So this was the stupidest 4 months of decisions I have ever made and I still have huge regrets about what I did. This was 2 years ago.
Ask away and feel absolutely free to berate me for the terrible decision making.
I got a trust fund of £23,000 at 18 and spent it in 4 months. AMA
r/AMA
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What did you spend it on?
Dummy
Yolo
Did you at least spend it on something nice?
I hope you paid off debt and got a car or something 💀 Also, never go into a casino
What would have you done with £230,000?
Not responsible with money man
What did you spend it on?
Also – as a trust fund baby myself, I am not going to yell or berate you one bit. I don’t know about you, but I didn’t even know I was a trust fund baby until I got it. I had no financial planning skills, no idea how to save money, nothing. I bought a $60k car in college with cash, and my mum got so mad at me. Like wtf did you expect me to do woman? You never taught me how to manage money!
I did something similar with about half that money. It’s not the end of the world though, money comes and goes.
If you receive the same amount of money today, what would you do with it?
I hope you had fun! You will think about this and regret it for the rest of your life!!!!
23000 is not a lot of money and not a trust fund it’s an inheritance
At least you know you pissed it up the wall. I’ve seen worse and with no self awareness. You will know for next time. Don’t beat yourself up too much.
Actually I’ve done the same, just with a MUCH smaller amount of money. Still, it was a lot for me. I was a kid who never had anything because there was no money for it so getting the (even tho small) lump sum I went crazy on useless shit I never had. Fun, good food, clothes… I even paid for someone’s dinner for the first time in my life! It wasn’t a lesson for me then as I didn’t understand how fucked up I was until recently. It sheds a lot of light on my growing up today.
Did you panic when you realized it is running out?
A very good friend of mine got $50k at 18. A lot of “friends” totally took advantage of him, he’s a super friendly dude. It lasted maybe a year, but it was a very fun year.
I don’t blame you, I blame whoever set up the trust. My son has a trust fund with about $150k. He is currently 16, I set it up so he can’t touch it until he is 30. 18 year olds are not very wise with money.
I’m gonna be in a similar boat after my mom died. What did you learn, so I don’t make the same mistakes you did? I have a hooker problem and relapsed after her death. I feel like I’ve been skating on thin ice and this gonna send me into a spiral.
Any regrets?
23k is not enough money to just go out on a bender like that 😂
Seriously, don’t waste any more energy regretting it or thinking of what you could have done with it instead.
My best friend had a similar situation but significantly more money…gone before she was 22. Having been by her side through all of it; what I can say with confidence is that you did what most kids would do if handed a seemingly endless amount of money.
At 18, you feel like an adult but the reality is your brain hasn’t yet fully developed to handle the type of situations that present themselves with being given a large influx of cash.
Should you ever be in a situation to leave someone you love money; put it in a trust that doesn’t pay out without approval from the estate until an age of 30 and even then pay out over time up until a certain age. Paying out at 18 more often than not is setting someone up for failure.
Learn what you can from it and leave the rest behind.
Yes it was do better I’ve hoped for a break like that since I was 15 never even got to touch my inheritance before my parent sold it for over 400k I never saw.
Have you put that into a compound interest calculator to compound your regret?
Why did you not save?
No big deal at all. You’re young.
It may seem like a lot at a young age, but as you earn more, invest, buy properties, you’ll remember the wild times early in your youth adulthood. There will be less time and more constraints/responsibilities as you enter each decade of your life.
These things are not possible as you get into relationships, have children, take care of elderly parents, become leaders of industry, etc.
How did you manage to make it last four months?
So before I ask this question, I need to give some background.
I am adopted into a family. My “step” grandfather died a multimillionaire. He set up a trust fund to gift the grandchildren a sizeable amount of money a few years before he died. He had specifically told myself and my “step” father that I was included as he didn’t want this to cause problems between me, my “father” and everyone else.
