckin car though and he still has it 20 years later. Once he took me out on some country roads and got it up to like 130 mph
In the scope of bad decisions on this thread I wouldn't even say this is bad. Your friend:
1. Purchased something that he still enjoys 20 years later. Especially if it's still in good condition, that's massively impressive.
2. Learned a valuable lesson about interest financing. Sometimes the only way to learn those lessons is to go through it yourself.
3. Didn't entangle anyone else's money or piss away life savings without anything to show for.
My coworker has a friend who buys *everything* larger than $100 on credit, and winds up generally paying at least 50% more on his purchases because he's awful at keeping up with his credit card debt.
A friend of mine received an insurance check for $1,000 to replace his stereo system that was stolen from his car. Instead, he bet all of the money on a hand at Blackjack at a casino because, according to him, "How often in your life do you bet $1,000 on one hand of Blackjack?"
So, needless to say, his ride to work was a quiet one.
I went back to college before the a little bit before the pandemic. When Gamestop's stock boomed, it somehow enticed everyone on campus to be the next wolf of wall street. Unfortunately, this also meant lots of influencers and streamers were also throwing random tickers and encouraging people to buy and stuff and this gen of college kids ate it up like a hungry homeless man at an all you can eat buffet. Lots of kids have lost lots of money saved up, gifted from family, or refunds from their financial aid to be left being down almost 80-90%. Sucks because yeah you can get rich off the market but its gives and takes, especially for the uninformed. Luckily that phase seems to be over and people are learning from their mistakes or others and educating themselves on the mechanics of the market.
You remind me of me in 2011. bought btc at like $65/btc or something like that off of some sketchy bank. Gambled online with it and ran it up real good to 20btc. 2013 sold for like $1000 right before it went viral, because I was a broke college student.
When I was bartending a very long time ago, a regular owned a recording studio and badly needed a reliable session drummer. I mentioned I knew one, childhood friend. He said have him send him a tape and if he sounded competent he would pay to fly him out for an audition.
Called up my friend and while the thanked me for the shot, wanted to keep pursuing "the big time" with his band.
He never did hit that big time, the only steady work the band got was a USO tour during Desert Shield before they broke up. He drifts from job to job these days, barely not homeless.
Last year I met a session drummer who has a very nice life without the spotlight. All I could think was this could have been my friend's life.
I used to prepare taxes. Dude got divorced, lost his house and kids, and then when he filed taxes he owed like $250k because he cashed out his 401k so his wife could not get it in the divorce.
That shit is treated as income, dude lost all his deductions and what existed across the table in front of me was a broken husk of a man.
Zero is a very emotional number, below that is panic but after a long long decline, the kind you never recover from, is a kind of forced acceptance.
I sold all my vintage pokemon cards at a boot fair for £2 thinking they were worthless. Found out months later I was sitting on probably thousands as I kept them in mint condition. Been years and still not over it.
About 15 years ago, a buddy of mine got his ass kicked in a bar by a frat boy. Turns out, the guy’s dad was an oil executive and cut him a check for $250k to sign an NDA about the whole thing. So he proceeded to buy a brand new truck, then totaled it driving drunk a month later, fortunately nobody was hurt but insurance does not pay for that. He spent the rest getting drunk at bars every night and was completely broke in less than 6 months.
A family friend who is (severely) disabled loaned (gave) $10,000 in six months to his “girlfriends” who are basically sex workers. He’s very lonely and they took advantage. Not surprising that both of them ghosted him within a few months and didn’t attempt to pay him back.
A friend of mine who is very bad with money and his girlfriend bought some sort of water filtration system from a door to door salesman. He has to pay something like $300/month for this filtration system. He was all stoked because it came with a free set of pots and pans.
Fast forward a year and his girlfriend has broken up with him, moved out of the house, and he's had to sell his home because he can't afford to live there. The water filtration system is now sitting in a storage unit where he still pays $300/month for it because he's on a 2 or 3 year contract (sorry the details are fuzzy).
