Impulse Buys
 

Trying hard to save up money for Animenorth in two weeks got me thinking about impulse buys. What are the silliest things that you have bought, or realized that you just wasted your money on? They don't necessarily have to be useless, or impulse buys; just admittedly overpriced or worth a second thought.

Very quickly I can think of things around my house that I really regret buying, seeing as the cash supply is low for me:


Gloomy Bear Plushie = $25, I thought I'd never see this anywhere else and it was so cute.

IPod In-Ear Headphones = $50, well I've basically lived off these since I bought them, but I could've gotten severely cheaper headphones, since I'm not a quality freak.

Nintendogs DS skin = approx. $13, I don't even have Nintendogs anymore :S

Boogiepop Phantom VHS tapes! = $12 for volumes 2-4, we all know how old VHS is! There were the dvds, but the tapes were a steal. Unfortunately, I had no inclination to watch the series, and at least one of the tapes doesn't even work -_-;

The Toastmaster's Treasure Chest = $10, a rather useless book of quotes. Damn those Chapters' $10 feature books!

Chop Meat ($2.79/lb, 3.48 lbs, $9.71) It's been in my refrigerator for a good four days now. I could make tacos, sloppy joes or Hamburger Helper with this meat, but I haven't had the will to cook anything over the weekend, and during the work week you can forget me being in the kitchen for anything other than a drink.

The most impulsive buys for me usually constitutes a game or something I might give as a gift. If you want specifics, I'd say the most recent was a Sterling Silver fork bracelet, which was more than overpriced.

If meat is the most impusilve buy, you're doing well : D

Cheap Digital Camera from Wal-Mart: $20 I hardly even use cameras, but even if I wanted to use one this is not the one to use. I'll probably never buy one of those cameras that costs hundreds of dollars, but I'll never get another cheap one like this, either.

Shadow of the Colossus - My friend was going to be home in a few days and he told me not to buy it since it's too short. I bought it anyway and finished it really quickly. Not worth full price.

iPod Video - Um, I pretty much only use it on plane rides. =\

I just bought a bass guitar and amp today at about 400 dollars. Now all I need to do is learn bass... It seemed like a cool idea at the time.

Pretty much any TV Show on DVD release

Don't let me anywhere near a Best Buy, trust me. I'll drain a wallet in no time.

"Wow, first 3 seasons of the X-Files on sale? Look, they're normally 100 bucks, but you save an additional 15 dollars if you buy 3 sets for $40 each!"

"Hey, look, the Muppet Show is on DVD! And it's so cheap!"

"Oooh, Earth2! I've never heard of it, but you get the whole series in one boxset! Better pick it up!"

GOODBYE MONEY!

Ohh, and don't even mention the new slimline anime series releases! It's like I'll pick up any 13/26-episode series if it's 30-40 bucks.

TROOF!

Every time I go into Best Buy I always end up dropping like $200. EVERY TIME! The last time I went there (which was on Tuesday) I bought MegaMan X Collection on PS2, Splinter Cell: Pandora Tomorrow on Xbox, , Munich, An Unfinished Life, Match Point and BrainAge on DS. Brain Age is the only thing I've played so far and Munich was only watched by my sister yesterday while I cooked in a fever of 102.

This is rather unhealthy. :/

I learned from my mistake. I once bought Devil May Cry brand spanking new for $50, thoroughly regretted my buy, but by that time it was a Greatest Hits and resell for high would've been very difficult. Never again did I buy a game on impulse.

The Art of Warhammer 40,000 + Mercenary: 11 Dreams + Motorola RAZR = $750 wasted.

The phone I use frequently now though.

PSP for $420 after tax, and a Bad Motherfucker wallet for about $35 after tax. I can't think of anything else off the top of my head, but I'm usually quite a notorious impulse buyer.

Aww shit... I didn't even think about my PSP. Although that wasn't so much an impulse buy, so much as it was a "I know it's coming, I'm buying that shit the day it comes out".

It's now as broken as my brittle emo heart. :(

Star Ocean 3: I got this in January sometime at Best Buy for $20 and everytime I played it, I've noticed more and more things wrong with it. I got it 'cause I haven't played a new RPG in a while, and unfortunately this was a disappointment compared to the last RPG I've played, Tales of Symphonia. That game was awesome : /

Months passed where I've liked everything I've purchased, until just now when I purchased a FFVII: AC Cloud figure at Ebay. It was a tad pricey, but was actually the cheapest I've found. However it looks so awesome that I'm sure it's worth it :D

I'm going to be saving up for a Wii, and it's hard not to buy things in the meantime. I want that new Squall fig :D

Magic the gathering cards some 2-3 years ago.

