Money Mistakes: 17 Purchases Teens Wish They Could Undo

Nobody gets through life without making a few money mistakes.

When people hear the phrase money mistake, they usually think of something dramatic: encountering fraud or scams, making a terrible investment, or losing a huge amount of money.

But when we asked kids and teens in the Modak app what they regretted buying, the answers looked very different.

Nobody mentioned losing thousands of dollars.

Nobody talked about financial disasters.

Instead, the regrets were surprisingly ordinary: a Starbucks that wasn’t worth it, a Roblox purchase that disappeared, a charger that never worked, a cookie that somehow cost ten dollars, and a handful of purchases that seemed like a great idea right up until they weren’t.

That’s what made this challenge so interesting.

Because most of these stories aren’t really about money. They’re about expectations, impulse decisions, and those moments when you realize the thing you bought wasn’t actually the thing you wanted.

About this article: The ideas discussed in this article reflect comments submitted by participants in a Modak community challenge and are intended for educational and informational purposes only. The examples below reflect individual experiences shared by participants and are not intended to evaluate the quality, reliability, or value of any specific product, company, or service. The purchases, products, and brands mentioned reflect participants’ personal experiences and opinions and should not be interpreted as endorsements, recommendations, or factual claims about those products or brands. Responses are shared in participants’ own words and are published with participants’ permission.

Why Money Mistakes Happen

Many money mistakes happen because people make everyday decisions influenced by factors like timing, emotions, social pressure, or expectations. That instinct lines up with what the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau’s own guidance for teens and young adults points to: financial capability is less about avoiding every mistake and more about building the judgment to recognize one sooner.

They happen because people are human.

We buy things when we’re excited. We buy things because our friends have them. We buy things because we’re hungry, bored, curious, or convinced that a product will somehow improve our day.

Then reality shows up.

Looking through the responses, a few themes appeared again and again: impulse purchases, social spending, digital purchases, low-quality products, and purchases that seemed worth it in the moment but didn’t feel worth it afterward.

The regret wasn’t always about losing money.

More often, it was about realizing there was probably a better use for it.

Sometimes the Smallest Purchases Leave the Biggest Regrets

One of the most surprising patterns in the challenge was that many of the regrets weren’t expensive at all.

In fact, some of them were the kinds of purchases people make without thinking twice.

One participant admitted:

“I regret getting a venti Starbucks because it was extra money and made my stomach hurt”

There’s something funny about that answer, but it’s also incredibly relatable. The regret isn’t just spending more money than necessary. It’s spending more money and ending up worse off than when you started.

Another teen shared:

“I regret buying a cookie for $10 it was way to expensive”

Ten dollars for a cookie sounds ridiculous after the fact. The problem is that most regrettable purchases never sound ridiculous beforehand.

The same feeling showed up in another response:

“i regret buying wax bottle candies don’t get me wrong they were good for a whole pound but just over priced and i coulda used that money for something else”

That last part is what makes the quote so interesting.

Not “they were bad.”

Not “I hated them.”

Just:

I could have used that money for something else.

That’s where a lot of money regrets begin.

The Biggest Waste of Money According to Teens

If there was one category that showed up over and over again, it was products that simply didn’t live up to what they promised.

One participant summed up the experience perfectly:

“I regret buying a charger that only cost 10$ and it didn’t charge out of the box”

The charger wasn’t expensive, but paying for something that doesn’t work can still feel like money wasted. The FTC’s own consumer advice is clear on this point — being disappointed by a product or service is worth acting on, starting with going back to the seller with your receipt before writing off the money as a loss.

Another teen shared a story that’s almost painful to read:

“A tiny 3D printed animal that broke before we made it home”

Not after a week.

Not after a month.

Before they even made it home.

Then there was this:

“I regret buying a 100$ electric dirtbike that didn’t have a battery because it was only worth 50$!”

At first glance, these purchases seem completely unrelated. A charger, a toy, a dirtbike.

But they’re all teaching the same lesson: price and value are not the same thing.

One of the funniest responses in the entire challenge captured that idea in a single sentence:

“A posture fixer that does in fact not fix my posture.”

Honestly, there isn’t much more to add.

When Digital Purchases Stop Feeling Valuable

Money feels different when it becomes digital.

There’s no wallet getting lighter and no cash changing hands. You tap a button, confirm a purchase, and a few seconds later it’s done.

