Your biggest financial blunder?

C

CLKeenan

Banned
Jun 24, 2006
2,506
14
0
Boston, MA
Mine was buying a ton of shares of WAMU back in 2008 when the financial industry was melting down. I got in at $1.50, it popped up to around $3.50. I also bought in more on the way up, honestly thinking that they were going to make it. Come home one day from work to see the Google Finance headline saying that WaMu had been sold and I'm thinking cha-ching! Some big bank bought it for $6-7/share. Nope. FDIC took control and sold the assets to JPM.

So my mistake wasn't buying WaMu, it was not protecting my gains.
 


Hah - this isn't my biggest financial blunder but my fathers.

In 1982 he got a large settlement (~350k) from an electric company because he was walking through a field and stepped on a downed powerline he couldn't see. In 1986 (he was 16 at the time) he wanted to invest 150k into Microsoft after their initial public offering. His dad was in control of his money at the time and wouldn't let him invest it into Microsoft.

At the IPO their shares were $21 each - $150k would've bought him ~7143 shares. The stock split ~9 times. If he would've kept the shares until ~4 years ago, his 150k would've turned into about 51,429,000.

Ugh.
 
OrganicJuice said:
Hah - this isn't my biggest financial blunder but my fathers.

In 1982 he got a large settlement (~350k) from an electric company because he was walking through a field and stepped on a downed powerline he couldn't see. In 1986 (he was 16 at the time) he wanted to invest 150k into Microsoft after their initial public offering. His dad was in control of his money at the time and wouldn't let him invest it into Microsoft.

At the IPO their shares were $21 each - $150k would've bought him ~7143 shares. The stock split ~9 times. If he would've kept the shares until ~4 years ago, his 150k would've turned into about 51,429,000.

Ugh.
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Oh sweet jesus. fuuuuck.

Don't have any particular major financial blunders, but I wish my Mum & Dad had let me invest £20 (or was it £50? Can't remember) in some shitty ebook selling business, back when I was like 11. I probably wouldn't have done too well, but I think it would've helped me immensely.
 
I had 3k shares of netflix at $7. It popped to $16 after a couple of months.

I went to a family dinner and discussed the company with an uncle -- long time investor. He was not as impressed with their biz model as I was.

I sold.

The stock, as you probably know, turned into an effing darling.

I lost multiple PROPERTIES by not holding that one.
 
10s of thousands in depreciable assets that I thought I needed by lying to myself to justify their purchases. Good mistake to learn while young though.
 
I was told that my great grandfather was offered 50% of the company velcro when it was first started in return for $100k or something - the inventor needed initial funding before it went anywhere. He turned it down. Could have been some sweet, sweet velcro money many generations later.

As far as stocks, I once had AAPL at $32, sold it a couple weeks later at $34 - not a massive deal, I only had $5k of it - still would have hit 6 figures.
 
The correct answer would be the money you didn't realize to earn because you're a stupid fuck.

(If this doesn't count, then most of the points ITT don't count as well)
 
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