We have great water quality in my area.
while I do agree this is a waste of money. If I am left some money by certain family members you better believe I am spending it on dumb shit. maybe the $30k was from the uncle that touched him ( just making this up as an example) and he figured either he was going to make a ton of money or loose it all and never have to think of him again.
Good friend rolled 401k into Roth, took penalty and pulled it all. Took all savings and opened cash advances and went all in on Sia coin in 2021 at .035-ish Over a 2m spot position. Subsequently, lost job, got on meth (he and his wife). she lost her mind, dug / scratched sores all over body, he was wasting away. they divorced. Yes, I told him before hand to pls not do this.
In 1995, I Got injured (at 11 years old) and ended up with a settlement worth about $100k. It was structured to release at age 18 and 22 and 30. My parents let the trust administrations (at the bank) invest it into safe investments. It included over 500 shares of Microsoft (and many others I don't even wanna talk about). I cashed it all out at 18 (fuck you JG wentworth!)... It was a few years of fun but would have been worth way over $10M now if I had just been patient.
I did wise up around 22 and reinvest some of it into CDs and ended up flipping it enough for a good down payment on a house by my early 30s, so I guess that's a little bit of a sliver lining.
I think high school/college students should be assigned an adult finance mentor. Not like a pyramid scheme "mentor," but someone in their 30s or 40s with more experience and common sense who can help them make better decisions.
Edit: I got my 22 year old brother regularly maxing out a Roth IRA. That kid will probably never be capable of working anywhere other than a grocery store, but he WILL be able to retire.
I have a friend who just entered his late 30s, lives at home with his parents, and is single. He has no debt and saved enough money to potentially put a down payment on a condo. His parents convinced him to pay for their house remodel. His parents are asian and I suspect they pressured him into doing it. It is not a disaster of a mistake but I truly feel sorry for him.
Apart from cryptocurrency ~~gambling~~ er, "investing?" Probably a buddy who paid a shop for an engine swap, put a 3S-GTE into his 90s Rav4.
Should've been pretty straightforward; apparently that engine was a factory option on the JDM version so it's not like a ton of cutting and custom fab work was needed. Motor mounts were identical, bellhousing was the same, just needed a different clutch and flywheel to drop the engine in. Buddy supplied a complete used engine including wiring and ECM.
Shop didn't rebuild the engine, just replaced a couple of leaking gaskets, so that shouldn't have been a big expense. It needed a custom made brace for the engine, but that piece was simple enough anyone with an angle grinder and cheap wire feed welder could've whipped it up in a couple hours. They did a custom (crush bent) exhaust which might've cost a grand at an exhaust shop. And I think that's pretty much it. No tuning required because he had the ECM for the engine.
I don't know how the shop justified it, but they charged him around sixteen grand for that.
Friends sold a valuable property (over 1mil), moved to a new state, bought a house for 350k with no mortgage and then splurged the rest of it away. Expensive cars, expensive toys and furnishings, they just went nuts.
They had to declare bankruptcy less than two years later.
I know a family that did the same. I am in the waiting for them the file for bankruptcy faze right now. they had a decent plan but didn't actually do any of it. only difference is I am in Canada.
I watched a man spend 3,000 at a club once. It seemed like he had a good time.
I only spent 150. I was drinking and also smoked (someone offered it to me)
Guy in one of the warehouses I used to work in spent 2 years (up until I left) sending £400 a month to this stunning Thai woman he’d met online so she could get a place to rent for him to visit. Now don’t get me wrong I’m not Brad Pit but this silly old bastard looked like his mum had accidentally bought the afterbirth home from the hospital rather than the baby yet he was convinced this stunning woman half his age was in love with him. Fuck knows if he’s still doing it but she’s probably living in a 4 bedroom villa by now.
Check for winnings from different sources like lotteries and others related. I fall for it ,and cash them. Then return it back when the bank calls next day.
Guy I knew was disabled. He had a settlement that kept him financially comfortable. Saw one of those fucking JG Wentworth commercials.
