Back in November of last year, I was having some really rough days. One of those evenings, I did a really stupid thing:
I bought a Nintendo DS Lite + Games at Walmart at 1am in the morning.
Why did I do this? I was depressed, I had the money in the bank, and I still hadn’t learned my lesson on budgeting cash flow. Since I had been “working so hard”, I decided to reward myself with this little gift. Nevermind the fact that I couldn’t really afford it, or that I had to use my company bank account to purchase it.
It was a dumb purchase. Since getting the little device, I’ve maybe played it a half dozen times. It’s been sitting on a shelf now for 2 months untouched.
It’s not that it’s not fun. It’s just:
a.) I resent the item and thus subconsciously avoid playing with it
b.) I feel guilty that I bought it
c.) I’d rather play sports in real life than on the DS
d.) I’ve never been a big handheld gamer (consoles and PC gaming is another story)
So here’s the deal. I fessed up about my dumbest purchase of late. And if you want to win my handy DS Lite, you gotta fess up too.
The Rules
This is gonna be kind of like going to confession if you’re catholic. There are two ways to enter this giveaway.
- Have a blog? Write about your dumbest purchase ever. Link back to here. Earn 25 entries.
- Leave a comment, share your dumbest purchase ever, earn 1 entry
You can leave one comment, and do one trackback. Don’t leave more than one, it will get deleted. Don’t leave multiple comments with different e-mails, I will delete them all. It’s really easy to detect. In two weeks, March 18, I’ll close the comments and trackbacks, assign them all numbers and use a random number generator to pick the winner.
Open to US residents only, 18 years or older.
Why This Contest
I’m sick of my perfectly good DS going unused….and I’m really hoping some of the bigger bloggers will join this confession train! (give ‘em a nudge, will ya?)
Don’t Forget
Don’t forget to subscribe to DebtKid…you don’t wanna miss a thing (cue song from “Armageddon”)
update March 19. The giveaway is now closed. Winner to be announced shortly…
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My worst purchase ever was buying a car out of desperation. The crankshaft seal on my 1979 Toyota Celica broke one Friday night, leaking massive amounts of oil. But I had to work that Monday morning so I needed some resemblance of transportation before then.
On that Saturday, I got a quote to get it repaired but it was just too high (I don’t remember the exact amount but it seemed really high for someone who’s barely out of high school). I decided that maybe replacing this old car would be a better option. I called a few big dealerships around and no one really wanted to take the car in as a trade-in. But then I saw an ad on the local Auto Trader publication for a small dealership that would take any trade-ins. I talked to their salesman over the phone and he assured me that my car would not be a problem at all and that they will finance anyone regardless of credit (if I only knew about used car salesman!).
That was all the encouragement I needed so on Sunday morning, I took a buddy of mine with me (to help push if necessary) to get me a working car! I forgot to mention that this dealership was over 30 miles away, by freeway, so we first purchased a case of the cheapest car oil at the nearest gas station. I understood that this was a one-way trip with no turning back, so one case should do. On the way there, I had to stop every so often to add a quart of oil. I don’t quite remember how I figured out when to re-fill – either when the oil pressure gauge suddenly dropped, or maybe with the engine light, or maybe even using the temperature gauge. In any case, we used up the entire case but we were bound and determined to get there. Believe you me, it was hard enough to pull over and get back on the road every few minutes on a California freeway. Oh, did I mention that there was this little voice in my head asking if we should still keep on going since this looked ridiculous? “But I shall not be deterred!”
Once we got there, just as surely as the salesman said yes on the phone, he easily declined the car in person. However, I felt trapped because I had no way to get home since the engine seems shot (maybe running without engine oil on the last few miles did it and the fact that it won’t start anymore). I ended up begging them to give me anything they’ve got, just to get home and eventually to work the next day. He mentioned this Datsun (pre-Nissan days) in the back lot that may or may not be working. Well, he got it started and pulled it up to the front of the dealership so I was willing to take it. I believe they gave it to me for over $3000-something, with 21% APR, and no money for the trade-in but tacked on the $800 left I owed on the car. Needless to say, I had tons of buyers remorse by the time I got home. The car does run but the transmission made a blackboard-screeching type of noise when it hits over 50mph and the steering wiggles at different speeds. As a kicker, we didn’t have a key to the gas cap so my friend and I were trying to pop it out at 2 in the morning with a big flathead screwdriver and a hammer, just so I can get it gassed up in time for the my 8AM shift.
Well lets see my dumbest purchase would probably have to be the time I went to the Body Shop in a near by mall with my mother. We enjoyed our time together and we stopped in to see what home fragrances they had in store. After seeing the scented oils used for burning. We selected a few scents. I purchased $600 dollars worth of scented oil which happened to be over 100 bottles………We still laugh about it today…..as one of the most ridiculous wastes of money! After getting home with all of it, we unpacked the bags and just laughed… What are we going to do with all this?…….. was the burning question…… not the scented oils.
My dumbest purchase ever? A gym membership that I hardly used over almost 2 years. over a thousand dollars down the tubes.
My dumbest purchase ever was a timeshare. My husband and I placed an offer on a house that we thought had a million to one chance of being accepted. Then we went on vacation. To save $100.00 on tickets to Disneyworld we went to see a timeshare… and bought one. When we got home, we found out we had 19k on a 6 month contract for the timeshare and our offer on the house had been accepted with a caveat. We needed to put an additional 10k down on the house within 6 months. We ended up having to refinance the timeshare over 3 years when we found out there was no escape clause even though we had owned it less than a week so we could use the money toward the house that we really did want. We still own the timeshare… current value 6k. Dumbest Purchase Ever!
