Hold onto your wallets and buckle up for a ride through a series of financial decisions that will leave you speechless. From misjudgments to outright blunders, the financial choices of these 17 Reddit users might just leave you questioning their sanity:
17. The Cash Advances for a New Car
“I knew a guy who was terrible with money. Worked in a warehouse but spent all his money on drugs and things for his controlling girlfriend. Then one day he came to me to show me his brand new car. Probably around $40-50k. He takes me for a ride and starts bragging about how he took his pay stub to like 10 of those cash advance places and get $10k worth of loans and, “had been living like a king.” It was as if he thought he found some sort of life hack. To this day I’m not sure if he just thought he wouldn’t have to pay it back or what. A couple weeks later I learned he wasn’t paying attention while driving and rear-ended a bus going way over the speed limit and totalled the car. Trainwreck of a guy.”
16. The Ex Who Was Obsessed with Anime Figurines
“When my ex and I lived together he suddenly got super into figurines and model kits, to the point where our living room was FULL of them. On every surface. At one point I counted and he had bought more than 30 over the span of six or so months. The math worked out to him spending about $300 a WEEK on these things.
Thing is, we were both full-time students. He was paying for these with student loans. And I had to drive him around because he “couldn’t afford a car”. But he could somehow afford these model kits and figurines and Doordash for every meal. He even tried to keep living with me when I broke up with him because he “couldn’t afford to move” either. I had no sympathy at that point.”
15. The Guy Who Spent a Fortune on a Night Out
“When I was 19, I went to Miami with some friends on Cinco de Mayo. We got insanely drunk and went bar hopping across the city. The next morning I looked at my transactions and realized I had spent over a grand.”
14. The Get Rich Quick Scam
“Knew someone who answered those scam emails thinking they would get rich. Last I heard, he lost around $50k. Emptied out savings account and maxed out credit cards. Left in debt and had to move back with ailing parents.
Not a close to them at all but more like a friend of a friend of a friend’s cousin. M*** just WOULD NOT listen. Genuinely thought he was going to be a millionaire. They kept stringing him along until the bitter end and then…poof. Biggest concern his friends had was him trying to milk his ailing parents for their last nickel and dime. Fortunately, he wised up and knew he been had. The last I heard of him was he had an hourly job somewhere and trying to get out of debt.”
13. The Man That Ruined His Wedding
“I knew someone who got a loan for their wedding, but decided to blow it all at a casino. Now they have a loan for 20k to pay off and nothing to show for it.”
12. The Guy Who Sold His Business for $1
“My SO’s father…sold his business to an employee for $1 to hide it during his divorce. [He] was shocked when suddenly, the guy didn’t magically give it back. He lost his entire business and inventory for $1. He was an abusive a******, so it couldn’t have happened to a nicer guy.”
11. The Craigslist Motorcycle Scam
“My brother’s ex fell for a Craig’s list scam. She found a motorcycle and the guy “needed money up front to pay bills” before she even saw it. We told her don’t do it, it’s a scam. She said she already sent $1000. Of course, he was never available to show her the bike and we found out from my brother after they broke up she actually continued sending him money in hopes of getting the motorcycle. I think she was out $3,000 by the end.”
10. The Lady Who Sold Her Husband’s Apple Stock
“I made my husband sell his Apple stock right before the iPhone came out so we can buy our first house. You don’t even want to know how much it is worth today. I have to stay with him forever now to make it up to him. He hasn’t ever mentioned it but I know one day if he confesses that he used all our savings on blackjack and hookers, I know he will use the Apple stock against me and I’ll have to forgive him.”
9. The Idiotic Aunt
“My (awful) aunt was the trustee for my grandparents’ estate. When they passed, she decided to sell their house to a random realtor who put a leaflet on the door. TO the realtor, not WITH the realtor. It wasn’t put on the market, and the aunt rejected a matching offer by me after I argued hard to actually list the house and have people bid on it. The realtor slapped a new coat of paint on it and sold it a couple of months later for literally a million dollars more than she bought it for.”
8. The Badly Planned Murder-For-Hire
“I won’t name any names, but a good friend who literally had it all; the high-rise apartment and a house down the street with a pool, sauna, Casita, Hummer, corvettes, a successful business, and about $400,000 in Bitcoin, threw it all away over a murder-for-hire, because him and his [business partner]…got greedy, and no longer wanted to split their financial gain with a third person, so yeah. Hired someone on the dark web to carry out the crime across state lines, but communicated EVERYTHING over text.
All three men (my friend, his business partner, and guy they hired) have been caught and convicted. One received life in prison, and my friend and his ‘business partner’ are up for the death penalty. Also, he was only 35 when he was originally arrested.”
7. The Foolish Neighbors
“Neighbors. The bread earner died. Her sister and her daughter were left with the place. They could not afford the payments. They would NOT sell. They let it go to foreclosure even though it had about $120,000 equity in it. New owners came in….did very little cosmetic work, just a little paint and fixed the fence. They sold it and made a $200k profit in about 6 months…”
6. The Unnecessarily Expensive Truck
“I used to be a car sales guy, and I watched as someone traded in their 6 month old $95,000 pickup truck for $70,000 just to buy the exact same $95,000 truck. Literally, it was the same truck. The only difference was that the new truck had a gun safe.
I told the guy we could install a gun safe for $2,000. It would have been the exact same gun safe in the exact same place. Guy added an additional $20,000 in debt for a gun safe. But hey I got to make a $95,000 sale.”
5. The Over-Leveraged Boss
“My supervisor took out a loan against their 401k to pay their rent because “their credit cards were maxed.” Two weeks later, they bought a brand new 60k Lincoln with basically nothing down because “her daughter just had a baby and I need a bigger car for that.”
4. The Stressed Scientologist
“My former sister-in-law had a thriving medical practice. She got so stressed that she joined the Scientologists and started taking their classes. She opened up five-six credit cards without telling my brother, maxed the cards out with hundreds of thousands in cash withdrawals, and gave it to that cult.”
3. The Unnecessary Water Filtration System
“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 [it]. 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…We have great water quality in my area.”
2. The Co-Worker Who Quit Too Early
“Had a co-worker with 5 kids who could all go to USC for free once he has worked there for 15 years (even if he quit). He quit at 14.5 years for a job that barely paid more than he made at USC. Cost all 5 kids a free education at a top school since he couldn’t wait 6 more months.”
1. The Guy Who Lost Everything Because of a Cash Loan
“A guy I worked with found out that check cashing places were offering $15,000 no question asked loans. The interest rates were ******* insane! I begged him not to do it but he impulsively went on a lunch break and got $15,000 in cash and deposited it in his bank account.
This was 6 years ago, he is still struggling because of it. He lost his wife and kid because he drank every penny of it in the summer. He got eviction notices and the stress was too much to the point where he had a psychotic break which lasted for months. He is pushing 40, lives alone, can’t see his child…and is forgotten by most of his friends because he was delusional and hallucinating for months.”
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Source: Reddit.