Everyone has made money mistakes during their life. I’m one of them. I’m almost 30 and I have made plenty of financial mistakes in the past. Here are the mistakes I’ve made – what financial errors have you made?
Not Saving Enough
Now that I am an adult with two children, saving is something I wish I could do and for the most part, do manage to do. I do end up dipping into my savings every now and again but I’m much better at saving than I used to be.
However, there once was a point where I was working two jobs – I was working 20 odd hours in my local shop on Friday’s and weekends and then at least 20 hours during the week at my local pub, often more as I’d do split shifts during the week and work at the pub in the evening over the weekend as well as at the shop. Both of these jobs paid me more than minimum wage for my age – I was 18/19 and minimum wage for that age back in 2008/2009 was awful. I was getting paid what those aged 25 and over were getting and I was also getting tips at the pub. I wasn’t exactly rolling in it but I had quite a lot of money coming in and minimal expenses – I paid £40 a week rent so £160 a month which left me with hundreds left over to pay my top ups for my phone (I wasn’t on a contract then) and anything else I wished to buy.
Even when I got together with Steve and he moved in, we were only paying £70 a week and he was earning a couple of hundred a week so we should have had £££ to play with. I really wish we’d saved a lot of that money as we have nothing to show for it now and although I probably earn as much per month now as I did then, perhaps even more, I have far more expenses now.
Burying My Head In The Sand
I’ve been guilty of this in the past – I think we all have. Thankfully in the past two years, I’ve not done this as much. However, in the past five years, I had two traumatic things happen and I fell behind on some payments. I also put quite a few things on my credit cards when I shouldn’t have done and lo and behold, it got me into a whole heap of financial trouble. Luckily, according to various credit score sites, I’ve been well on track for the past couple of years and seem to have put that part of life behind me.
It can happen to everyone so I don’t feel guilty because of it, I just know I should have faced it head on at the time – although I just wasn’t in the right frame of mind. Have you ever felt like this?
Buying Stuff I Don’t Need
Again, another thing we all do and another thing I’ve got much better at. I used to buy magazines, books, clothes constantly. My house is full of stuff I don’t need so I’m currently decluttering it – either selling it or donating it, But the fact remains I used to spend, spend, spend without a care in the world and that is perhaps one of the biggest financial mistakes to make. I think we need to make these mistakes though to realise exactly where we are going wrong.
These are my top money mistakes – what are yours?