Other people's facepalm financial management

[Frimley111R]

Hardly a week goes by without me hearing about some insane personal financial decision. One neighbour bought a second house, had to scrape the money together and used their credit card to cover the deposit. Another lost his job, didn't get paid for the previous 5 months of work, was so hard up he couldn't even make it out for a drink and then a couple of weeks later bought a BMW Z4 (not new bit still...) WTF is wrong with people?

[Frimley111R]

I live in a middle class area, mostly people are reasonably well off but many are borrowing to keep up. Here's an example:

We went to a neighbour's for Christmas. She is a mobile hairdresser on pin money but drives a new car every 3 years and he is on about £50k, they had 2 kids 7 and 9. The wife said her budget for the kids Christmas stocking (small pressies) was £500. Each. They then got fancy micro scooters (nice enough!), ... oh and Ipod Nanos, engraved with names, when they first came out, and suitcases (bit crap but...) .... filled with laptops! Plus other 'normal' presents.

Also, I heard that the husband got made redundant but found a new job quickly. His redundancy cleared her cc of £25K and yet a few months later it was up to ..... yep, £25k again! Mental.