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Day 12: Be Sure
Before you make a personal finance-related decision, be sure that you understand the full impact of the decision you are about to make. Years ago, before I worried about things like gas mileage, interest rates, and credit scores, I financed the purchase of an SUV. It was a beautiful SUV – deep blue paint job, soft interior, awesome sound system – it was the coolest thing ever. The problem was, I made one of those “if everything goes right I can afford it” purchases. So, for the next two years, I worried about every single payment, until finally, I managed to sell my nice SUV and replace it with the car I now own. Of course, when I went to sell it, I was “upside-down” and I had to finance my car for more than it was worth. I pushed my debt from one vehicle to the other.
Sound familiar? I am sure, that for most of you, it does. So, instead of rushing headlong into ANY financial decision, be sure that you take into account “what could happen” and “what might happen”. I am not trying to scare you into never spending any money, but I am reminding you to be aware of future possibilities. In my experience, when I planned for the “perfect, nothing will go wrong” scenario, I got burned. Be reasonable, live below you means, and think about each and every financial decision.
Have you ever made a poor financial decision? Leave a comment and let us know. If you are a blogger, write a post about making decisions and contact me. I’ll be more than happy to link to your post.
Click here to read all of the 33 Days And 33 Ways To Save Money And Reduce Debt posts.
Its funny that you would make such a point at this time. In fact I am in the same position. My car was totalled about two weeks ago and I have been struggling with buying a new one. It’s a luxury not having a car payment for the last 6 year and I don’t look forward to having to include one in my budget at this time. My struggle has been do I buy a car that I can pay cash for and hope that there are no major problems it, or do I purchase a newer (albeit still used) car and take on payments. I really wanted to pay off a couple more cards before making that decision.