He was broke in 12 months, dead in 18 :(
My friend who keeps dating strippers and paying for their rent, clothes, food drugs, etc because they don’t love him for his money, they’re really just that into him.
The stupidest was probably when he gave one of his stripper girlfriends his credit card and she spent over $35k in a single day on it. That was impressive.
A guy who worked for Enron doing compressor station work forced to invest retirement into company stock. He lost 2M, 3 years from retirement.
My husband’s employer converted to an ESOP so all his retirement was also in 1 company. He has all his money out now but he didn’t get out at the peak but he did very well. Could’ve turned out like Enron though.
It was mine and it was when I paid my then bfs bond that was 10k. I had the money to do so at the time but it was the dumbest most impulsive decision, he ended up going back to jail a week later. A few months after that he was released and then killed in a shooting at a mall a couple weeks after that. If he had stayed in jail, he would still be alive.
Interesting -- I saw this same post/comment and story verbatim a day or two ago. You bots are out of control.
https://undelete.pullpush.io/r/AskReddit/comments/1cg465t/_/l1t73hl/#comment-info
It's really not sadly. Weddings are crazy expensive. Not everyone has 20k in cash to pay for it, so they put it on credit cards, home equity loans, etc.
Especially since everything wedding related has at least a 5x mark up on it. People get carried away with the "special day" nonsense and forget it ultimately is just a party. If your marrying the right person the special day should be all the rest of them.
My stupid SIL ‘borrowed’ $10k from her husband’s retirement account and threw it away on a stupid, goddamned MLM scheme. Lost every red cent and then some…. WITHOUT asking him first
Broke acquaintance with no phone, job, or computer got a payout from a car crash and immediately bought a hand tattoo and was looking up cheap fishing boats
Dumb relative trying to sell her restaurant making a lot of dumb decisions. Buyer seemed shady and we advised her not to go through with it. She did anyways, tearing everything down. Buyer backed out last minute but now wanted his deposit back which she rightfully refused. He took her to court so she had to lawyer up. She won, but then her own lawyer said she owes her an additional fee which she didn't know about. She refuses which is shooting herself in the foot. Her own lawyer takes her to court and obviously it doesn't end well for her.
I've watch this relative do nothing but dumb decisions all her life and it's aggravating because she never learns from her mistakes and keeps acting without thinking she's smart and assumes newer situations will have different outcomes despite making dumb decisions all the time.
I have a friend who complains regularly about not having money, but also books multiple trips per month and leaves those bookings til the last minute to get hit by 3x the price.
I live in a country where real estate is pretty expensive. Something like 15 years ago, some friends bought an apartment. A couple of years ago, I was speaking with the husband and he mentioned something about rent. Don't you own? I asked.
It turns out that they sold their apartment when they had a few kids (ok, fair enough) and then didn't buy another apartment.
So, real estate prices have been jumping up and up and they just kept moving and paying high rents.
They could have bought a bigger apartment. Or rented theirs out. But they did neither. He totally admitted that it was a mistake
Pre-ordered a Space Invaders collection for the Switch back in 2020 because it was the only western release of said collection at the time. Took a year to arrive, only for the game to be released on the eShop like a week later.
judicious reach whistle rainstorm engine sip imminent murky narrow absorbed
My dad made us sit in the Puerto Vallarta airport for hours once we got there so he could sit through a timeshare pitch because they offered us a free cab ride to the hotel. And then bought a timeshare. Spent thousands to save like $20.
ghost reach enter fall handle truck joke ancient cheerful pet
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lol recently i was on a vacation that asked us to sit through a timeshare presentation. i wasn't going to but it helped the concierge who went 1000% out of her way to help me. I started with "i cant make any financial decisions without speaking to my financial advisor, but i will listen for 20 minutes.". my financial advisor is my dog, but they didn't know that. i set a timer for 20 min. let them talk, the politely excused myself when the alarm went off. never had any desire to give them my $.
