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Why anyone has more than 2 kids in America is beyond me. http://www.reddit.com/r/personalfinance/comments/1sbfoz/huge_mess_help/ I really hate navigating reddit but the Personal Finance forum seems worth it. Sephiroth_IRA fucked around with this message at 15:40 on Dec 7, 2013 |
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Dec 7, 2013 15:35
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He should have filed BK as soon as the garnishment hit. Or move in with their parents.
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Dec 7, 2013 16:25
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A co-worker a few years ago took out like a $30k home equity line to renovate the house. The project got delayed about a month so naturally he wanted to find a safe short term place to park his borrowed money - he decided to use it all to buy company stock. The stock tanked and he was forced to sell at less than 2/3 original value then he had to borrow more to pay for the project.
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Dec 7, 2013 16:50
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asdf32 posted:A co-worker a few years ago took out like a $30k home equity line to renovate the house. The project got delayed about a month so naturally he wanted to find a safe short term place to park his borrowed money - he decided to use it all to buy company stock. I had a client who did something similar. I completed a student loan application for him. It was a tough application- had to get his parents to co-sign, and his interest rate pretty high because his co-signors weren't exactly solid applicants. Long story short, he opted to buy risky mutual funds with the student loan funds. Their value dropped, and when he sold the units he not incurred a loss, but also short-term trading fees since he held the funds for less than 30 days. melon cat fucked around with this message at 19:47 on Dec 7, 2013 |
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Dec 7, 2013 19:32
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melon cat posted:Hahaha. Ouch. I've heard of a few grad students making tidy returns doing the same thing with individual stocks. There are worse things to do with your student loan than gambling. (See: buying consumer poo poo and drinking)
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Dec 7, 2013 19:42
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tuyop posted:I've heard of a few grad students making tidy returns doing the same thing with individual stocks. There are worse things to do with your student loan than gambling. (See: buying consumer poo poo and drinking) Besides, if they really knew what they were doing, they'd apply for an RSP Loan instead (RSP = Canadian equivalent of 401K for those who don't know) and use THAT for investing. Not only is it tax-deductible, but the interest rates are much lower. The repayment terms are also more favourable since that's specifically what they're designed for. melon cat fucked around with this message at 19:56 on Dec 7, 2013 |
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Dec 7, 2013 19:50
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There's a show on Netflix streaming called My First Home. It's a "reality show" from TLC, and each episode follows a first time home buyer. A lot of the stuff is pretty obviously fictional or embellished for TV. However, there are some things that make me roll my eyes. A lot of real estate myths perpetuated, or just really dumb personal/relationship decisions. For example: - A couple who had been dating for less than a year, have never lived with each other, decide that they should BUY A HOUSE TOGETHER, cause hey man, it's a really good time to buy right now! - Banks will approve you for hilariously high amounts if you have decent credit. Most people (who aren't crazy) realize they cannot afford that, and buy at like, 60% of their approved top-end. Some people were buying right up next to that, such as the couple who gross $80k combined as retail managers buying a $350k house in some boring suburb. - Nonsense about buying "fixer-uppers" to flip in a couple years. Basically, the antithesis of the smart stuff discussed in the homebuying thread here.