Seriously.

I wasted money on it just because... well, just because. Looking back, all that money could've been put to better use.

Walked into BestBuy around sometime in April, probably the 2nd week and to my surprise the Xbox 360 was available. 3 Premium's and 2 Core systems available on a Sunday afternoon. :eyebrow: Either way, I plunked down $399+tax, extra controller and a game. The blasted thing doesn't work properly out of the box and I'm waiting on BestBuy to restock so I can exchange it. Either way, that's a good $500 or so dollars. :doh:

Random foil/rare for 15-20+ bucks every now and then. =(

Pretty much every PC game I've bought. I just don't get enough in them 99% of the time so they just stay in a pile of CD somewhere in my room.

Quite literally almost every time I walk past the $5.50 DVD rack @ walmart. I shouldn't even be allowed NEAR that rack :). The other day I was in there and bought 4 movies from there, movies that I just kind of like.

Most expensive impulse buy I've ever made was a Nintendo DS. I kinda immediately got bored with it and sold it to pay debts, but now I want a DS Lite more than anything.

Most worthwhile impulse buy I made was Dream Theater's 1999 Fanclub CD. It was mislabelled on eBay a while ago, so I immediately used "buy it now" and snaffled it for £30. Shame I had to sell it to pay the aforementioned debts - I did wind up netting £90 for it, though.

Worst impulse buy I've ever made was a train ticket to Nottingham. I don't remember buying it. I have no motivation to go to Nottingham as I live in Canterbury and was in London at the time. I've got no idea what happened there.

Creepy! I'm listening to the title track right now.

My PSP is my biggest impulse buy. I enjoy it, but it was still bought on impulse. Much like my DS, come to think of it, which I also still enjoy.

I did buy some crappy anime box set once, I forget the series but it was amazingly cheap ($10 for something that's NOT a bootleg!). Hated it, traded it in at Gamestop and got $5 per DVD. With 3 DVDs, I made a $5 profit off of it.

beatmaniaIIDX RED CS was an impulse pre-order. I meant to take it off before it shipped, but I forgot play-asia ships early. Bye, $80 :<

A Stand Alone Complex DVD at AnimeNorth 2005 for $30cdn. I could have just waited until I got home and gotten it for $20.

Almost everything you see for sale at anime cons is horribly overpriced anyway, unless it's a retail chain setup like Waldenbooks who can afford to lose $1 or $2 on each graphic novel they sell.

Last fairly big impulse buy I had was my Gameboy Color. It was on sale at KB-Toys for something like $30 off, my old Gameboy was dying, and I wanted a new one to finish playing Pokemon with. Turns out I was just about at the end of the darned game, so the only use my GBC gets anymore is the occasional game of Tetris since it's always in my backpack.

I have done a lot of impulse buys over the last few years. I have my on and off times. I would go a couple months where I don't buy anything, and my expenses are pretty low. Then there would be a set of months where I'm buying whatever's interesting that comes my way. ;_; I haven't made any "impulse buys" since last summer. I just made one a couple days ago importing a DS lite right after mr current DS broke. ;_; Impulse buy. $180. Basically paid $50 more to get it a month earlier and for a different color (but then again, I wouldn't be able to make purchases like these next month). Hot. I will say it was worth it.

A couple years ago I went on a classic gaming (more like SNES) collecting spree, so I spend hundreds getting classic SNES games. Last school year, I remember buying basketball cards on impulse.

Oh, I also tend to go to concerts on impulse. I usually end up going on craigslist to get last minute tickets and stuff. Even my trip to LA for the first Dear Friends concert was impulse.... and I went to it during my final exam week. :p

I'm sure I've bought plenty of things on impulse that I regretted, but the one jumping to mind was that brand-new copy of Lunar: Silver Star Story Complete years and years ago. God, what an atrociously bad game. One of the few games I ever hated enough to sell, and the one that made me forever swear off buying new games on impulse. Now whenever I'm tempted to buy something that's new and full price ($60+), I hold off and do some research first, or at least have some patience and wait until it drops in price. Lesson learned.

Thanks, Lunar! In the long run you probably saved me more money than I wasted on you, so I guess we're even.

I bought a dolphin globe thing for about $1 b/c I thought my sister would like it (even though I already had a gift for her). Also, candy can sometime be an impulse buy for me.