However, when the unfortunate time came, I was cut out. It took a year longer for everyone to receive their share of the trust fund because my step “grandmother” decided I was not family and cut me out. How she did it is still a bit of a mystery… But no one in the family wanted to stand up for me and argue my case because it meant more money for them. I am essentially gaslit into the concept that I am not and never was on the trust.
What hurts is I have one blood relative left on this planet. I always assumed that I was family and welcomed in. I spent most of my life thinking I was part of them. But when it came to money, which was, and still is, in NO short supply, suddenly I am viewed as a bottom feeder and scrounger. I was even told I wasn’t “real family” and that I should count myself lucky that they were willing to help me by association. That hurt more than words can ever convey, but let’s not go there.
I got to watch my family put down money for homes… Buy cars, get married, open businesses. I got to watch them thrive while I struggled. I was “ungrateful” while they were lucky.
What annoys the shit out of me is that you sound exactly like my cousin. You’re clearly not, since the amount of money is off, but I got to see several cousins do exactly what you have described.
My question to you: would you stand up for an adopted family member that you had known for decades, or would you have revelled in the extra year or three of coke and prostitutes you could have gained from my share?
Use it as a learning lesson. You’re very young and making financial mistakes like this is more than okay as you’ll make significantly more than that in your life time. If anything, it’s good to get this lesson out of the way now for the future.
You’ll be just fine kiddo.
If it helps you could have wasted much more money! Also, do you have anything you wished you spent it on or did with the money?
Do you live in the UK? While incredibly irresponsible as it can mean a lot of money for your family, it is far from being a life changing mistake. You are young and can turn around things in a few years with constancy and perseverance. Take it as a wake up call, stop being a child and act as a grown up that needs not just to carry its own weight but to use your life for something good.
So….what’s the best story you got for us? I love me some cocaine fueled hooker tales.
Hey man, I read your responses and it seems like you learned a valuable lesson and have matured a lot because of it. Good for you and keep working hard at staying away from addiction. That part of you never fully dies; it hides in the dark recesses and whispers at you from the shadows, so stay on top of staying healthy.
Don’t beat yourself up too badly. That’s basically a year of tuition at an American college that you blew in one semester instead. You are far from the only dumbass kid to do that. Far better to learn that lesson at 18 than to learn it at 40 when you’ve lost your life savings and your house.
What is the 1 item you most wish you had bought with the money instead of drugs and whores?
My guy , I got 31k ISH and done it in like 10 weeks on cocaine alone. You ain’t alone son.
A lot of young people who receive a large sum waste it. 23,000 sounds like a lot but you can spend that much with out much effort. I had a friend who inherited $50K from his grandma when he was around 18. Spent a year doing drugs, not working, and just partying. Then the money ran out.
I got nothing to berate you for. I just hope you learned the lesson that this teaches. I did the same thing with bitcoin money, although it wasn’t as much as your trust. I don’t regret it, I made two really good friends and had a blast during my 4 months of pretending to be rich. Just make sure next time you come into a lump sum, you invest it for the future.
Could’ve payed off my car, my phone, put some money in some sort of investment and used it to help pay off my student loans. I’m jealous man, at least you got to enjoy it. It’s not productive to berate you on how you spent it, at least you realized you fucked up.
That’s nothing. I know a guy who earns like $250,000 per month. He spends like $100,000 each month on expenses.
Soooo don’t be hard on yourself. Just figure out how to make double, triple, quadruple the amount
My dad left $200k each for my kids for when they turn 21. They’re both under 11 now. Do you have any advice for me so they won’t use the money to kill themselves? I’m teaching them about investing now, but any insight would be appreciated.
You’ve learned nothing.
I’m pretty impressed it lasted you 4 months.
You found $100,000… and turned it into $16,000?
Iykyk
You’re 18, in the grand scheme of things 23k is nothing. Take this as a lesson and start learning about finance, I’m 23 now but I started investing at 18 and am now sitting at about 90k, was a little over 100k until the recent US tariff’s took hold.
Use this shock to start doing something positive. If you start investing now you’ll be way ahead of your peers by the time you’re 21.
