What was your biggest financial mistake?

[QuickNameChange22]

Was watching an interesting video on YouTube of people talking about their biggest financial mistake and thought I'd be nosy and ask 😁

Mine (aside from having kids 😂) was either:

Taking a credit card out ",for emergencies". It's just amazing what I justified to myself as an emergency when I had that card!

And also taking out a student bank account with a £1.5k overdraft and thinking it was basically free money. Cue the next 4 years of constantly living in my overdraft, my wage not even half clearing it before I spent it to the limit again before the next payday. Sometimes I wish I could go back and give my idiot self a bloody shake.

I was born 1956 got mine at 66 I think? I was a WASPIE so had been expecting it at 60...

Mine was not realising the difference between buying a house in Scotland and one in England. At the time I didn't know that it was possible to offer less for a new build in England, because in Scotland, my experience (of 30 years ago) was you paid the asking price. Things are different now as you can negotiate with builders in Scotland too.

I was a cash buyer who needed to move, and I believed the developer when he said that all repairs (I didn't know that the house, a showhouse, had been on the market for over a year) touch ups etc would be done, so didn't keep back any money.

I should have offered £10k less, and the developer (a family business) turned out to be dodgy and had form in not keeping their word. I also found out that building warranty body is toothless, when I complained, and ended up paying myself for badly installed guttering to be rectified.

The plus side is that neighbours are lovely and the house in a great location in a beautiful part of England. I would make a fortune if I ever decide to put it on AirBnB.

Buying a pizza for like 5 bitcoin 😂

Buying a nice one bedroom house instead of a dooer upper 2 bedroom house. The dooer upper was in a better area, same price and had more space. We were young and did not have many responsibilities. We would have made a lot of money and had a better house too.

Buying a terraced house in a rough but supposedly 'up and coming area' of a Northern city in 2006 with a 100% Northern Rock mortgage of 6.8% interest (not crazily high at the time). Lost 25% negative equity after the 2008 crash and after huge overpayments still sold at a loss 10 years later as the area had gone downhill. 😫

Like you @QuickNameChange22mine was the credit card I got during freshers week - at Freshers Fair - from memory I was offered a free camera and a cc with a £500 limit which I burnt through almost instantly and then spent the next three years getting charged for non payment, crazy interest etc. I had absolutely no financial sense. I dread to think how much I was charged on that card. I don't think they're allowed to charge those kind of fees any more.
Getting a second student overdraft - again thinking it was free money. I had £2000 on one and £1800 on another by the time I left uni and it took me years to pay off and my credit rating was shot.

The upside is that I'm a very strict budgeter now, but I never feel as flush as I did back then!

Getting married.

Selling a house in London in 2004 because the market had obviously peaked. :-(

Not getting a AuDHD diagnosis earlier
as as I now know how to focus on my business

@QuickNameChange22 @SparrowFeet thank God it wasn't just me! I signed up on the spot for a Barclaycard at my freshers fair in 1999 because it came with a free blow up chair which lasted three days before it popped. Nobody explained that you needed to make monthly payments pay, in the vague words of the young girl promoting the cards it was much like our student overdrafts so I had assumed it was something I'd pay off after graduation. Ended up with defaults which stayed on my credit record for a good few years.

@Mumblememumthat really made me chuckle. Sorry 🤣

Getting into debt for my gobshite of an ex 🙄😅

Taking out student loans.

In theory, marrying my second husband. If I'd posted on here beforehand, Mumsnet would have thrown its collective hands up in horror. I'd been done over financially when I divorced my first husband and was just getting back to a secure position. I had more assets and a much higher income than DH, and if things hadn't worked out I'd have ended up skint all over again. I must have taken leave of my senses when I accepted his proposal instead of saying, "No, let's just stay as we are." (It's OK, 20 years on we're still together and on top of the complexities of inheritance in a blended family.)

When I was younger I threw too much money away on home improvements and garden landscaping.

Not buying that parcel of land behind our small terraced house for £5k in 1985 because we thought it couldn't be developed.
Turns out it could and we'd have made millions.

Oh god you've set my car anxiety off now! My dad very kindly bought us a 12 year old Renault Clio when DH passed his driving test, we had it for 3 years and the engine died (very low mileage, one owner who took great care of it and used it as a weekend runaround)

We had approx £300 in savings so had to get a small loan from the bank, ended up buying a slightly newer Renault Clio because it was all we could afford. We have that car's first MOT next week and I'm just dreading the mechanic finding loads of things that need doing to it 😓

I do sometimes joke with DH that I should have married for money and not love, but I think the millionaires go for the beautiful model type women.

If anyone knows a single millionaire with a fetish for Ogre Princess Fiona, send him my way and I'll kick DH to the curb 🤣

Living to my means (yes better than beyond my means) but years ago I definitely had enough spare to save but didn't. Not understanding compound interest early enough (the two go hand in hand really!)

We have a little spare each month that does go into savings but the pot could have so much more money in it now.

A big wedding. I worried too much about optics, the dress etc etc. I did suggest having a small one at the beginning, but my mother in law (who didn’t pay a penny towards it anyway), told us no we couldn’t have a small one because she didn’t want any of her relatives being offended by not getting an invite. And looking back, my parents used my wedding as an opportunity to flash the cash at other wealthier relatives they always try to outdo. I wish I had stuck to my guns and just had parents, siblings and close friends or even a wedding abroad combined with the honeymoon. It ended up being more about the wedding than the meaning of it. It was very nice, but it was one day.

And also not overpaying on the mortgage when interest rates were really low.

Not buying a bigger house when younger.

Marrying my husband. He lacks ambition and has a fragile ego so it’s held us both back as financial unit. I’m the breadwinner and every year when my salary goes up up, he just gets angry and bitter.

I know I shouldn’t think about it but two of my serious ex’s have gone on to be very financially successful, one is a millionaire who owns care homes and the other is a VP at a large commercial bank.

sometimes I wonder what my life would have been had I married someone else.

@GoldenGirl85this doesn’t sound like a very satisfying relationship you’re in. Life’s too short!

marrying my husband

Having kids without being married. Stupid stupid stupid.