I found out recently that one of my friends has filed for bankruptcy and it pisses me off. It irritates me because over the years her and her husband have made very poor financial decisions and now the people who they told they were going to pay back are not going to get paid. I feel like my friends are going to get away scott free and get to keep the items they bought on credit without having to pay for them. I know, I know bankruptcy will follow you around for the rest of your life whenever you try to get credit, but it still feels like they stole because they bought things that were out of their range.
Here are some of the dumb financial decisions they have made over the years. They bought a house when they got married, but 2 years later they bought another house. They couldn’t sell their first house and still decided to buy a second house. They couldn’t rent out their first house for more than their payments and because they were short on cash they had to take renters who they shouldn’t have in order to make payments. Some of these renters were terrible and cost them thousands of dollars in damages.
They have bought more than one car per year over the last 5 years! And those cars were new. After only having a new car for a year, they would trade it in for something else. Since they didn’t put down money, they were upside down on the cars when they traded them in to get a new car. They were constantly rolling in the cost of old car into their new car payment. Why they needed so many cars, I have no idea.
They have bought every new gadget over the years. They always have the latest phone, or computer or tv. Did they need a new phone? No! Their old phones worked just fine.
Finally, they didn’t constantly improve their income. They have switched jobs multiple times looking for greener grass and thought they would make more at their new job, only to find out after a couple of months that they were making less. I am not sure if they were lied to or if they are just not good at math. Also, the wife stayed home for a while after having a child. Needless to say they couldn’t really afford that.
That is why it pisses me off that they have filed for bankruptcy. Nothing bad happened to them, they made bad financial choices and it isn’t the creditor’s fault! I want to go over to their house and slap them around and tell them not to file for bankruptcy, make them a plan to get them out of the hole, and watch them like a hawk for a year or two to make sure they are on track. However, I don’t think they would really appreciate that.