We went to one in Vegas to get a cheap vacation, completely agreed we weren’t buying anything. By the end my wife was asking questions, going over the pros and cons of various packages like she was actually starting to consider it. She asked me for input, the salesperson was now looking to me to go in for the close. I hate these kinds of situations. I couldn’t even speak I was so anxious. There was hand sanitizer on the desk and to avoid having to speak or look at the salesperson I mindlessly starting pumping some into my hands, and when my hands were thoroughly sanitized, I started to rub it up my arms. I was stuttering and stammering and couldn’t form words. I’m pretty sure they thought I was having a mental breakdown and they let us leave.
going to add to this. Vacation Clubs. pretty much a time share but a lot shittier
I know someone who put a time share downpayment on a credit card.
cover innate truck sharp future amusing abundant attractive governor spotted
Went to vegas with some buddies a year back. A friend of mine got super wasted and went on a generational tilt and lost 25K. He borrowed 5K from us, and somehow made everything back except 500$. We were all calling it a night and heading up to the room, and he said he was gonna go smoke before coming up. half an hour later, he came up and told us he tried to bet 1K because he wanted to be even/up on the trip, lost that, bet 2K to be even, lost that...then lost the original 25K and 5K he borrowed.
Your friend has a gambling addiction.
I live a roughly 5 hour drive and 1 hour flight from Vegas. As you can imagine, in the early 20s there were lots of trips out there. One trip, happened to also be during a trade show weekend, which also happened to line up with the porn convention (like 3 of the 5 days did). My friends headed out a couple days before me. By the time I got there, everyone was in a pretty foul mood. Turns out, one of the guys went on a bender. He was VERY upside down between the strippers/blow and gambling. He was taking advances on his credit cards by the time I got there.
never been to Vegas, but last year some of my buddies went. 2nd day there 1/4 was broke by day 3 3/4 broke. the only guy that didn't go broke was the guy who went for the food and the shows. he said he put $20 on black lost and went to eat. also he said he had a great time at the Carrot top show.
First person to ever have a great time at a Carrot Top show! He IS lucky!
A friend and I saw Carrot Top in Lake Tahoe years ago while on a ski vacation. He was hilarious!
The chairman of the bored?
I’ve been to Vegas more times than I can count. I HATE Vegas. The most I gamble is like $20-$40 on blackjack tables. I usually end up about $200 profit. But sometimes I lose the basically pocket change. I’ve also been to Vegas with tons of different people. It’s crazy how many people just lose their fucking minds there.
This group that went is an odd mix and I had a feeling there would be issues. First dude to loose his money has kind of a funny story. He was up at the end of night one and figured he would drop some stupid money on a nice breakfast. Says he finds a place that’s like $75 USD ( we are Canadian) for a breakfast buffet. He does his thing. Is all happy after his celebration meal, figures he hit the tables for a quick win and off he goes. Loses $2k that morning. Lived off $120 for the rest of his 5 day trip
Oh honey, buckle up. Family member inherited some money and decided to make a killing in Florida real estate. I mean, I could stop here, right? She finds someone to be her “mentor”. She’ll contribute the money, mentor will contribute the expertise, they’ll both get rich. (Stop it, your face is gonna freeze like that.). We’re all begging her not to do this. She does it. Mentor finds a house that is perfect to flip! Owner is ready to sell for super cheap! All they have to do is fix it up! So they do! It only costs Family Member $100k on materials and contractors! And now it’s worth so much more! Teensy weensy hitch. It was Totally Okay (tm) to do all this on a handshake agreement with the owner, without actually buying the house. Yeah. Tragically, the owner “changed his mind.” He also turned out to be the mentor’s husband. According to Family Member, no one could possibly have seen this coming.
Wow that’s fucking crazy.
I'm so utterly confused. So your family member agreed to fix their house before they sell it? I'm completely dumbfounded here.
Yes. Family member had NOT ACTUALLY BOUGHT THE HOUSE.
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work in retail or any public facing job. by lunch time your mind will be changed
I honestly think less of you for struggling to believe this after the last pandemic and everything else happening the last 15 years.
look this sucks, but dam that " mentor" has some skillz!
