Post the most financially outrageous things you've ever heard of...

[alisonbestford]

So here is a question for all you SAHMs on the board. Do YOU have life insurance? NOT on DH, but on YOU? If something happens to you, who is going to do what you do? I have a male friend who lost his wife to cancer. It has been a financial struggle since "we don't need life insurance on Suzy" (Name changed to protect the innocent) Well, now it's a one man shop and some of the things Suzy did for "free" have to be paid for. Things like child care????

I have life insurance 'coming out of my ears' but, DH who was diagnosed with a, now terminal, brain tumour 15 years ago (before we met, married and had 8 year old DD) has nothing

I've been unable to work for the last 7 years as a result of his ill health so we have little in the way of savings but are fortunate enough to have cleared our cc debt and only owe a little over £1000 on the mortgage

I guess we could have more in the way of savings if we didn't take holidays and were more frugal with food etc but then we'd be barely existing.
I'm lucky in that I'm a qualified nurse so am hoping to be able to return to work which fits in with school

 

[Mono~rail]

Stupid is as stupid does.

25 years ago, a friend of my at the time boyfriend was a professional poker player. He supported his wife and two kids in a nice middle-class suburban neighborhood, they had savings college funds, etc. She worked as a school nurse to get their health insurance.

The husband didn't particularly enjoy playing poker, he was just good at it. It was a job to him. The nice thing was that he "worked" four days a month and was home with his kids the rest of the time.

I think the key is that he considered it a job, and was realistic about it. When he wasn't winning, he just walked away and tried again later.

Anne

Yes, some people can make a living out of it, but those people are few and far between. For every person who is successful, there are probably 1,000 more who are not.

That's fine if a person wants to do that and bankrolls their "career" with their own money. I would be highly suspect of some guy that I had just started dating asking me to finance his bankroll so he could quit his job and be a professional poker player. I have a feeling this new relationship will end disastrously for my friends' friend.

I don't really know the person or her new boyfriend. My good friend and her SILs are all very close friends with her. From what I know of the friend, this isn't typical behavior for her.

 

[rigs32]

A classmate went right from undergrad to law school. She had two small kids, so single mom grants reduced the amount of student loans she needed, but her BF (the kids' dad) was on disability, so she did rack up a fair amount.

After accepting a legal aid job, she was telling me about the car she wanted to buy - brand new with a sticker price higher than her salary. I tried to explain why that wouldn't be a good idea. I told her to go to the library and recommended a book on basic financial planning. She looked at me funy and said she didn't have a library card because libraries are for kids. I shook my head and gave up after that.

 

[ducklite]

Yes, some people can make a living out of it, but those people are few and far between. For every person who is successful, there are probably 1,000 more who are not.

That's fine if a person wants to do that and bankrolls their "career" with their own money. I would be highly suspect of some guy that I had just started dating asking me to finance his bankroll so he could quit his job and be a professional poker player. I have a feeling this new relationship will end disastrously for my friends' friend.

I don't really know the person or her new boyfriend. My good friend and her SILs are all very close friends with her. From what I know of the friend, this isn't typical behavior for her.

Oh, I agree with you 100%! I'd say you're being ultra-generous with your thinking that one in 1000 can make a living at it. I think she's foolish for giving him money. Generally people who gamble for a living have been playing for a long time and the smart ones don't quit their day jobs until they've got major savings. The people I knew had put three years living expenses in the bank (not including retirement and college funds) and he had a bankroll to start with on top of that. He had taken a three month leave from his day job, so he had an out if it didn't work. He extended his leave to six months, then a year. After the year he was making more gambling than he had been at the day job. In their case it was a very calculated risk--the same way he played cards.

I'd say there are one in 100,000 who can do that.

And if I had ever had a boyfriend that hit me up for money, he would ahve quickly been an ex-boyfriend.

Anne

 

[bumbershoot]

The husband didn't particularly enjoy playing poker, he was just good at it. It was a job to him. The nice thing was that he "worked" four days a month and was home with his kids the rest of the time.

I think the key is that he considered it a job, and was realistic about it. When he wasn't winning, he just walked away and tried again later.

DH could absolutely do that for a living. He really doesn't enjoy the game, but he can play and read the other players, and whenever he has had the opportunity to play since I've known him, he has won. But he wouldn't just quit his job, move to Vegas, and expect to win a million!

