Observing others financial choices, part 3
Also on the day after the repo man came I heard a lot of talk about various things my relatives were planning on buying.
My brother-in-law was on the computer looking at motorcycles. He asked how far of a drive Hartford, CT was because he found a motorcycle there for “only” $14,000 that was normally closer to $20,000. I told him it sounded like $14,000 too much to me.
Moments later he was asking me about computers. He told me he was planning on putting the one that he was using into one of the kids rooms and getting a new one. He was thinking about a laptop and asked me what I would buy if I was him. I told him that I would stick to a desktop if I was him as it was cheaper but that I thought his computer worked fine. He insisted that they needed two computers. That also meant buying another desk.
Later that evening, before the movie rental, we were dicsussing something I had seen in the LTD catalog. Then it turned to Fingerhut and how high their prices were. Then I found out they bought a lot of stuff from Fingerhut as you could get stuff for “only $10 a month!” I learned how they got iPods from Fingerhut by paying $10 a month for two years. They knew that they had paid about twice as much for them but were seemingly okay with it. Then the conversation turned to other things they had seen in the Fingerhut catalog that they planned on buying for $10 a month. They also told me how great this was for them as they could buy what they wanted even though they did not have the money for it.
I wondered if they were actually hearing what they were saying.
Read the previous posts in this series:
Observing others financial choices
Observing others financial choices, part 1
Observing others financial choices, part 2
July 31st, 2008 at 11:02 am
I have a very good friend who I sat down with yesterday over a cup of coffee and listened to her complain about her finances. She insists she knows what’s she’s doing and that she’s financially savvy. But she has over $4000 on credit cards (all maxed out) and a line of credit she uses to pay rent.
I listened to her as she explained how her system worked. It went a little like this. Well when I get paid, I pay my phone bill (good) and then I throw the rest of the cash at my credit cards. I asked her about food - she said she uses her credit cards to pay for it. I asked her what her interest rates were on the cards, she had no idea.
So I pulled out my calculator and showed her the difference between having the $4k on her credit cards and on a line of credit, interest wise. She retorted she couldn’t do that because she used her line of credit to pay her rent! OMG!
Beyond this, she’s out bar hopping at least 2-3 times a week, grabbing lattes whenever, buying stuff she’s putting on credit, and whining about how she can’t afford to pay things. Even when I said, you should probably just pay the minimum payment on your credit card (because she refuses to transfer it to the line of credit) so that you can stop dipping into your cc to pay for day to day stuff - she simply said I know what I’m doing. Really? Really? You could have fooled me!
I offered to help her sort things out - but again, she insists she’s got it under control. *sigh* It’s hard to watch. She’s family to me and I want to help but I know it’s useless until she’s ready to face reality. I feel for you, I really do.
August 1st, 2008 at 8:44 am
Yep, it is clear that your brother in law is not hearing you. They just don’t get the lessons you are telling them.
As they are people dear to you, it might be worthwhile to figure out a different line of attack.
Otherwise it will just fall into the “what do we do when the person does not want to help himself/herself”.