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If you had to take a wild guess, how much money do you think you might have wasted over the course of your lifetime?
I'll go first: A LOT, such as:
* Stuff I bought by mistake
* Stuff I bought and didn't use
* Groceries thrown out after going bad
* Bad restaurant meals that you couldn't eat
* Dentist upcharges for work you really didn't want or need
* Books that haven't been read
* Pet supplies never used
* Essentials for relatives that went to waste or were not utilized properly
* Bad plays and live music venues that you didn't enjoy
* Paying "experts" for negligible or bad advice
* Not renewing CDs at best rates (letting them roll over into paltry rates)
* Gifts for people that weren't used (probably donated or sold)
* Tax write-offs that weren't taken out of ignorance of yourself or tax advisor
* Money lost on pyramid scheme (young and had no idea what they were - back in 1970's)
* Working for less than market value
* Buying crap of one kind or another
* Useless collections (dolls, whatever)
* Not shopping for best deals on just about anything (airline tickets, etc.)
* Paying for other people's living expenses (rental deposits, rent, clothes, toiletries, etc.)
* "Special" coffee drinks
* Beauty supplies, creams, lotions that are still in your medicine cabinets
* Supplements that you have to throw out because they've expired
* Canned and boxed foods that you have to recycle because they've expired
* Single use water bottles, half used
* Late fees accrued when you could have paid on time, but forgot
* Cable TV fee that is outrageous but you don't know how to get same services for less
etc., etc.
Everyone's list will be different. Some won't have much of a list, some will have more big ticket items that were not necessary and you have regrets about.
Ha ha we did a downsize our house clutter this past summer. I filled a 15 foot dumpster with at least $10k worth of stuff. One big item in the pile that went was a enhanced definition tv (plasma) that I paid $5k brand new. It still worked but was as heavy as a hippo. I have done similar to that a few times over the years. I always felt like I kept the economy going singlehandedly.
Excluding money I have spent on my kids and family gifts, I define "wasted" as spending money for something that I didn't use or didn't appreciate as much as I thought I would. My guess is probably only an average of about $200 a year since the age of 30 -- so about $7,000.00 -- or about $10,000 if you include wine that we didn't like Before age 30, money was usually too tight for me to spend money on anything I didn't need or didn't know that I would like.
However, if you count the money we wasted on our two kids that they either didn't use or didn't appreciate -- oh, about $100,000, easily.
P.S. On Edit After Reading Other Posts -- Oh, I forgot about our Maine house that we ended up hating and couldn't sell during the 2008-09 crisis. THAT was another $100,000 or so totally wasted. (It was actually more than that, but I subtracted what we would have paid in rent.)
And, oh, yeah -- the time share. We probably wasted $20,000 on that.
You know, I bought a "charming" old farm house in 1993 and took on a 35 mile commute when I could have kept my apartment with its 1 mile commute. I've sunk a lot into this old Money Pit but I also got married here and raised two fine sons who got to grow up in the country.
I could have saved a lot on commuting expenses, upgrades and repairs by living in an apartment for the last 3 decades but when all is said & done it wasn't really a waste of money.
Now, someone else mentioned a timeshare. I bought one of those when I was in my 20's for $10k and sold it 9 years later for $1k and I consider myself lucky to be rid of it!
You know, I bought a "charming" old farm house in 1993 and took on a 35 mile commute when I could have kept my apartment with its 1 mile commute. I've sunk a lot into this old Money Pit but I also got married here and raised two fine sons who got to grow up in the country.
I could have saved a lot on commuting expenses, upgrades and repairs by living in an apartment for the last 3 decades but when all is said & done it wasn't really a waste of money.
Now, someone else mentioned a timeshare. I bought one of those when I was in my 20's for $10k and sold it 9 years later for $1k and I consider myself lucky to be rid of it!
I didn't read all of these but yeah I spent $10k for a timeshare on Cape Cod. We used it twice. When we got the maintenance bill and it was as expensive as it would be to rent a hotel room on the cape we told them they could keep it. Never sent a dime and they could keep the entire thing. Thanks for that reminder.
