To think STFU about people who complain about having no money but then buy stupid shit

[Hubb]

It's not my business what people want to spend their money on of course, but when trying to be a good friend and offer support I just get fed up of hearing the same story over and over!

No money for essentials like food/electric some weeks but randomly take up expensive hobbies, go through phases of eating out.

Anyone else got a friend like this? Anyone like this? (ie crap at budgeting and moaning continuously to everyone, dropping hints for money etc)

Suppose it's like the friend that moans about the shit boyfriend but always forgives them, or someone who is having a hard time at work but won't do anything about it..

Do good friends just roll with it? AIBU?

Pisses me off no end in work (am a Secondary school teacher) when kids come in with no pens, not to mention pencil cases. They've ALL got expensive smart phones but no fecking pens. I spend £40 every term on pens and they all fritter away. WTF is wrong with parents who send their kids to school with expensive phones but no bloody school equipment?!

Rant over.

" I have no comprehension how she cannot see that being a SAHM to children who are at school all day, living a mile from the school, wanting to lose weight and wanting to spend less on petrol gives her the time, opportunity and motive to walk to school - can anyone explain why on earth this candidate would drive???"
it took me decades to see for myself and therefore believe that eating less and walking more led to weight loss. sounds stupid but before then it was a leap of faith

Actually mine is a relative and I am frustrated rather than judgy.
It's not only her who is suffering from her odd choices. I would never say anything in real life. I posted on an anonymous forum.
I give her money to try and help. It's just frustrating and baffling when she spends it on stuff instead of securing her home.

No, I know Pag, I didn't really mean you.

It's just some of the sneering on here is pretty horrible to read, as while I am NOT like the cases described I have an understanding about it - I suppose a bit like how someone who looks forward to a glass or two of wine at the end of the day has an understanding as to how someone might fall into alcoholism (that isn't my vice; I'm pretty much teetotal!)

I can honestly understand it - not condone, CERTAINLY not encourage the borrowing money from others which I disapprove of strongly especially when not paid back - but I can understand how it happens.

Its aaall about perspective!
Each to their own

People have different priorities or, never learned how to budget if they didnt have pocket money etc I think. I have a friend on a very low income who spends £30 a week on womens magazines then penny pinches on food. She insists the magazines are non negotiable. Another married couple i know have every gadget known to man, but again, skimp on food. I do get tired of those same friends who criticise me for saving up for nice furniture etc but i saved up and nice stuff for my home is my thing, not gadgets or womens magazines full of unobtainable lifestyle stuff.

I can stretch a low income because i had pocket money to teach me about saving and budgeting. I also will get second hand til i can upgrade to new: my reconditioned laptop was 100 quid & is still ok i prob wont get brand new after all. Technology isnt a priority to me. Budgeting should be part of a life skills and emotional intelligence component of the curriculum.

These threads all go the same, sneery way.

This comes down to the need to educate from a young age on the workings of budget and finance as well as the inside knowledge of how sales and marketing is designed to extract money from people. I was almost thirty before I randomly sat down with a mortgage statement and realised just how much I was being fleeced for if I kept my payments at the set rate. Luckily we now have access to all the information we need on the web, the trick is now to realise it and get the motivation. I bloody love MSE and wish everyone would realise how important that sort of info is!

I know lots of people who redecorate frequently, catalogue shop, have subscriptions to sky, amazon prime etc but struggle month to month and cannot afford to overpay the mortgage and it frustrates me but that is their business. I learned the hard way so now save up to splurge so they think I am the nutty one buying unnecessary expensive stuff! What frustrates me more is the way big business manipulates people by messing with their self esteem to eke every penny they don't have out of their pockets.

This comes down to the need to educate from a young age on the workings of budget and finance as well as the inside knowledge of how sales and marketing is designed to extract money from people

true, but the system would fall apart..... it's not in the interests of large corporations to have us all clued up about the myriad ways that we are duped and exploited

good, top down economics isn't working, time for a paradigm shift!

well ya just never know what might happen really now do ya!

I propose a MN/MSE association education campaign!

When I was a student 20+ years ago, I had a part-time job in a pub.

I encountered many skint people in said pub. I knew they were skint because they told me so repeatedly while drinking their beer and smoking their cigarettes.

Four pints of beer and packet of fags per day added up to £50 per week in those days. It would be at least twice that in today's money. No wonder they were skint.

They thought me a lesson I have never forgotten, though.