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Dec 8, 2013 07:19
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Poison Cake posted:Beanie Babies as an investment. Defending Beanie Babies as an investment. Filling your bedroom with ugly plastic bins to keep your Beanie Babies in pristine condition. In fairness, Beanie Babies have a value as a toy, it's those who hoard them and think of them as collectibles and think they're going to be worth a ton someday The really old ones do, in fact, sell for crazy money on ebay. Helmholz posted:I've been *friends* with a guy I've known since the fifth grade (we're in our mid-twenties now) who decided that it was a good idea to pay someone on craigslist $400 cash for a motorcycle the seller wanted $1200 for on the verbal agreement that he would hold onto it for him until the other $800 had been delivered. Dave's so bad with money that I knew he'd never come up with the rest. At the time, his girlfriend was weeks away from delivering his baby. He's impossible to give advice to. If you try telling him that something he's about to do is stupid, he'll deliver his famous line of "I don't care." repeatedly until the topic changes or you leave in frustration. He's since lost custody of his kid, lost two jobs, and changes tires at an auto-body chain store for minimum wage. It's really too bad he was never able to mature along with the rest of our group of friends. Years ago, I was at a traditional game store one day, scoping out all the then-new D&D and Warhammer, and a saw a guy scooping up hordes of Battletech, which at the time was being blown out everywhere (the CGL renaissance was years away) I'm like, "Uh... you're buying a lot of stuff..." He's like "Yeah, but I'm the type of dude that doesn't care if his light bills get paid." and then he gave me the most poo poo-eating grin. Some people are just immature. And bad with money. CitizenKain posted:The solution they came up was the pay a dog breeder to get their dog pregnant with some certified dog and then sell the puppies. He thought he could sell each puppy for 400-500 bucks for some reason. Turns out raising puppies in a camper is a bad idea, as a half dozen puppies will poo poo everywhere. Also he only got 250 each for the 4 he sold, 1 was given away as a gift and the other was payment to the breeder. This is dumb as hell, I knew a co-worker that worked at a shelter, and she said she got purebred animals, animals with papers, the works. They all were put down. CuddleChunks posted:Ahahahahah that is awesome. "Welp, just gettin' back on my feet. Time to buy me a boat!" You idiot! In fairness, some people look at outwitting creditors like a game. When I worked at a QA game testing place I was shocked to learn a co-worker had 410k in debt. I asked him if he was worried, and he said, nah, they only come after you when you owe $20k or more. He was essentially fired for being sketchy as hell and skipping work to goof off and play video games. Dick Spacious CPA posted:During the big E3 gaming convention when Microsoft and Sony announced their new consoles my friend texted me and said he preordered 5 of the new Xbox consoles and 5 Playstation 4 consoles with the hope to "flip" them on release. Not even a week before this he quit his job and went back to work on his parent's farm where he is getting paid cash under the table each week, and, to top it all off, he and his wife are trying to close on a house. He can cancel his order. It is, but unlike all these other stories, he could conceivably flip them for profit come Christmas. It's risky, though. The Xbox One is not the hot item everyone hopes it will be. majestic12 posted:My uncle's retirement plan was a basement full of model trains. He was planning on selling them all to collectors, I guess, but he died a couple years ago and now there's hundreds of loving trains gathering dust in a basement that no one has the first clue what to do with. In his defense, sort of, his formative years were in Weimar Germany where banks weren't the most stable things in the world, but really, trains? In fairness, the locos could be worth $100-300 each, maybe as much as $1500. The Lionel stuff goes for good money on ebay. The only problem is, its like trying to sell Howdy Doody collectibles, all the fans are dying off. Try posting pics on train fourms then contacting a train museum to buy it all. They're used to railfans dying off. The Banana Pee posted:This right here is the tip of the iceberg. I've been considering making an "Ask Me About Growing Up With Stage Parents" thread in A/T, but didn't know if people would find it funny or it would just make them sad and weep for humanity. DO IT! I just read Fame Junkies and the poo poo that goes down is amazeballs. I'm amazed your parents sunk all that into your career, and yet never moved to Nashville or LA. Perceptopolis posted:We also had a neighbor that constantly spent her husband's entire paycheck on horribly made costumes for her LARP group and then proceeded to live without electricity for several months. Gotta prioritize, mang. Galstaff can't open dungeon doors unless he's wearing the finest custom-made robes... Huttan posted:If she's an older woman, like my mother was before she died, she'd get lonely and any door-to-door salesman that was remotely cute and charismatic could chat with her for a couple hours and get the sale. Drove my father nuts. Maybe Pops should have brought home more flowers, and been a lot nicer to the kids, so that they visit more often.