One is reminded of those smarmy self-help books claiming that by canceling the newspaper subscription and brewing our coffee at home, we'll after a few decades amass millions. Or alternatively, that the difference between poverty and wealth is the minor recurring indulgences. Utter nonsense!
The real waste is on blunders and missed opportunities. Blunders, already mentioned in this thread, are marrying the wrong person and/or sustaining a costly divorce. Or malinvestment, such as sinking a large chunk into a private-equity deal that completely fails. Or buying at house in a bad neighborhood, at the top of the market, and watching one's "investment" melt over the decades.
I haven't wasted a lot of money in my lifetime. But, I lost a big chunk on an investment. Ouch.
My marriage turned out to be an opportunity cost situation. But, as much as he killed me emotionally we were kind to each other financially (no problems, we agreed and I had an attorney write if up for $1,000 and he signed and handed over whatever funds were due me). I had a good lawyer (who I was recommended to my by my boss (who reportedly skulked around for years with her boxes of records on her ex). In other words, I guess I got to ride on her coat tails with her good attorney on that one. Attorney told me it's not worth fighting and it boils down to an agreement. But, I can't take credit because my Ex had apparently gotten similar advice somewhere and he sat down with me with a legal pad and wrote down what he was willing to do. I took it to my attorney and she tweaked it with two or three small items and I called him and told him to go to her office and sign and he did (but, that was ridiculously simple compared to the way I was emotionally destroyed for years).
I clued in early, early on in my young adulthood that a hole in our budget was buying music. So, we never bought much music or movies. I finally bought some movies when Blu Ray came out in full force like around 2010ish.. I have the Top 100 Movies sliced and diced several ways. I just bought a boatload of books I intend to read between now and death (but, I don't consider that a waste at all (unless I die before I read then, but, then someone else will get the use so it's not wasted). So, I guess if you call all the cell phones and laptops as technology was coming of age a waste then okay. If I make a mistake on a purchase it goes to a Thrift store that recovers money to invest in animal rescue (so, mistakes don't bother me to much, but, at my age I don't make a lot of mistakes on simple things).
When I look at your list my focus of wasting was extremely narrowed down.
I didn't read all of these but yeah I spent $10k for a timeshare on Cape Cod. We used it twice. When we got the maintenance bill and it was as expensive as it would be to rent a hotel room on the cape we told them they could keep it. Never sent a dime and they could keep the entire thing. Thanks for that reminder.
My folks got a timeshare in the '80s also. It was for a condo in the Poconos. I tried hard to understand this since neither of them ever had the slightest interest in spending any time "out in the country", their idea of fun was going to clubs with a band & dancing & drinks, not sitting out on a porch listening to loons at night.
A few years later it went bust, they only used it once or twice & lost whatever money they had put into it. Decades later after I had done a "unclaimed funds" type search there was $100 I was able to get for my mother from some earlier court settlement. It seems like it was an organized crime money-laundering type situation.
What's wasteful to one person can be a thrill for another.
I've never been big into cars or motorsports. To me, cars are an appliance to get from A to B. I want some level of comfort and reliability, but beyond that, I don't really care. I know a lot of folks who spend tons of time and money on cars.
The headphones are a big spend item for me because I use them a lot. I'm in front of my iMac at least eight hours a day, five days a week. I want a good computer given how much I use it.
I am the same with cars. They are transportation to me. I am driving a 2010 Corolla with 153K miles on it. I bought it used in 2012 after the Sandy storm took out a bridge over water on my train line, and I had to drive to work. Then I started traveling to Canada regularly, and hey, the thing is good on gas.
Recently I was invited to the home of my S.O.'s sister for a cooking activity, and she said "if you need a ride, it can be arranged". Made me scratch my head--why would I need a ride to her home half an hour away? Then I realized that since they are well off and drive late-model big SUVs, she was probably questioning the integrity of my poor old Toyota. Lol.
I want to hit 200k before I buy another vehicle, just because. But I can afford one.
By the way, I once calculated that quitting smoking bought me that car. So earlier in life, I wasted money smoking what could have been better cars!
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