Has this ever happened to you????

**MomK** · 07-23-2010, 10:07 AM

Our family has joined with 9 other families to travel to Florida for a World Series Softball tourn this week. We get down here and one night our battery on our 6-year-old minivan goes dead. It will cost $100 to fix it. No big deal, we need a battery. We get it fixed and go on our way.

My husband is head coach and his assistant (who drives a brand new Suburban) is joking with us about how "cheap" we are. I can tell they are kidding, we are very close friends, but I can also tell there is a little bit of admiration there!

The wife says, "I bet they have more money in the bank than we do!" The husband says, "K.(my DH) is the only person I know who will try to bargain over a glass of lemonade."

I responded, "We try to take care of what we have and go the least expensive route and only buy on credit for a car or house. We haven't had any vehicle payments for 4 years; so a new battery is not a big deal."

"Really?" said the wife? "We needed new tires that would have cost $600, so we just traded for a new vehicle and paid the $600 on sales tax."

I'm thinkin': "good grief! Now you have a payment every month and could have kept that vehicle and had new tires on it?"

**Saule** · 07-23-2010, 10:28 AM

When I was just starting out in the working world, there was a slightly older woman who worked with us, and who came from a financially more secure background than most of the rest of us. She was talking about getting a new car - why? because her windshield wipers weren't working quite right. Turns out all she needed was new blades...

And I knew any number of people who got a new car every two years - you may as well just put your money in a pile and have a bonfire!!!

**Englishlady** · 07-23-2010, 02:54 PM

Not with a car, but many years ago, I was at a social occasion with older wives of some of my husbands colleagues.

We had just moved to the area and so there was polite chit chat about this and that.............I was asked about the house we had just bought and I told her it was a good sized 3 bedroom and we were decorating.

Aquaintance: "So will you be extending the house?"

Me "Well, we don't really need to there are 3 bedrooms and there is only the two of us"

Aquaintence " Oh, my dear you must not think like THAT!!!!"

I was gobbsmacked,

being rebuked for not WANTING to make my house bigger than I needed.

The conversation then went on between this woman and her friend which became a brag-fest over their kids and what they were doing/achieving!!!!!

Needless to say I never went to one of these social occasions again!!

What is with these people?

**MomK** · 07-23-2010, 07:43 PM

Another friend traded her van (less than a year old) for a brand new one because she needed money to buy her two kids Christmas gifts. By trading, they were able to start payments on the new van a month later and used their December payment for Christmas! CRAZY!!!