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Dec 8, 2013 07:49
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I work for a major Canadian bank and deal with people all the time who are ABSOLUTELY terrible with their money. I actually met a person who has been in Canada for several decades, and while not a permanent resident could easily open a bank account at any major financial institution. This person was illiterate and somehow got it into his mind that using cheque cashing places like Money Mart were the best ways to access his money. For those who don't know, Money Mart and their ilk charge annual interest rates in the vicinity of 550% for payday loans and between 10 and 20 percent of your cheque to cash it for you. I've done debt consolidation loans pushing $100,000 not including their mortgage. I've also seen the same people I've helped refinance go right back out and max all of their credit out again within months. The best client meetings are when one spouse is so deeply in debt and the other spouse doesn't know about it. "Hey honey, the guy at the bank wants to meet with us so he can help us consolidate my massive credit card debt... surprise!" It's actually fairly frightening how bad people are with their money. The average person I deal with typically has between 10-20k in credit card debt and usually can't be bothered to at least get themselves a card that has a lower interest rate tan the industry standards that are between 20-30%. Imagine paying between 4-6k a year in interest alone on top of all of the other payments you have to make on a monthly basis. The shocking part is people are quite content to make minimum payments and never improve their financial situation. The buy everything on credit society we live in is a bit of a strange one. I'm not quite sure how to phrase it, but our economy is in part fueled by credit, which in part has helped to make credit more available and so a cycle continues. A retail store I used to work for actually only made money if its customers made their purchases using their store credit card. To be clear, the store lost money if you used another payment method like cash/other credit card/debit so there was always a HUGE push for credit card sales. To apply for their credit card all you needed was a piece of photo ID and a major credit card and within about 2 minutes you could walk away with a whopping 10% discount on your purchase and a 30% interest rate and as a minimum wage worker I couldn't give 2 shits what your piece of ID was and I don't think anybody within the company truly cared either. It's actually a pretty frightening world when you consider how bad in general people are with their money and how extremely over extended everybody is. Not to mention how much every single company out their is eager to gently caress you over with its high interest credit products. Add to this the general stigma people have in talking about their personal finances and the sense of shame people generally have when they're dealing with serious levels of debt and it's no surprise that things are the way they are.
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Dec 8, 2013 09:21
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http://www.reddit.com/r/personalfinance/comments/1sd485/am_i_trapped_making_high_car_payments_for_6_years/quote:First and foremost, I want to stress that I'm coming to you all in the spirit of learning and hope that you will take pity on me in my ignorance.
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Dec 8, 2013 18:27
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The head of the HR department at my work set up a lunch seminar a couple weeks ago. My company brought in a financial adviser who went through setting up a budget, making smart choices with your money, and talked a bit about credit card debt. Out of the ~60 people who work in our office, the only people that showed up were the head of HR who set the thing up, the two girls who work directly under her, and me. The adviser and her shared stories about people who take out loans against their 401Ks or just straight up withdraw from them. We all agreed the next seminar should be mandatory for all employees.
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Dec 8, 2013 18:56
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I was fixing a computer at a car dealership yesterday and heard a guy talking about how it would probably take 3 weeks to get his money for the car he wanted. He would have to take a loan from his 401k to pay off the car that he crashed, then get another loan from his 401k for the new car. This was normal to him and how he has purchased every car since his 40's when he stated his 401k.
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Dec 8, 2013 19:19
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Spermy Smurf posted:I was fixing a computer at a car dealership yesterday and heard a guy talking about how it would probably take 3 weeks to get his money for the car he wanted. There's a goon with his own BFC thread who uses his 401k to pay off his credit cards and finance his monthly expenses exceeding his monthly income. And he works in finance. People are absolutely terrible with money, it's amazing.
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Dec 8, 2013 19:43
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What a dumby. The "in" thing to do is roll the old loan over into the new one.
