I am terrible about buyer’s remorse. Every time I spend a large amount of money, I immediately have buyer’s remorse. I can’t explain it. It happened with my car, which I bought six years ago and still love. It happened with my computer (bought a year and a half ago and I still love it). Most recently, it happened with a camera.
My camera was on its last legs. It was only four years old, but with the increases in technology, it was advantageous for me to start looking for a new camera. So I did research. And then I did more research. And finally, I purchased.
And it arrived, and I had buyer’s remorse. I can’t explain why. It takes great pictures and was a good price and the reviews are awesome. But I just hope I made the right choice. I commented about this on my personal twitter account and immediately had responses telling me that it was an awesome camera (from people who own and love it), so I’m sure that I will love it once I get using it.
I just wish I didn’t always have buyer’s remorse!
Megan is a 40-something government employee in the Washington, DC area. She got interested in Personal Finance when she got out of college and realized that her paycheck wasn’t going to go as far as she had hoped. Since starting this blog, she has managed to buy a house and make a solid start on her retirement goals, and hopes to help others do the same. Here is her story:
In 2007, I was a gainfully employed 20-something with no debt but not a lot of knowledge about personal finance. It was a co-worker’s comment about Roth IRAs that sent me to the internet, searching for information. It was then that I realized that I really didn’t know a whole lot about personal finance and that my current financial situation was due a lot to inherent frugal tendencies, generous family members, a fear of debt, and good luck. While that was working for me, clearly I needed a better plan.
While I had no debt, I was also pretty much living paycheck to paycheck and not worrying about going over budget (I say this as if I had a real budget) because I had an emergency fund set aside to cover any overages.
Except that’s not what an emergency fund is for.
So I did a lot of research, read a lot of blogs, and decided that I needed a plan. I needed to budget. I needed to know what I was spending my money on. I needed to prepare for the future.
I decided to create a blog not only to make myself accountable to others but also to share the knowledge that I gained along the way. I’ve learned so much from my fellow bloggers, and I hope that my readers can find something useful in what I have to share as well.
It sounds more like guilt than remorse. I get that too sometimes… I think it’s related to my mother and her view of spending money. Why do you think you feel that way?
Finally someone like me!!!! I have buyers remorse over most things cd’s, dvds, and especially large purchases! my definition of a large purchase is anything over ($100) even when I know I’ve got the best deal available there still this part of me that says “did you really need that?”. “Sure your old bicycle was ridiculously uncomfortable and not at all designed for commuting but did you really need a new bike?” etc etc etc. My car gives me the worst buyers remorse ever
I have no idea why! It doesn’t make sense – it’s not that I’m buying things I can’t afford! Maybe I’m just trained to save.