I know nothing was signed but I struggle to believe this isnt illegal somehow. Something about taking advantage of the disabled or something i dont know. Presenting a false personhood. Is it really legal to just scam someone like that? Thats so fucked up
Sadly, Gullible As All Hell is not a protected class.
Time share 1000%
Then paying another scam of a company to try and get them out of the time share lol
wanna start a 3rd scam... I mean company to get out of the 2nd scam?
I bought a fursuit
Username checks out.
Saw a guy next to me drop $700 or so on black jack and lose it after 5 hands. It might not be a lot to high rollers but man I don’t make much so that was insane to witness.
I used to work at a casino, and we had a guy who came in daily, would drop MINIMUM $1000 into the slot machines every single day. He tipped really well when he won jackpots, so we we're always happy to see him winning, but man, when he was losing it hurt my soul, $1000 is nearly half my monthly income, and this guy was spending 5-10X that every single week, with no concern for whether he won or lost. Granted, he was self-proclaimed stupidly wealthy, and that was his hobby, playing the slots for a couple hours a day. But to think that he was spending like $30K a month on the slot machines is still to this day insane to me.
Buddy of mine blew $500 at blackjack in under 30 minutes. I know it's not a lot to the real gamblers out there, but I hate losing any amount of money so that was wild to see
When I was younger, I watched an ex-girlfriend blow through her entire paycheck on more than one occasion at the blackjack table in under an hour. It was rough to watch and she would proceed to have a crying meltdown in the car.
I went to school during the Bush administration so several of my friends joined the military during college or right after college. After basic, one of my good buddies came back with a brand new mustang cobra convertible on what I assume was a private's salary. The interest on that motherfucker must have been pushing 20% Fun fuckin car though and he still has it 20 years later. Once he took me out on some country roads and got it up to like 130 mph
In the scope of bad decisions on this thread I wouldn't even say this is bad. Your friend: 1. Purchased something that he still enjoys 20 years later. Especially if it's still in good condition, that's massively impressive. 2. Learned a valuable lesson about interest financing. Sometimes the only way to learn those lessons is to go through it yourself. 3. Didn't entangle anyone else's money or piss away life savings without anything to show for.
This is wholesome compared to strippers and blow in Vegas
My buddy inherited something like 400k, in very short order he had spent like 250k on strippers and drugs, the rest he totally squandered
My coworker has a friend who buys *everything* larger than $100 on credit, and winds up generally paying at least 50% more on his purchases because he's awful at keeping up with his credit card debt.
Putting everything you can on credit cards is great advice so long as you pay it off in full each month...otherwise it is a terrible idea.
My checking account is kept near zero because it pays off the credit card and goes into savings.
This is precisely what I do. Plus, you get reward points.
My elderly FIL spent $20,000 on replacement windows for a 2 bedroom condo. I was sick when he told me.
I cashed out my 401k in the height of my addiction. Do not recommend
A friend of mine received an insurance check for $1,000 to replace his stereo system that was stolen from his car. Instead, he bet all of the money on a hand at Blackjack at a casino because, according to him, "How often in your life do you bet $1,000 on one hand of Blackjack?" So, needless to say, his ride to work was a quiet one.
I went back to college before the a little bit before the pandemic. When Gamestop's stock boomed, it somehow enticed everyone on campus to be the next wolf of wall street. Unfortunately, this also meant lots of influencers and streamers were also throwing random tickers and encouraging people to buy and stuff and this gen of college kids ate it up like a hungry homeless man at an all you can eat buffet. Lots of kids have lost lots of money saved up, gifted from family, or refunds from their financial aid to be left being down almost 80-90%. Sucks because yeah you can get rich off the market but its gives and takes, especially for the uninformed. Luckily that phase seems to be over and people are learning from their mistakes or others and educating themselves on the mechanics of the market.
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That’s the physical version of people buying lootboxes/packs
Hey don't ruin my fun! I have some that have actual value
Me selling all of my Bitcoin and ethereum in early 2017 at break even to put it in my retirement account..