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Dec 8, 2013 19:48
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Harry posted:http://www.reddit.com/r/personalfinance/comments/1sd485/am_i_trapped_making_high_car_payments_for_6_years/ Oh man, the entitlement complex here. quote:Since you're living at home, any reason why your parents aren't financing it through them? Normally this is a bad idea, but at 18% interest even if they did screw you over completely and steal the car once it's paid off it wouldn't be that hard to come out ahead. OP posted:My parents refuse to co-sign for anything. It's a long story, but my dad basically "doesn't believe in co-signing". quote:Does he know that you're paying 18% interest? I don't see the logic of having you move home but also not being willing to co-sign anything. OP posted:Because clearly the line for what it's okay to watch your son endure is drawn between high interest rates and living in a dumpster? OP, later down the thread posted:Part of why my credit is poor, and in fact, the largest reason is that I had a repossession years ago on my first car ever -- which was purchased new. I was a fool, and got a new car when I should've gotten a used one... and I wasn't able to keep up payments. Cicero fucked around with this message at 22:39 on Dec 8, 2013 |
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Dec 8, 2013 19:59
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In his Dad's defense, co-signing is probably a bad idea in most situations. I would only do it if you can afford to eat the loan. If I can do that, then I should probably just loan the money myself directly. Also, wat? Does this quote make as little sense as it sounds like it does? quote:This [2012 Chrysler 300] was NOT my choice, but it was the only one the dealership told me a bank would finance me for. Please tell me that there's something I don't know about financing a car that translates this from bald-faced bullshit into English?
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Dec 8, 2013 21:12
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It means the dealership found a sucker.
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Dec 8, 2013 21:16
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That's how I was reading it. I just couldn't imagine it working. Welp, if the dealer got her to spend that much money I hope he was decent enough to top off her halogen fluid before giving her the car.
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Dec 8, 2013 21:25
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I imagine it went down similar to this classic SA thread which I don't think has been mentioned here. http://forums.somethingawful.com/showthread.php?threadid=2873673&userid=0&perpage=40&pagenumber=1
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Dec 8, 2013 21:32
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Folly posted:In his Dad's defense, co-signing is probably a bad idea in most situations. I would only do it if you can afford to eat the loan. If I can do that, then I should probably just loan the money myself directly. It can help build a good credit record, when his son wouldn't get a loan otherwise.
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Dec 8, 2013 22:12
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Cicero posted:Oh man, the entitlement complex here. Jesus. He could have bought 2 eco cars with how much he spent on it. Like 2 Honda fits or something. He made a crucial mistake of trusting a dealership that his brother used to work at and thinking they didn't see a sucker.
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Dec 8, 2013 22:13
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Folly posted:Please tell me that there's something I don't know about financing a car that translates this from bald-faced bullshit into English? quote:As someone who sells cars, this is only true for people with decent credit. If someone has really terrible credit, the approval will be based on the specific vehicle and miles. I just sold one today that was the only car on the whole lot that would work. The bank limited us to 2010 and newer with under 50k miles for 48 months @24% with payments no more than 400/mo. Also, they were only going to lend 85% of NADA trade including taxes, fees, money down. Many dealers are shady but most dealers just want to sell whatever the bank will let them buy. I hate those deals because the bank usually charges is to do the loan instead of paying us for them to take it.
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Dec 8, 2013 22:20
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Folly posted:In his Dad's defense, co-signing is probably a bad idea in most situations. Haifisch posted:Apparently that might be a thing if you have terrible credit:
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Dec 8, 2013 22:42
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Harry posted:I imagine it went down similar to this classic SA thread which I don't think has been mentioned here. I really wish the scan of the contract hadn't fallen off the internet, because I'm even having trouble wrapping my head around this thing. As much as the F&I guy at the dealership will try to distract you from reading it, the truth-in-lending statements are quite clear about what you will be paying, when, and under what terms. Am I correctly understanding that what he wound up doing was buying a vehicle on what essentially amounts to an interest-only loan, with a big balloon payment? His "down payment" was prepayment toward the balloon payment at the end, but he still was just paying interest every month? kitten smoothie fucked around with this message at 23:22 on Dec 8, 2013 |
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Dec 8, 2013 23:20
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This is actually starting to make a little sense. I'm guessing that the bank wants to make sure the car you buy has enough value that they can recover the cost of repossessing it. Harry posted:I imagine it went down similar to this classic SA thread which I don't think has been mentioned here. Holy poo poo! I've had to walk away from that thread 3 times since you posted it. I'm not even halfway done.