His wife refuses to give up her "lifestyle". I don't even comment anymore.

For anyone who read about my FIL and MIL on page 3, that sounds like my MIL. There's no excuse for FIL's actions throughout his life; a better man would have done differently.

However, my MIL is a dragon. Back in the 60s or 70s (they have always been VERY vague on their timeline, and with her re-makes of her age, along with confusion of her Korean birth certificate of considering a baby to be 1 year at birth AND being born rurally and getting a delayed b.c., plus confusion about when they got married compared to when her first son was born (she was pregnant with another man's baby when they married)...and then found out he was already married so had to REmarry later on but no one will use actual YEARS to describe things.....it's very confusing), he had had an affair, and so she felt she needed jewelry. She picked out a $500 pearl ring at the jewelers, and he went off to buy it. Of course, she either misunderstood or flat-out lied, and it was 5K. 30 or 40 years ago. But her personality is such that, since he had promised her that ring, he really needed to get THAT ring. So he did, and then had to do hinky things to pay for it afterwards.

Her entire jewelry collection is made up of guilt pieces like that. She went DH's whole life telling him that gold and precious stones were an investment, that they will increase in value and it's important to have it....she could sell ONE ring and pay the IRS, but suddenly now it's "all I have left of your father"... (thinking back on that IRS tip thing....oh gosh no I can't do that...it was a phone call I initiated with the IRS that found out he hadn't filed in that long, so I"m already "blamed" for this junk, let alone cause her MORE trouble)

We think a big reason for not paying estimated taxes on his big income was because it would take away from take-home, which would show "failure" to her. Meanwhile, of course, she was *stealing* money from him by hiding it away (and then gave it to her son's partner who truly stole it)...so they both contributed to the lifelong money problems....all while lying to their children about EVERYTHING.


Sorry to go on.

 

[barbeml]

I'll post one then go back and read all the horror stories!

Friend, single. Two years ago, she got fired (for maybe the fifth time..she does not like to work). Had 24 active credit cards and no savings. Close to upside down on her mortgage. While unemployed, somehow got a new car loan. New car loan had remnants of two previous car loans in it (she gets "bored" with each "must have it now" car after about two years). At the same time, she flew to London for a week for a Xena Warrior Princess convention.

Present day and another firing later, she still has nothing in the bank or saved for retirement, took out a home equity loan to re-do her kitchen (she NEVER cooks) has purchased yet another new car and had the nerve (or psychosis) to ask us to pay for half of the pool she wants to put in.

Oh, she's now working as a financial advisor.

 

[WatchinCaptKangaroo]

I have a friend who got off to a fairly rough start in early adulthood.

Her and her now husband finally planted some roots about 5 years ago. They live in a fairly affordable area. They declared bankruptcy 2 years ago. Here's why: she job hops from part time minimum wage job to minimum wage job. While he was unemployed (no fault of his own and he was looking) they bought a big screen TV, every video game system out there (and games to go with), the latest and greatest cell phone (extending their insane contracts to begin with). They have 5 cars (3 of which don't run, 1 of which barely runs) for 2 adults. For xmas she bought him some sort of dvd/tv for his car when they could barely afford food and diapers for their baby. Her reasoning was he was going to buy it anyways. He was employed with a great full time job with awesome benefits but left it to drive limos for a little over minimum wage + tips. No insurance.

I don't always make the best financial decisions but I couldn't take hearing her complain about being to broke come out my way (I always drive out her way) in one breath and then talking about the latest toy they bought. I hardly talk to her anymore.

This thread reminds me - I should go dig up the financial thread I started last year and update it. I did good!

 

[bookgirl]

Yes, some people can make a living out of it, but those people are few and far between. For every person who is successful, there are probably 1,000 more who are not.

That's fine if a person wants to do that and bankrolls their "career" with their own money. I would be highly suspect of some guy that I had just started dating asking me to finance his bankroll so he could quit his job and be a professional poker player. I have a feeling this new relationship will end disastrously for my friends' friend.

I don't really know the person or her new boyfriend. My good friend and her SILs are all very close friends with her. From what I know of the friend, this isn't typical behavior for her.