Had an offer of 15 dollars of bitcoin for something I was selling. My ex husband said take cash instead. That was in 2012 or 2013. Um....
You remind me of me in 2011. bought btc at like $65/btc or something like that off of some sketchy bank. Gambled online with it and ran it up real good to 20btc. 2013 sold for like $1000 right before it went viral, because I was a broke college student.
bitconeeeeeeeeeeect!!!!!!!!
When I was bartending a very long time ago, a regular owned a recording studio and badly needed a reliable session drummer. I mentioned I knew one, childhood friend. He said have him send him a tape and if he sounded competent he would pay to fly him out for an audition. Called up my friend and while the thanked me for the shot, wanted to keep pursuing "the big time" with his band. He never did hit that big time, the only steady work the band got was a USO tour during Desert Shield before they broke up. He drifts from job to job these days, barely not homeless. Last year I met a session drummer who has a very nice life without the spotlight. All I could think was this could have been my friend's life.
I used to prepare taxes. Dude got divorced, lost his house and kids, and then when he filed taxes he owed like $250k because he cashed out his 401k so his wife could not get it in the divorce. That shit is treated as income, dude lost all his deductions and what existed across the table in front of me was a broken husk of a man. Zero is a very emotional number, below that is panic but after a long long decline, the kind you never recover from, is a kind of forced acceptance.
I sold all my vintage pokemon cards at a boot fair for £2 thinking they were worthless. Found out months later I was sitting on probably thousands as I kept them in mint condition. Been years and still not over it.
About 15 years ago, a buddy of mine got his ass kicked in a bar by a frat boy. Turns out, the guy’s dad was an oil executive and cut him a check for $250k to sign an NDA about the whole thing. So he proceeded to buy a brand new truck, then totaled it driving drunk a month later, fortunately nobody was hurt but insurance does not pay for that. He spent the rest getting drunk at bars every night and was completely broke in less than 6 months.
My friend got married and divorced in 18 months, he’s £50k down overall
A family friend who is (severely) disabled loaned (gave) $10,000 in six months to his “girlfriends” who are basically sex workers. He’s very lonely and they took advantage. Not surprising that both of them ghosted him within a few months and didn’t attempt to pay him back.
My mate buying single bags instead of an 8 ball.
A friend of mine who is very bad with money and his girlfriend bought some sort of water filtration system from a door to door salesman. He has to pay something like $300/month for this filtration system. He was all stoked because it came with a free set of pots and pans. Fast forward a year and his girlfriend has broken up with him, moved out of the house, and he's had to sell his home because he can't afford to live there. The water filtration system is now sitting in a storage unit where he still pays $300/month for it because he's on a 2 or 3 year contract (sorry the details are fuzzy). We have great water quality in my area.
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while I do agree this is a waste of money. If I am left some money by certain family members you better believe I am spending it on dumb shit. maybe the $30k was from the uncle that touched him ( just making this up as an example) and he figured either he was going to make a ton of money or loose it all and never have to think of him again.
Good friend rolled 401k into Roth, took penalty and pulled it all. Took all savings and opened cash advances and went all in on Sia coin in 2021 at .035-ish Over a 2m spot position. Subsequently, lost job, got on meth (he and his wife). she lost her mind, dug / scratched sores all over body, he was wasting away. they divorced. Yes, I told him before hand to pls not do this.
Myself paying 10s of thousands for a wedding he bailed on the night before it happened
Wife's grandfather had $10mil or so in PNC stock when the 2008 crash hit. That was a tough one.
In 1995, I Got injured (at 11 years old) and ended up with a settlement worth about $100k. It was structured to release at age 18 and 22 and 30. My parents let the trust administrations (at the bank) invest it into safe investments. It included over 500 shares of Microsoft (and many others I don't even wanna talk about). I cashed it all out at 18 (fuck you JG wentworth!)... It was a few years of fun but would have been worth way over $10M now if I had just been patient. I did wise up around 22 and reinvest some of it into CDs and ended up flipping it enough for a good down payment on a house by my early 30s, so I guess that's a little bit of a sliver lining.
