Spending

In honor of “Black Friday” I figured I’d write a little about some of the most memorable purchases I’ve made in my life. I’ve never done the whole fight the crowd and try to get the best deals on the day after Thanksgiving, I see that as more of an impulse buy thing, and I hate buying stuff on impulses. I’m the kind of person who will check eBay multiple times a day for 3-4 weeks to get the price I want on something… or just go without. Maybe that tactic is a little obsessive, but it helps weed out the stuff I think I want versus the stuff I really want. Anyway on to some of the things I have bought over the years.


Biggest Purchase:

Kia Soul – My car, pretty much has to kick off the list as it is the most expensive thing I have ever bought and probably will ever buy until I decide to purchase a house. I bought this on my Birthday in 2009 so I’ve only had it for a year and a half. Sometimes I regret spending that much money on something as I have 3.5 more years on the loan, however I did need something to drive and it hasn’t failed me yet. I like the car so overall I’d rate it as a good purchase. Add in the facts that I’m not a mechanic or even mechanically inclined, getting something new a dependable was a good option, plus I know I’m most likely going to end up driving this even after its paid off I don’t think I’ll truly ever regret the purchase. That said I don’t know if I will buy new next time. The one sad thing about the Soul is that now that the car has been on sale for almost two years, I am beginning to see a lot more of them. It was cool when I rarely saw another Soul on the road. Now I see another one almost every day on my commute to Indianapolis.

Worst Purchase:

Car Stereo System – back in 2001 I wanted to get a new sound system for my Monte Carlo (I was running a cassette player), and well being a hoarder of money from way back since I was little I had a nice chuck of change saved up from Christmas’s and Birthdays. For some reason I wanted something flashy and cool… so I picked out this neat looking Pioneer car stereo that even had screen savers! Problem was a didn’t know a thing about installing such a thing, so I talked to a guy I knew from school about getting this set up and after a couple of hours he also had me talked into a subwoofer and amp. I mean really… I did not need that stuff, it’s kind of ridiculous looking back at it. Well long story short the guy really was never good at finishing a project once he started it… and I never ended up having the subs installed correctly, and worst of all…. An electrical short fried my cool stereo. Thus this was by far my worst purchase after I shelled out around 700 dollars on all of the stuff that I never really got the use of. A couple years ago after I quit driving the Monte I was like maybe I should sell the Subs/Amp but water had leaked through the rusty trunk and the sub box was a little warped, plus one of the actually subs rotted out. So sadly worst purchase ever, but I did learn a little about picking only what I want and making sure I get the person I buy from to do all of the installing.

Fun Purchase:

Hulk Hands – For a series of summers in High School through the first year of college I would go to a flea market in Brookville every Wednesday morning. It was always a fun time, even if I never purchased much. One summer I bought basketball cards, a couple summers I bough Magic cards there, I also got a Nixon for President pin there… but by far my best purchase… for a whopping one dollar… from a guy my friends lovingly dubbed “Crazy Box Man” (this was due to the fact that he had all of his stuff just laying in boxes and it was normally priced as one item… one dollar, and was always fun to dig through while the guy would randomly shout stuff like “Your uncle joe has the best deals here, one item, one dollar”) Anyway one day… he had a set of Hulk Hands, sure they had been used, and only had one sound box between the two… but they were awesome… and I had really wanted them when they first came but I was too old to ask for them for Christmas or anything… I am proud to say I still have my Hulk Hands!

Regretted at first, but was a solid purchase in the long run:

HP Laptop – I bought my first computer in the summer of 2004 before I went to Purdue. Oh man I must admit I didn’t know a lot about computers… well not much as into what was a good laptop and what wouldn’t be good. I was honestly overwhelmed add in the fact I was about to spend over $700 on the purchase I was stressed out. My mom took me shopping for the laptop and I remember freaking out and having buyer’s remorse as soon as we left the store and I was sitting in the van with a laptop in a box wishing I had never spent the money. To be honest, I didn’t get a good deal on the laptop, really it was outdated two years later, but man did I get the use out of that thing. I most recently used it as late as this August a full 6 years after I bought it which is good for a computer. Granted it did die once from having water spilt on it in a infamous accident… but I got it fixed by piecing some stuff together. It was a great backup after that, filling in whenever I traveled and couldn’t haul my desktop (that I bought as a replacement after the water spill of summer 2007), pulling through when the power source had to be replaced on that desktop and stepping up big when I moved home and needed its wireless abilities. Sure it was slow as heck this summer, but it was a trooper and looking back I don’t regret the purchase nearly as much as I thought I would the day we bought it.