One of the guys in the World Series of Poker last year or year before, his wife told him if he wanted to try to become a professional that was fine but he could not touch household money to do it. This guy saved all his pocket/extra money and picked up cans to bankroll his early starter games. As he won he banked it for bigger games, as he lost he hit the road again and picked up more cans. He built on it, winning small games, banking and getting his buy in for larger games till he got his 10,000 for the series. I also believe while he was doing this he was the stay at home caretaker for their daughter. That's what I call supporting your husbands dream while still living in the real world.

 

[bookgirl]

Present day and another firing later, she still has nothing in the bank or saved for retirement, took out a home equity loan to re-do her kitchen (she NEVER cooks) has purchased yet another new car and had the nerve (or psychosis) to ask us to pay for half of the pool she wants to put in.

Why would she ask you to pay half? I'd put that one down to psychosis unless she thought you might be using and was going to charge you pre pay rent.

 

[RayJay]

Didn't everyone see the videos of people buying the $500 Iphones?

Most of them were kids, 18 to 25 range. I never had $500 to burn
on something like that! How did they do it? Credit Cards........

I'm not saying everyone did that, but c'mon I make good money and
$500 bucks is still alot to me.

Peace
RayJay

 

[samanthacatangel]

So here is a question for all you SAHMs on the board. Do YOU have life insurance? NOT on DH, but on YOU? If something happens to you, who is going to do what you do? I have a male friend who lost his wife to cancer. It has been a financial struggle since "we don't need life insurance on Suzy" (Name changed to protect the innocent) Well, now it's a one man shop and some of the things Suzy did for "free" have to be paid for. Things like child care????

Since I left my teaching position 5 years ago, we increased our life insurance on both of us - and we are insured equally. We decided we would need enough to allow the other to continue to stay home until DD was school age. Hard to believe she will be in kindergarten in September. still keeping the insurance up on both of us, and I finished my Master's in ed to make sure I continued to be employable in case something happens to DH.

Not fun to think about, but a necessary evil.

Samantha

 

[samanthacatangel]

Didn't everyone see the videos of people buying the $500 Iphones?

Most of them were kids, 18 to 25 range. I never had $500 to burn
on something like that! How did they do it? Credit Cards........

I'm not saying everyone did that, but c'mon I make good money and
$500 bucks is still alot to me.

Peace
RayJay

On the front page of our local paper, there was a guy who bought ten of them! Since he was only "allowed" to purchase 2, he brought his 2 (young) daughters, his mom, etc to allow him to complete the purchase. He bought them for "gifts"

They said he spent $7000!

 

[ellyn2000]

I heard one today. DS's sister in law and her husband have a small house they purchased 10 years ago when they married. It was a fixer upper and they made it into a nice home, but she's always wanted the dream house. He was well employed, but has been through 2 lay offs. Haven't been able to have children yet. They just got custody of his young son from previous relationship after much costly litigation. So how do they celebrate? They buy a Ford Excursion V-10. It cost more than $120. to fill up and they intend to use it for vacation traveling so they'll have more room for the one child. The payments would have afforded them a much nicer house and they kept the 2 cars they already had. My spending causes me to have to stop and think regularly but this was the silliest thing I ever heard with the cost of fuel going up daily.

 

[runwad]

I guess I lead a very sheltered life. I know noone like any of these people in all these stories you guys are telling. Not my family, not friends, not even the neighbors...I guess I'm really lucky uh? Its so unbelievable to me sometimes that this kinda stuff goes on in the world.

 

[barbeml]

Why would she ask you to pay half? I'd put that one down to psychosis unless she thought you might be using and was going to charge you pre pay rent.

She's nuts. She said we could use it anytime (right, she lives miles away) and she might be able to pay us back "in a couple of years."

 

[mumom95]

On the front page of our local paper, there was a guy who bought ten of them! Since he was only "allowed" to purchase 2, he brought his 2 (young) daughters, his mom, etc to allow him to complete the purchase. He bought them for "gifts"

They said he spent $7000!

He's probably going to sell them on ebay.

 

[tinatark]

I just heard of one last night that broke my heart.

The cousin of a friend's husband died last week suddenly - a heart attack at age 45. He wasn't overweight, ate well and exercised and it was a shock to everyone.

He lingered for several days and then died, leaving behind a wife and three young children. What he didn't leave behind was life insurance other than the 1X salary coverage provided by his employer. There is a small retirement fund and mortgage insurance - so the house will be paid for but virtually nothing else. His wife hasn't worked in nine years and now has only slightly more than their annual income with which to raise her three children.

I swear, I could weep.