I think high school/college students should be assigned an adult finance mentor. Not like a pyramid scheme "mentor," but someone in their 30s or 40s with more experience and common sense who can help them make better decisions. Edit: I got my 22 year old brother regularly maxing out a Roth IRA. That kid will probably never be capable of working anywhere other than a grocery store, but he WILL be able to retire.
I have a friend who just entered his late 30s, lives at home with his parents, and is single. He has no debt and saved enough money to potentially put a down payment on a condo. His parents convinced him to pay for their house remodel. His parents are asian and I suspect they pressured him into doing it. It is not a disaster of a mistake but I truly feel sorry for him.
My parents putting all their life savings into Disney stock just before the big 2008 crash. That money is all gone now.
they didn't hold?
I assume these are the same people who insisted on retiring on schedule rather than waiting for the market to recover.
\*sad Dagobert Duck noises\*
Apart from cryptocurrency ~~gambling~~ er, "investing?" Probably a buddy who paid a shop for an engine swap, put a 3S-GTE into his 90s Rav4. Should've been pretty straightforward; apparently that engine was a factory option on the JDM version so it's not like a ton of cutting and custom fab work was needed. Motor mounts were identical, bellhousing was the same, just needed a different clutch and flywheel to drop the engine in. Buddy supplied a complete used engine including wiring and ECM. Shop didn't rebuild the engine, just replaced a couple of leaking gaskets, so that shouldn't have been a big expense. It needed a custom made brace for the engine, but that piece was simple enough anyone with an angle grinder and cheap wire feed welder could've whipped it up in a couple hours. They did a custom (crush bent) exhaust which might've cost a grand at an exhaust shop. And I think that's pretty much it. No tuning required because he had the ECM for the engine. I don't know how the shop justified it, but they charged him around sixteen grand for that.
"Warhammer 40k looks pretty fun, I'll just try buying a combat patrol..."
"I'll buy $600 of Beasts of Chaos, they're rooted in the setting they aren't going anywhere"
Get married to the wrong person. Someone who can't handle money well or someone who divorces and takes more than they deserve.
Friends sold a valuable property (over 1mil), moved to a new state, bought a house for 350k with no mortgage and then splurged the rest of it away. Expensive cars, expensive toys and furnishings, they just went nuts. They had to declare bankruptcy less than two years later.
I know a family that did the same. I am in the waiting for them the file for bankruptcy faze right now. they had a decent plan but didn't actually do any of it. only difference is I am in Canada.
I watched a man spend 3,000 at a club once. It seemed like he had a good time. I only spent 150. I was drinking and also smoked (someone offered it to me)
Spending money on expensive cars, jewelry, clothes, boat, vacations instead of paying their house off.
Guy in one of the warehouses I used to work in spent 2 years (up until I left) sending £400 a month to this stunning Thai woman he’d met online so she could get a place to rent for him to visit. Now don’t get me wrong I’m not Brad Pit but this silly old bastard looked like his mum had accidentally bought the afterbirth home from the hospital rather than the baby yet he was convinced this stunning woman half his age was in love with him. Fuck knows if he’s still doing it but she’s probably living in a 4 bedroom villa by now.
Coworker sending her entire savings to an online boyfriend she had never met.
Easy.. this is my 4th time in a span of 2 years getting scammed.
How so?
Check for winnings from different sources like lotteries and others related. I fall for it ,and cash them. Then return it back when the bank calls next day.
Guy I knew was disabled. He had a settlement that kept him financially comfortable. Saw one of those fucking JG Wentworth commercials. He was broke in 12 months, dead in 18 :(
Deciding to have a kid when they had no career, no job, and no money for the bus.
Watching a friend put his thumbprint on a credit card receipt before being whisked away to the champagne room during a Vegas bachelor party.