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Dec 8, 2013 23:33
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kitten smoothie posted:I really wish the scan of the contract hadn't fallen off the internet, because I'm even having trouble wrapping my head around this thing. As much as the F&I guy at the dealership will try to distract you from reading it, the truth-in-lending statements are quite clear about what you will be paying, when, and under what terms. What it was is that he got a lease, and then promised to buy it at the end of the lease period (3 years). From what I remember, the $16,000 down payment is simply a promised amount and the interest is accrued as if he owes the full $33,000.
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Dec 8, 2013 23:39
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Cicero posted:The thing is, the OP said they are paying $500/month for the car, so obviously they actually did have some money. The moral of this story is to have an emergency fund. Haifisch fucked around with this message at 01:12 on Dec 9, 2013 |
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Dec 9, 2013 01:10
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kitten smoothie posted:Am I correctly understanding that what he wound up doing was buying a vehicle on what essentially amounts to an interest-only loan, with a big balloon payment? His "down payment" was prepayment toward the balloon payment at the end, but he still was just paying interest every month? No, it's more like a long-term conventional amortizing loan with a balloon payment due half way through. It's set up to be similar to a lease - the balloon payment reduces the monthly payments to less than what they would be for a conventional loan. The agreement also says that the dealer will buy back the car for the balloon price, so instead of making the balloon payment, you can turn the car in and get another one. His down payment did serve as a down payment (cap cost reduction in lease terms), but the F&I guy screwed him hard on the sales price, so both his monthly payments and balloon payment were high.
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Dec 9, 2013 13:56
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Bigntasty posted:He should get a divorce and let his wife have custody and go on welfare, but continue living with her. Could probably bring in another 30k a year tax free. I was thinking the same thing, but didn't want to say it out loud.
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Dec 9, 2013 17:09
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canyoneer posted:There's a show on Netflix streaming called My First Home. Oh thank you for recommending this, I had a sick day yesterday and binge-watched maybe 6-7 of these. I think I've only seen one down payment break $10K. Most of the couples buying are not married. People are actually vetoing houses over bad paint colors and even because of a mirror hanging on the wall. It's like a series of case studies on how not to buy a house.
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Dec 11, 2013 22:18
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Baja Mofufu posted:Oh thank you for recommending this, I had a sick day yesterday and binge-watched maybe 6-7 of these. I think I've only seen one down payment break $10K. Most of the couples buying are not married. People are actually vetoing houses over bad paint colors and even because of a mirror hanging on the wall. It's like a series of case studies on how not to buy a house. Did you see the one of the three single siblings buying a house together? The older brother and sister both work as account managers at the same company, and their college student younger brother is going to live with them rent free. Yes, that will certainly not cause any resentment.
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Dec 11, 2013 23:32
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canyoneer posted:Did you see the one of the three single siblings buying a house together? The older brother and sister both work as account managers at the same company, and their college student younger brother is going to live with them rent free. Yes, I just did! One thing that really surprises me about this show is that they give guests' full names and where they live. I just did a quick search on Facebook and it looks like the sister just got married--doubt she's living in that house now! The prodigal son little brother who had to have a gigantic house for his rent-free study pad didn't even end up going to medical school in the US. The older brother was right to act like he was going to get stuck with the place.
