Crash and Burn: Financial Biography, Part 3

This is the third installment of my financial history. Last I left this thing off, I had just graduated college with no student loans and a clean slate. It was an opportunity to turn my back on a history of financial mismanagement. But by this point I felt I knew a lot more about how the real world worked. For one, I realized that there was no criminal prosecution for debt, and thus no real incentive to repay it.

I ran up a couple of cards upon first moving to Atlanta and deliberately just didn't repay them. I had no intention of using credit later and didn't want to be bothered with needless bills. I knew this would screw my credit score but at the time I just didn't really care (I figured some day I'd just pay it off). I had three grand in savings bonds that I quickly burned through while I struggled to find a job. Temp work only lasted so long and my job prospects dried up when I confessed to the placement agent that I didn't have professional attire.

After my bonds ran out, I put my car title up for cash. Please whatever you do-- don't pawn your title-- those loans are a scam. I could have lost my Tercel, except for a fortuitous ATM error where Wachovia's machine spit out $750 dollars because their main network was down. I was later hit with a $500 overdraft which I also didn't pay. With credit cards and banks now blacklisting me, I lived on cash alone.

I made some very rich, well-connected friends and ended up working when I wanted to, doing odd jobs for them. I'll leave it at that. Because of the various lines of business these people were in, they could buy basically anything they wanted. Hundreds of thousands of dollars went into buying televisions, DJ equipment, you name it. At this point I think I finally realized that money was not buying these people happiness.

On the other hand, I got pretty good with managing my money. Everything I had was in cash so there was no abstract credit account or sequestered assets. I could look at my net worth, spread it out on my bed and even roll around in it if I wanted. I actually started a savings pile. That lifestyle was fun while it lasted but as you could probably guess, everything came crashing down at once.

My friends were all arrested on various charges, my car broke down and I was left with no income. I learned how to be frugal. I scraped by completing online surveys for cash and eating 20$ worth of groceries a week. Eventually my roommates started to get sick of supporting me so they did what anyone would do to get rid of an unwanted layabout. They all moved out.

I was without a job or even a formal work history. I had a degree but at this point, I was convinced it was worthless so I applied in the soul crushing world of retail. Pounding the pavement was as hard as it ever was and lacking any job search skills, I came up with nothing. Eventually another friend offered me a real job making 8$ an hour at his accounting office.

This marked the turning point in my financial life from bad decisions to better. The biography also gets a lot less interesting. ;)