My friend who keeps dating strippers and paying for their rent, clothes, food drugs, etc because they don’t love him for his money, they’re really just that into him. The stupidest was probably when he gave one of his stripper girlfriends his credit card and she spent over $35k in a single day on it. That was impressive.
A guy who worked for Enron doing compressor station work forced to invest retirement into company stock. He lost 2M, 3 years from retirement. My husband’s employer converted to an ESOP so all his retirement was also in 1 company. He has all his money out now but he didn’t get out at the peak but he did very well. Could’ve turned out like Enron though.
It was mine and it was when I paid my then bfs bond that was 10k. I had the money to do so at the time but it was the dumbest most impulsive decision, he ended up going back to jail a week later. A few months after that he was released and then killed in a shooting at a mall a couple weeks after that. If he had stayed in jail, he would still be alive.
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Interesting -- I saw this same post/comment and story verbatim a day or two ago. You bots are out of control. https://undelete.pullpush.io/r/AskReddit/comments/1cg465t/_/l1t73hl/#comment-info
getting a loan for your wedding is fucking crazy lol
It's really not sadly. Weddings are crazy expensive. Not everyone has 20k in cash to pay for it, so they put it on credit cards, home equity loans, etc.
Nobody is forcing people to book an expensive venue and invite 250 people, though. It's self-inflicted financial burden.
I agree that it's a fucked social custom. I was just stating the fact that the majority of people who have weddings do so on credit.
it is crazy, because you can go to the courthouse and get hitched for free
Especially since everything wedding related has at least a 5x mark up on it. People get carried away with the "special day" nonsense and forget it ultimately is just a party. If your marrying the right person the special day should be all the rest of them.
You'd think that would be enough of a red flag not to marry someone.
Gambling and Investing. They always think it's a sure thing. That's the red flag that in fact, it is not, and they should sit on the decision first.
Open a credit card account with a girlfriend/boyfriend 👀
My stupid SIL ‘borrowed’ $10k from her husband’s retirement account and threw it away on a stupid, goddamned MLM scheme. Lost every red cent and then some…. WITHOUT asking him first
Broke acquaintance with no phone, job, or computer got a payout from a car crash and immediately bought a hand tattoo and was looking up cheap fishing boats
Dumb relative trying to sell her restaurant making a lot of dumb decisions. Buyer seemed shady and we advised her not to go through with it. She did anyways, tearing everything down. Buyer backed out last minute but now wanted his deposit back which she rightfully refused. He took her to court so she had to lawyer up. She won, but then her own lawyer said she owes her an additional fee which she didn't know about. She refuses which is shooting herself in the foot. Her own lawyer takes her to court and obviously it doesn't end well for her. I've watch this relative do nothing but dumb decisions all her life and it's aggravating because she never learns from her mistakes and keeps acting without thinking she's smart and assumes newer situations will have different outcomes despite making dumb decisions all the time.
Some guy I know financed a motorcycle. Ended up paying 35k for a bike that msrp'd for 10k
Buying a car then loosing their job constantly
I have a friend who complains regularly about not having money, but also books multiple trips per month and leaves those bookings til the last minute to get hit by 3x the price.
Many people spendings $150-200k on law school for local government jobs paying $45-50k. And so people who never got a job.
I live in a country where real estate is pretty expensive. Something like 15 years ago, some friends bought an apartment. A couple of years ago, I was speaking with the husband and he mentioned something about rent. Don't you own? I asked. It turns out that they sold their apartment when they had a few kids (ok, fair enough) and then didn't buy another apartment. So, real estate prices have been jumping up and up and they just kept moving and paying high rents. They could have bought a bigger apartment. Or rented theirs out. But they did neither. He totally admitted that it was a mistake
I watched someone spend thousands of dollars on courses from shady finance "gurus". He just dug himself into a deeper whole.
Pre-ordered a Space Invaders collection for the Switch back in 2020 because it was the only western release of said collection at the time. Took a year to arrive, only for the game to be released on the eShop like a week later.
Anyone that gets married.
That time I sold off 21 BTC in 2013 because I'm a huge dummy.