The wife will have the house paid for, the insurance payout and social security benefits for the children and herself. The kids will be paid until they're 18 or out of school, she will get payments until the kids stop, or she gets married. Here (TN), children getting SS death benefits are also eligible for TennCare (health insurance, pays for everything).

So, yes, it is bad, but not as bad as you think, financially.

 

[Coll0610]

I had a friend in high school and college (We'll call him Freddy) whose family didn't have much money. His parents were divorced. His dad was a drunk who didn't give them any money. His mom owned a business cleaning offices.

He lived at home while we went to junior college and got lots of financial aid, so his tuition, fees, books were paid and he even got cash on top of that for his other expenses. He actually told me that the government owed him because he came from a "broken home".

He only worked when he needed money for something. For example, he needed money to insure his car and buy gas. After he'd earned enough to pay for that and save a little for gas, he quit that job. He would go months between haircuts (getting it cut really short and then letting grow for months) because he didn't have the money. When the muffler fell off his car, he got a job until he'd saved up enough money to pay for a new exhaust and then he quit. He must have worked 5 different jobs in 2 years.

We flew to Nashville to visit another friend. While we were there, Freddy spent every penny he had on some clothes he really wanted. Then when it was time to leave, our friends said we'd stop for sandwiches on the way to the airport. Freddy said he'd have to make a pb&j because he didn't have the money to buy food. The kicker was after our flight. His mom was supposed to pick us up (my dad had dropped us off) and we didn't see her when we got off the plane. He went to call her on a pay phone and had to BORROW A QUARTER. I remember thinking that if his mom didn't come, I was taking a cab and leaving him in the airport.

I haven't talked to him in years, but I heard he's living with his girlfriend and their kids. I wonder if he ever got a job.

 

[DisneyDarling89]

Didn't everyone see the videos of people buying the $500 Iphones?

Most of them were kids, 18 to 25 range. I never had $500 to burn
on something like that! How did they do it? Credit Cards........

I'm not saying everyone did that, but c'mon I make good money and
$500 bucks is still alot to me.

Peace
RayJay

Thats a 1/5 of a friends weekly paycheck. So at that age some can afford it.

 

[purplegirl247]

I have a friend who does outrageous financial things constantly! She and her husband make more than DH and me, but are always somehow struggling. Let's see...

*For two years she didn't put any money into her company 401k (even though they match 120% of 6% of your salary) because she "seriously had no extra cash to spare." I told her that it was before taxes and would likely not affect her that much, but to no avail.

*Had two cats that they could barely afford to keep up with (food, litter, vet appointments, they kept getting sick, etc.) and before I know it, she has a third "because it was so cute I couldn't resist." In the meantime, they've racked up hundreds of dollars on their credit cards because they didn't get him checked out in advance and he had worms, which required lots of treatment.

*Speaking of credit cards, since I've known them (going on five years), they've been dealing with the husband's cc debt, which constantly hovers around $10-15k. When I ask why it hasn't ever gone below $10k, she isn't really sure. Except that he just had to buy a Wii from eBay at FIVE HUNDRED DOLLARS (twice what it's worth), along with all the accessories. And when they got married, they put the week-long extravagant honeymoon to CA on their credit card. And she shops constantly with her cards to "improve" her wardrove. Gee, I wonder why it never goes down.

*They're constantly going out to eat. Like 7 times a week at least. When I took a look at their budget for them (at their request), I enthusiastically told them this was an area they could really save on. Well, a few months later she reported that eating at home hadn't helped much. I was stunned. How is that possible? Apparently they didn't really "like" eating at home, so they stocked up on outrageous, expensive brand-name frozen meals, snacks, etc. (none on sale, of course) every week, so that on a whim, they could have whatever their little hearts desired.

*They were going to move to Tennessee because it's cheaper, her parents are there (to mooch off of, I suppose), and she "just doesn't like it here anymore." Before they even finalized their moving plans, she stocked up on winter clothes because "it just doesn't get cold here in Florida." Well, guess what, in the end, they decided to stay here and now have an entire CLOSET full of clothes they may never wear. *sighs*

Now they want to buy a house . But she doesn't want a starter house, make equity, and move up step by step. They want their first home to be GORGEOUS, with all the amenities, yet don't have a savings plan to make a down payment on this mystery house. She keeps saying "the money will come from somewhere". Arrrggh!