That might be why several teens mentioned gaming purchases when talking about regret.

One participant wrote:

“I regret buying a face on Roblox and it didn’t show up”

That’s a uniquely modern kind of disappointment. The purchase happened. The money disappeared. The thing you paid for somehow never arrived.

Others weren’t frustrated by glitches. They were frustrated by time.

One teen explained:

“I regret buying online credit. On games, once you spend that money, you can’t get it back. What happens when you no longer play the game? That money is no longer useful.”

Another shared a similar realization:

“I regret spending my money on in game currency because I don’t play games like that anymore and it just feels like a wasted of a lot of my money.”

What’s striking about these responses is how reflective they are.

These aren’t complaints about gaming.

They’re questions about permanence.

A hoodie might sit in your closet for years. A book can stay on your shelf forever.

But what happens when the thing you bought only matters while you’re playing one specific game?

That’s a question a lot of adults still struggle with.

When Spending on Other People Backfires

Some of the strongest responses had nothing to do with stores, apps, or products.

They involved other people.

One participant wrote:

“I regret lending my sister 20 bucks because she still hasn’t paid me back I don’t think she ever will”

The ending makes the whole quote.

You can practically hear the resignation. The CFPB’s guidance on lending money to family and friends makes the same point: talking through expectations up front, even for a small amount, avoids exactly this kind of situation.

Another teen shared:

“I regret buying stuff for my friends when I had 25 dollars because I didn’t save any money”

Generosity is usually a good thing. Most people like helping their friends, buying gifts, or treating someone they care about.

But these responses highlight something important: being generous is a lot easier when you’ve taken care of your own financial goals first.

One of the most personal responses in the challenge was:

“I regret spending money on an ex-boyfriend because he treated me so poorly after all the money I worked hard for and dumbly spent on him”

This isn’t just a money lesson.

It’s a life lesson.

Sometimes the purchases that stay with us the longest aren’t products at all.

The Money Lessons Teens Learned the Hard Way

Every challenge has a few responses that accidentally summarize the entire article.

This was one of them:

“I regret buying Nike dunk shoes because it caused me money which I had to remove from my savings account for. It taught me to save up money for spending so you don’t have to worry about spending.”

That’s a lesson many adults spend years learning. It echoes one of psychology’s most famous findings: Columbia University’s coverage of Walter Mischel’s delayed gratification research found that the ability to wait for a bigger reward later, instead of taking a smaller one now, is a skill that can be practiced and strengthened over time — not a fixed trait some people just have.

Saving for a purchase feels very different from pulling money away from a goal you’ve already been working toward.

Another participant delivered what might be the most unintentionally funny response in the entire dataset:

“I regret buying a piggy bank. I lost all of my money in it. I couldn’t get it back out.”

Somewhere between comedy and tragedy sits a perfectly trapped collection of coins.

And then there was this:

“So much Monster energy (the caffeine addiction was WILDDDD)”

It’s easy to laugh at that answer, but it points to something real.

Many money mistakes aren’t one big decision. They’re built around repetition. A drink here. A snack there. A small purchase that doesn’t seem important until you realize you’ve made it fifty times.

What These Money Mistakes Actually Reveal

The funny thing about reading hundreds of money regrets is that very few of them were actually about money.

Nobody was sitting there calculating interest rates or analyzing investment returns.

They were talking about disappointment. About realizing something wasn’t worth what they paid for it. About wishing they had waited. About wishing they had saved. About discovering that the thing they wanted and the thing they valued weren’t always the same thing.

That’s why challenges like this are so interesting to us at Modak.

Every week, kids and teens in the Modak community participate in challenges like this one, sharing their experiences, opinions, and lessons learned along the way. If you’d like to join future challenges, earn rewards, and build real-world money skills, you can get started with Modak and become part of the conversation.

What makes these responses so valuable is that they don’t come from experts or textbooks.

They come from experience.

A Roblox purchase that didn’t show up.

A charger that never worked.

A pair of shoes that came out of savings.

A sibling who still owes you twenty bucks.

Those moments are frustrating when they happen, but they’re also how people start developing judgment.

And that’s ultimately what good money management is: not making perfect decisions every time, but getting a little better at recognizing which purchases are actually worth it.

Because if this challenge proved anything, it’s that most regrets aren’t caused by spending money.

They’re caused by realizing, a little too late, what you would have rather done with it.