When purchasing a diamond ring, no one (at least I didn’t) considers the risks of such an investment. What happens if you have to resell the diamond ring? Where do you sell it? Who the hell wants to buy a used diamond?
Diamond sellers may have convinced you that diamonds are forever. While that may be true, sometimes relationships are seasonal. You will lose money if you ever have to resell an engagement ring.
I know this from personal experience. A part of my story was shared on High Fiving Dollar’s blog in a post titled Crucial Mindset Shifts to Master Your Money. Read what was shared below!
This life lesson was learned over four years ago. After it happened, I did what any creative writer would have done. I wrote about the experience in a sad but highly creative letter.via GIPHY
On Monday my heart decided to pack its bags and head to Houston without conversing with me first. I came home on my lunch break to find my heart had already packed its suitcases, emptied its closets, and taken pictures off of the wall. My heart had already made up its mind that it would flee my existence. After seeing this on my lunch break, I went back to work in a great deal of invisible pain. Invisible in the sense that my coworkers could not detect it, at least I suppose they could not. Would anything I say when I got home change my hearts mind?
When I got home, I would try to plead with my heart not to leave me. “I don’t want you to leave” I’d say. But the suitcases and crates on the floor would whisper, “Your heart has already made up its mind…”
My heart would say, “Just tell me to unpack and I will stay” and “I am sorry.” These words in my left ear and out of my right ear and down the street. The suitcases and the crates’ whisper were louder than any screams she could make at the top of its lungs. My stubborn heart had made up its mind earlier in the day, and nothing I said to her that night could have changed anything.
When I purchased the engagement ring, I initially went in to buy something I could afford. Something I could afford was in the neighborhood of $300. Just like I was suckered into buying a new car by a saleswoman, I was suckered into buying a $1,200 1/2 carat diamond ring I could not afford by another one.
In addition to pressure being applied by the saleswoman, my friend’s applied pressure, too. They would tell me, “Why would anyone accept a $300 ring? Jerry, stop being a cheap ass!” It was my fault for folding under pressure.
The societal pressure to purchase a diamond is real. I feel like it is moreso a contest of who can purchase the biggest ring than is it is about love. If I would have purchased a 1 carat ring, would that have meant I loved the girl I was proposing to twice as much?
When I sold the ring a couple of years ago, the first place I went to was the pawn shop. I walked in and ask the guys there to inspect the ring and give me a price. After looking at the ring for a second, they told me something about the price of gold being down and offered $100 for it.
I politely declined and told them that I would try my luck on the open market.
The channel I chose was a Facebook group called New Orleans-Kenner garage sale. I made sure to publish the initial price of the ring ($1,200) along with my asking price of $300.
After two hours passed, I lured a fish in! The fish was a guy who lived in New Orleans. I’d be driving to New Orleans that weekend and I would meet him in the Lakeside mall parking lot.
When I met up with the guy in the mall parking lot, he asked me to hop in his truck so he could inspect the ring. I politely declined and allowed him to inspect the ring with me standing next to his vehicle. After inspecting the ring for a few minutes, he handed me $300 and I wished him the best of luck with his marriage.
He had proposed a week before without a ring so this would be a Christmas gift for her!
While my first engagement did not work out, I can no longer allow the past to hold me back. With any investment, investing your time, energy, and money into love has risks involved.
I recently allowed someone very special to get away from me because I was afraid of the risks. While I cannot change the past, I will work harder to make moves in the present to create a better future for myself and future wife.
As for purchasing a ring again, I guess I have no choice in the matter. If that’s what my future wife wants, she will get it. We will just have to make the smart move and purchase something affordable. Perhaps a bubble gum ring?
Time will tell. Focused on paying this debt back now. 93% done with my car loan!
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