There’s a link above to my “dumbest purchase” post (http://hestial.blogspot.com/2008/03/dumbest-purchase-ever.html).
This is a great contest, and it really got me thinking!
DK,
My dumbest purchase had to be the brand new Montero Sport I bought two months out of college. I didn’t realize insurance was going to be so high, like $200/mo. I had to bring the Montero back and lost my down payment of $1000.
PT
My dumbest purchase ever was also a timeshare. My resistance was low after a long sales spiel and I bought it when I couldn’t afford it. The timeshare week is in December at the Outer Banks. I’ve never used the December week. And I still own the stupid thing. Heavy sigh…
My dumbest purchase ever…can we just say I’ve spent and continue to invest considerable chunks of change into my wardrobe/shoe collection? I justify it with the fact that almost everything I buy is on sale or comes from a discount store, but…man, I could have had a lot more in savings by now.
My dumbest purchase would be the 1966 FoMoCo Thunderbird that I bought during a family weekend away in Solvang, Ca.
http://bloggamoney.blogspot.com/2008/03/my-dumbest-purchase-ever.html
Needing money, I rented a booth at an antique mall and took what antiques I had there to sell. No problem selling them, but the rental fee, commission, and truck rental for transporting cost me more than I made. The antiques are gone, and I ended up paying more than I made. Also, some of my things went missing while there. The place went out of business soon after.
My husband bought a Volkswagono GTI when we were dating. He let the insurance lapse and crashed it. We have been paying $500 a month for a car that no longer exists. Stupid thing to let happen, but the worst purchase ever!
My wife purchased a hockey table for $200. It is still in the original packaging as of right now, after nearly four years. Seems she did realise the apartment was too small for such game. We did not even have space for a dinner table. What was she thinking?????
My dumbest purchase ever: five candy/soda vending machines.
I took out $30,000 on a second mortgage to buy the machines, sold them for pennies on the dollar (I think I made roughly $300 per machine when I sold them), then had to bring $1,500 to the closing table when I sold my condo… because the second mortgage put me upside down.
Yep, a $30,000 mistake with a nice little $1,500 “reminder” at the end of it all. Not to mention all the emotional anxiety while I was in the middle of the whole mess.
Ryan
I bought two investment properties back to back. the first one was easy, didnt need any work and we got renters in it immediately.
so on the second, we got lazy and didnt get it inspected. after closing we found out it had flooded and the walls were full of mold.
a total gut, six months of my time and all the money i had and could borrow, was to follow.
advice, never rush anything. pay attention to the details.
Mine would definitely be a $7000 used ski boat 10 years ago.. while I was in college using student loans mind you. Although I used the boat quite a bit.. I could barely afford the maintenance, gas, and docking fees.. THEN… 6 months later an arsonist went on a rampage and burned a trash receptacle, a house, and my boat down in one night.. I didn’t have insurance.. my college buddies bring this up still to the day as the most ridiculous purchase they ever witnessed..
I bought an 1985 Cadillac for about $2000 and paid to give it away for $70. I had more trouble with that car than any other car put together and almost caused a global environmental incident. Read about it here:
http://milkyourmoney.com/2008/03/17/my-dumbest-purchase-ever/
An awful waste of money that I should have used on tuition.
I have a feeling this contest is over but i stilll wanted to share my stupidest purchase ever.
it was a designer bag and wallet, combined i spent about 600 dollars on them and put myself in debt. which made the purchase useless cause i as a result had no money to put in the wallet.
at the time of this purchase i was working at a clothing store and it hink i spent every penny i earned there trying to pay this back.
My most stupid purchase is definetly a Flirting Seminar I took.
The cost was around $28 dollars. I have since learned not to purchase anything online past 2AM. The class was horrible. Everyone else in the class looked as if they had just come from NBC’s To Catch A Preditor.
The contest is probably closed by now but my dumbest purchase was after an accident i had in my Toyota Camry that totally demolished the vehicle (this was 4 years ago). I was so desperate looking for a car because I had a girlfriend, I wanted to go out, and I just couldn’t afford something new. So I perused all the deal sites, forums, newspapers etc, and found a low mileage Mazda 626. I thought Mazda’s were great cars, so I purchased the car 2 weeks later with the help of my parents (broke college student at the time.. still broke, but no more college). Still was slightly under warranty because it was a 1997 and thought it would be this great purchase. Boy, was I wrong. I ended up putting 7 new transmissions in the vehicle (1 a week after I bought it and the only warranty I had left on it, that i later found out, was a paint warranty. The power train warranty ran out in 2000 and 20 miles ago). Definitely this will keep me from ever purchasing a Mazda and/or recommending one. I went to Mazda about this particular problem and even though there are probably over a 100 complaints through the BBB about the transmission that was built in this car, they refused to do anything because the warranty was up.
Well, if my massive debt can attest to anything… the unused gym membership, the new car I really didn’t need and regret now, because I have to keep it since I can’t afford a used one without a loan… which defeats the purpose of buying used… because I have the new car. The LCD and Wii I bought for my ex before he broke up with me (I kept them both…. just didn’t especially want either at the time… and both are on credit cards).
I could go on all day with this…
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