What is your worst and most expensive financial mistake?

[HorseHeist]

Long time ago now, but mine was in my early twenties. Managed to buy two very unsuitable horses in succession over a short period of time They must have cost me thousands, to deal with the subsequent mess. Which was a lot of money going back almost a couple of decades.

I keep wondering if I'd put that money in a pension, what would it be worth now? I would have been off to a great start pension wise at an early age.

What stupid financial decision did you make, that sticks with you years later?

@HorseHeist I did the same. Got totally burnt buying an unsuitable pony for my daughter after the seller lied through their teeth. Lost thousands

Marriage. Never again.

My mother - trying to get her to like me by bankrolling her fecklessness.
Wish it had been horses!

Selling a house in 2011 which is now worth more than double, to go and build house on DP`s family land, but not actually owning the house due to lack of proper family discussion beforehand..

Lending money to a gambler. But he owed his boss £7000, I only lent £200, of course I never got it back, so it could’ve been worse. I come from a financial career family, so I’m a right miser 😂

Marrying a financially abusive narc twat. Divorcing said FANT.

Drawing down some of my.private pension when i was 55 and getting stung for tax as it took me over the threshold for that financial year

Falling for the sales pitch and buying a timeshare

A pony which I bought for my then 7 year old. It was completely nuts and I found out later,had bronked competent teenagers off. I ended up giving it away as I was too honest to sell it to someone else's child.£1800 down the drain.
Although to be fair,I have been given some fabulous horses and ponies since,so it probably evens out. Although I still bear a grudge against the seller who sold a pony with a known vice for a tiny child.

I dropped some hours at work but my (large) employer didn’t drop my pay. Initially I thought it would just be a delay but then months later I was still receiving the pay. I felt so uneasy but also afraid to raise it. Not sure why! I was young, and the longer it went on the more scared I was. I also told loads of my colleagues, I think hoping someone would tell me to confess but everyone was congratulating me and saying it was better in my pocket than employers’.

Of course in the end, it came to light, I had to lie and pretend I didn’t know and narrowly avoided a full disciplinary. It was about 2yr and I had to slowly repay the money which was about £5k by then. So stressful. Dishonesty doesn’t pay!

Turning down a job offer for a big well known international company. At the time I was put off by the commute in relation to the salary, so I choose to stay at my job to have a work life balance.

I was made redundant six months later and had to take an awful job for crap pay before finding something better a year later. If I'd take the job offer, who knows, I may have worked up in the company and avoided the trauma of the redundancy.

Being a writer!

Oh and I should also add, going to university. No one cares about my degree, employers have only cared about the training course I did after which cost a fraction of the price. 90% of degrees are just not useful.

A house on a 110% interest only Mortgage in 2007 which soon became worth even less than I paid for never mind the mortgage amount.

Stuck it out for 15 years and that same house finally gave me £60k equity when I sold.

So whilst I lost a hell of a lot of money I always days I couldn't have rented for less and renting would have ever been fruitful.

So both my worst and best due to the timing of each.

A few...

A horse
A credit card mess
A £300 gazebo that dh told me not to put up as it was too windy. Was in the skip within hours...

Choosing the wrong career

Marrying the wrong man

The opposite to many others, not getting married to the man I’d lived and worked with for twenty years. Then he died without a will…

Marrying a man with no financial sense!

Interesting thread!
I always regret frittering away my student loans on clothes and other rubbish, graduating with a maxed out overdraft and taking ages to get out of it when earning in my first proper job!

Turning down a fellow student at University (he married his subsequent girlfriend). He has a very high profile job and earned £10 million last year. Don't regret it though - my main joy in life is bargain-hunting 😂

Letting DH push certain decisions - he's laid back until he really wants something then pushes/discounts all my ideas until he gets it.

I let him do primary management of our finances until a few years ago. Realised he was ignoring them except to do minimum maintenance. I took them over, have almost paid off our house in 7 years.

Let him push me into building, and this horrible block. Cost & build time blew out. If we'd bought where I wanted to live house would be worth double the price. House still barely worth what it cost to build 10 years ago & block maintenance a pain. He whines about it too and wants to pay someone else to do it! Not happening.

Letting him do speccy investing. Lost 10k in a month.

Really I should have stuck up for myself & been brutal & kept control of everything. Then we'd be debt free & plenty of good investments by now.

Marriage. The wedding cost me about £2k, the divorce cost me nearly £40k 😩

I had the same mortgage. Split up with partner and he signed it over to me. I thought he’d done me a favour, but I couldn’t sell it after 10 years due to negative equity. Had to rent it out and then pay a fortune to repair damages when renter moved out. Sold it as a loss, I was very lucky to get another mortgage. The relationship and house are big regrets

I bought an item for a hobby, it cost 1k, it’s never had the use it should have . Resell value would be about 300 max.