MSE is very good but, you can take a horse to water....

will the people who appear to have most to gain from spending time on such a site actually take the time to read it?

isnt the problem fundamentally one of lack of impulse control, the inability to resist the urge to spend money on things that take your fancy?

we've all heard of the marshmallow test, the little kids who resisted the one marshmallow now so that they could have 2 later grew up (so the story goes) to do better in adult life.

Conscientiousness is regarded by many as a stable personality train, it's the 'C' in OCEAN

I have several relatives and friends who are like this. It used to really annoy me - they'd post photos on FB of their latest frivolous purchases, then whine about not being able to afford to pay some fairly essential bills! Some of them have pretty good jobs too. They don't ask me for money though and I'd never consider lending/giving - perhaps they already know that, which is why they don't ask!

I've been disadvantaged in various ways and sometimes not able to earn nearly as much, but I've always been shrewd with money (and a big fan of MSE!). I've tried to share some of my tips with them - both old-style housekeeping moneysaving and investment tips - but they're always quite sneery about it. Now I just relax in the knowledge that I'm financially secure with my own house and a good pension behind me (at the expense of lots of daily luxuries) and they're sleepwalking into a bit of a financial timebomb. Some of them have already hit crisis point, you just have to bide your time and watch it happen, like a slow car crash.

Someone I know who has a well paid job, but over spent on stuff like holidays, tattoos and various other non essentials.
Then asked her dad to lend her £4000 to pay off her debts.
He said NO.
I thought good for you. This bank of Mum and Dad rubbish really annoys me. She's 32 btw.

We will help our DC with emergencies and buy some nice things for their big birthdays/weddings etc. But paying off debts from buying random crap- no chance. Hopefully the messages we've already conveyed to ours will stop them being so silly.

Some regard being cautious, frugal and planning ahead as deeply boring.
They enjoy being spontaneous and living for the moment.
I totally get that, really I do, I support their right to live life on their own terms.
But don't be surprised when you reap what you sow, don't expect ms conscientious to pick up the pieces?.
If you blow all your wages don't expect to benefit from the fact that I carefully saved mine.

The careful people may help at first, thinking that you will take a leaf out of their book.
But when they see that you want to have your cake and then eat their cake, well you may just find yourself up the creek and sans paddle ?
?

expat I don't think that's fair.

Most people are complaining about family or close friends, who are not skint and just getting on with it, but expecting to borrow money, criticising people who don't fritter for what they do spend. And so on.

If I'm sitting there at my SIL's kitchen table while she discussing what car she is buying for her 18 year old (who can't drive btw!), and how much the monthly livery is for her horse, while opening a huge pile of parcels from Boden and other places - and she is telling me how lucky I am to have been on the holiday i've just got back from, then I think I have the right to be annoyed.

Alibab, Your SIL is playing fast and loose
She wants to big herself up with status symbols whilst simultaneously scoring 'pity poor me' points

The two strategies are incompatible but she's too dumb to realize, or not cunning enough to pull it off?

I've got a friend like this, buying Charlotte tilbury make up every other week and bragging on Instagram, new kurt Geiger shoes, foreign travel, wardrobe full of designer clothes and shoes . .. Then constantly moaning she has to work so much just to keep a roof over her kids head! Sponging of family who are oblivious to her expensive habits

Ah thank fook it's not just me that has one if these 'friends'.

Friend of mine always plays the victim, can't afford the rent, can't afford this, that or the other. She and her partner are in dire times, have 3 kids an have had bailiffs knocking on the door.

Yet they have to have virgin media with all the schizzle that goes with it (they previously had sky), and she spends money on shit like there is no tomorrow. Has her hair done properly every month, new clothes all the time, she spends her life popping into town, and she constantly complains of 'needing' nights out when she has at least 2 a month (I might sound jealous but I'm lucky if I get two a year).

She's always complaining how shit her life is etc etc and I've given her advice over a number of years as positive things she could do to help her current situation. She does nothing!!

It's none of my beeswax but if I was her dp - the one who went out to work everyday whilst she stayed home and did nowt I'd seriously be asking where all the money is going. To top it all she was on such hard times she took out one of those extortionate pay day loans with whopping interest rates... And the money 70/30 with a friend of hers.

Words fail me.

Split*

Had an ex friend who hinted at needing money for her kids birthday party and kept going out. I always paid for everyone to eat and drink if we met up. Wasn't that close to her and got fed up of feeling used that I started making excuses or ensuring I was busy when she wanted to meet up.

Common theme here where people will buy other crap and forgo good food. This especially pisses me off when children are involved.

BigRed we're the opposite, we spend far too much on good food!