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Dec 12, 2013 03:10
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While this family might qualify as "bad with money", their story is incredible and highlights the complexity of the issue of extreme poverty in America and NYC in particular. http://www.nytimes.com/projects/2013/invisible-child/#/?chapt=0 
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Dec 12, 2013 04:16
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Stealth Tiger posted:The head of the HR department at my work set up a lunch seminar a couple weeks ago. My company brought in a financial adviser who went through setting up a budget, making smart choices with your money, and talked a bit about credit card debt. Out of the ~60 people who work in our office, the only people that showed up were the head of HR who set the thing up, the two girls who work directly under her, and me. The adviser and her shared stories about people who take out loans against their 401Ks or just straight up withdraw from them.  "
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Dec 12, 2013 04:16
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I feel like my roommate belongs in this thread. She makes about $85k a year and still lives paycheck to paycheck accruing interest on credit cards. She spent all day tracking her finances the other day and "found out" she spent about $35k in the past five months alone, that's like half of her entire year's salary post-tax. None of this went into savings or retirement. She's super bad at estimating her spending habits. Before she signed up for Mint she guessed she spent about $500-$2000 per year on clothes (Mint says she spent closer to $5000 in that five month period). She's also paying off credit cards from the time period between where she got her new high paying job and when it actually started (a few months) cause she was already spending money like she was earning $85k. She just quipped about how black friday was the best friday ever this year. Oh and she bought a fully loaded 3 series BMW when her job started because her old roommate had one and she liked how it looks. I think the only fiscally responsible thing she does is she bought a used bike for $100 and bikes the 5 minute commute to work instead of driving her car (because it has lovely 20-25 mpg or something like that). Yeah she doesn't even use her fancy car that she spent (borrowed) so much on. e: Another example of her terrible spending habits: I cook nearly all my meals and she doesn't know how to cook and she really likes my cooking, so she just gives me money for half the groceries and I cook for us both. There is so much food in our fridge right now cause she just doesn't eat her half. In fact she just came back from the store with a Red Box blue-ray and take-home food even though we have half a grilled chicken in the fridge and some bowls of chili. (Then again it could be a subtle way of telling me my food's not good.) Boris Galerkin fucked around with this message at 03:46 on Dec 16, 2013 |
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Dec 16, 2013 03:41
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Getting takeout is such an easy habit to get into. You smell the food walking by, or you're a regular, or someone talks about it at work. I wouldn't take it to heart, this woman is a creature of weak habits.
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Dec 16, 2013 04:25
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tuyop posted:While this family might qualify as "bad with money", their story is incredible and highlights the complexity of the issue of extreme poverty in America and NYC in particular. That's not so much bad with money as it is intergenerationalpoverty.txt What a depressing read.
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Dec 16, 2013 11:43
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If you wanna watch a show about people bad with money while a financial advisor tries to talk them through it, the Canadian show Til Debt Do Us Part is required viewing: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Til_Debt_Do_Us_Part Basically if they make the smart moves that she says, she'll give them $5000 at the end to put towards the debt. It's pretty astonishing how many of them are so bad with money and so married to their bad spending habits that they'll turn down thousands of free dollars.
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Dec 16, 2013 16:44
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Saros posted:That's not so much bad with money as it is intergenerationalpoverty.txt Want to talk depressing poverty? Watch "A Place At The Table" on Netflix, about hunger in America. It is heartbreaking to see those kids who don't have enough to eat, and the parents working two minimum wage jobs that can't provide enough for them. Baja Mofufu posted:Yes, I just did! One thing that really surprises me about this show is that they give guests' full names and where they live. I just did a quick search on Facebook and it looks like the sister just got married--doubt she's living in that house now! The prodigal son little brother who had to have a gigantic house for his rent-free study pad didn't even end up going to medical school in the US. The older brother was right to act like he was going to get stuck with the place. That is hilarious. Especially because the little brother and the sister were so demanding about what they wanted in the house, and now neither of them are paying for it. The sister was pressuring the brother to go to the upper range of the budget HARD in that show. There's no way that guy can afford that house on just his income. And of course, you have to have the extra bedroom for when mom comes to visit!
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Dec 16, 2013 17:38
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http://www.reddit.com/r/personalfinance/comments/1syosc/should_i_invest_in_a_condo_in_ann_arbor_while_i/ They haven't gone through with this yet, but I can't understand the thought process that would even make this a possibility worth asking about. OP is wondering if they should buy a condo. While they're in dental school. Living off of student loans. They already have pre-existing student loan debt, a small amount of credit card debt, and no savings.  (The good news is that there's no way in hell they'd be approved since they have no real income. ...there is no way they'd be approved, right?  )
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Dec 16, 2013 17:41
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