The Three Little Pigs, Pig #2

I’m posting about 2 other friends and the similarities that we’ve had over the ages to the story of the “Three Little Pigs”

As a small child my grandmother use to read “The Three Little Pigs” to me, and it had an everlasting impression on me.

When I was a child, I had two friends that were like brothers to me.  In certain ways, we grew up like the three little pigs in many respects.

So today, I’m going to talk about my Pig #2 friend:

Pig #2 isn’t in the same situation as Pig #1.  He still has his job (and actually making pretty decent money), and his house is better than both mine (by a little) and my first friend (Pig #1).  He also works fairly hard and doesn’t take advantage of his work (or at least not as much as Pig 1 did).  His wife is very attractive and very faithful to him.

So why is he my choice for Pig #2?

My friend always handles his finances poorly, he always lives for the moment.  Back 5 or so years ago, he also had a lot of credit card debt (like friend 1).  But after his mom complained to him (she does his income taxes…), he started changing their spending habits.  There was a time in the past when they bounced 10 checks in a row (incurring the cost of at least $20 overdraw fee for each check bounced…).  Friend #2 is getting better, but he still spends his money rather quickly, taking vacations to Disney every other years and to other expensive places.  Of course, he had to go out and purchase a new boat 4 years ago…  He takes trips out to Las Vegas every year (leaving his wife at home to watch the children).  He also goes out to the bars and buy his friends from work, rounds of drinks.

The last few years, he has been renovating his house, spending 10s of thousands replacing the kitchen and living rooms, bathrooms and driveway (which wasn’t that bad to begin with).

That said, my Friend #2 is lucky.  The house he lives in was his mother-in-law’s old house, it was signed to them as a gift in a trust, although they were suppose to pay 1/3 of the value of it back to his mother-in-law, they haven’t (nor do I think they ever will).  Ironically, his mother-in-law has fallen on more difficult financial times, but I still don’t think they are sending any money to her for the house agreement (even though they can afford it).

My Pig #2 friend doesn’t save anything in any retirement account, nor has he started saving for college for his 2 kids…  Mostly, he is about having a good time…  Although he is married, often he goes out leaving his wife alone with the kids.  In some ways, it’s almost like he was back in college again.

Financially, I’m pretty sure I’m doing better than he is, but not by much.  Getting a free house really helps in his case.  If it wasn’t for the free house, his net worth would be almost as low as Pig #1.

Life isn’t fair sometimes is it!  What do you think about his lifestyle?

-MR