Maybe you should have given it to me and I would still have money left
I saw you spent it on Fancy nails and prostitutes and women
So to flip this around instead of such a negative commentary on a situation
What was your most fulfilling / fun / great experience with a prostitute and with a meal?
How did the best prostitution meeting go and what was the most fulfilling and delicious meal basically?
What took so long?
Damn. I’m glad you didn’t get any more than that. At least it was only £23,000 that you pissed away.
I have a very similar story. I regret it too.
But I did help out a few friends with my money too, so I guess I tell myself it’s okay because of that.
Money is temporary and nothing truly matters. Don’t beat yourself up.
I think your mum needs to work on letting this go – it’s not healthy to be holding on to regret, disappointment, anger etc. What is done is done and living in the past won’t change what happened. Can she get help with processing these feelings? Sounds like you learned valuable lessons from it and thankfully it wasn’t a large, life-changing sum of money.
The fact your now like woah I blew 23k! Means you learnt something.
If you were to recieve it again, would you do that again?
You say you weren’t taught how to manage money – this seems like a good lesson. Wouldn’t you say?
What are you going to do differently going forward?
Don’t have regrets, it’s pointless. We all do crazy ish in our younger years, that’s how we know not to be an A.Hole when we are old.
Was selling the family donkey worth the cocaine & prostitutes?
You spent it on hookers and blow, didn’t you? Lol
23k really isn’t much for a trust fund. It’s just not a manageable amount of money to be life changing. Sure, it could go to a down payment on a house, car, etc, but then after you make a years worth of payments what do you do then? Can’t actually DO anything with that other than blow it or invest it in your future and at 18 why would you understand that unless you’ve managed money like that your whole life? For reference… I’m almost 27, and still haven’t gotten my full trust fund, because my mom is paying attention to make sure her investment isn’t thrown away.
What leg up did she think she was giving you? What did she want you to do with it?
Your mother was dumber than you were by giving a struggling young man a small lump sum (not a trust fund). She made the mistake. Both of you need to be kind to you!
And it is low: It’s the cost of many new cars, and plenty of parents make that poor purchase. In the US, it’s like 3 semesters of state university tuition (w/o room and board). It wouldn’t pay off the average student loan if someone your age. Imagine if you had tried a few semesters in the wrong field of study or partied too hard, flunked out, and owed student loan payments of $400/month with no skills gained. Similar debt, similar shame, but stuck in a worse place financially.
I’m more than 10 years older than you and I’d I could tell my younger self something, it would be that the world is full of money and there are few gatekeepers. Start investing in the market even a little in your 20s and you’ll have made the equivalent of that lost amount with little time and little effort. And you’ll keep growing it.
Only 23k? That’s not a trust fund, that’s a small inheritance.
Friend, a) that’s not a trust fund but rather a decent amount of money your mom put away for you. B) 23k is nothing anymore these days, unfortunately. So, while it would’ve been nice to use that money to buy a car or just keep it in the bank and add to it for a house downpayment – don’t beat yourself up too much
Wow. You must feel like a steamy mcdreamy pile of crap… so I’m not gonna shovel more on top. It sounds like you have taken in some very hard lessons in life. Sometimes not opening the box is an option too. Human curiosity is a strong force within us and it can drive us to do obscene things.
My experience is different, my girlfriend (at the time), her Mom won 38 million and let’s just say I was given her card to plan a trip around Europe. No expense was spared. Millions of dollars. I remember the first-class flights alone were upwards of $12k per person? This was a lifetime ago….
Guess where we all are now?…..
Unless you got advice with that trust fund and had some rules around it … it should have never just been given to you. The problem is you say you’ve learned… but you’ll never get the chance to prove it by anyone. Winfalls are rare. but where my thoughts fall to is your Mother. That poor lady. She saved your whole life… as I parent I would have serious relationship boundaries with my kid from that point forward and it would crush me.
Sounds like you’re doing better. Good job, keep going forward!
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