I heard someone talking about this weekend. For them it was a decorating accessory that was vintage. They loved it and looked at it, and looked at it, and walked away….and has always regretted it.
It could be a home item, a clothing item, a piece of jewelry, a food item from afar they you regret not buying and bringing home. Anything! Maybe it wasn’t necessarily a “good buy” - but that is where my mind goes. Mostly something that you really, really, REALLY regret not buying.
About 8 years ago, regret not purchasing a good-sized lot (slightly over an acre) in Florida with over 300 feet of ocean frontage and spectacular changing scenery/views. (Was the last unimproved waterfront lot in a highly developed area.)
Every inch of the lot was level & usable.
Perfect location for my preferences of access to the state’s most beautiful beaches, tennis, golf, health club, dining, etc.
An historic house, known as “The Elephant House,” in Marblehead, MA. We made a low offer, and I had mentally moved into that house before the owners (acrimonious divorce) pulled it off the market. About six months later, on the day we were to sign the purchase-and-sale on the house we did buy, their realtor called to say they wanted to sell the house and accepted our offer. By that time, though, we’d looked at too many houses, and DH didn’t want to deal with the antiquity of the Marblehead house. To this day, that is the house that got away. I still have regrets.
I can’t think of anything smaller I regret walking away from, except maybe that one boy… (JK)
About 10 years ago I saw a necklace in a jewelry shop in one of the resort towns in northern Michigan where we vacation. It was evenly sized aquamarine beads, about the size of baroque pearls. Both of our kids were in college at the time and I didn’t want to spend the money. I have regretted it since, I wear a lot of blue and I think I would have worn them a lot.
Kindof silly… but there is some old ratty blue shag carpeting that I regret not replacing in our first house back in NY. We did a lot of other improvements, and that was not addressed during our 8 years there. (There was also brown/gold shag in another bedroom, not as annoying.)
Never leave anything you want at a resale shop! I saw a great craft table that would have been perfect for my painting hobby. I wanted to think about it…and of course it was gone two days later.
There was also a gorgeous batik sundress and jacket on the first stop on my first cruise. I just couldn’t decide but thought there would be something like it in the following week and multiple islands. Nope.
These are fun to read! So sorry for all of your “losses”!!
I’ve had my fair share of items left behind but have tried to learn my lesson.
So I’m standing in a store looking at a small 4 ft fold up table which was very light weight compared to the rest of them.
I unfolded it, debated, put it back together. As I was about to convince myself I didn’t really need it a gentleman near me said “You know you want it. Buy it!” And I did–they were gone by the next week.
I got to accompany husband on an all expenses paid business trip to China several years ago. There was a Cloisonne gift shop in the Summer Palace where I fell in love with a blue bowl, cloisonne inside and out, but was talked out of buying by our interpreter who thought I could get better prices elsewhere. (I think it was about 900 yuan.) Of course I never saw anything I liked as well and wish I had bought it at the time.
We did go to an enamel factory (that I tracked down and requested) and got some pieces there. And current research suggests that Summer Palace gift shop may have had overpriced non-authentic pieces. Maybe I dodged a bullet? Who knows.
I’m going to say no. Simply for the fact you keep thinking about it and wish you had it.
If you were buying it for investment, resale etc. then you dodged a bullet. But you wanted it for basically a souvenir to remember your travels. It might’ve cost more than it was worth but satisfied your desire at the time.
I read a study long ago on “satisfaction after purchase”. The most satisfied consumer after several weeks wasn’t the person who studied all the specs and analyzed all the angles prior purchase be it a car purchase or a poster on the wall. It wasn’t the one who “got the best deal”.
The most satisfied was the person who had a gut feeling of what they wanted and went with it. They simply “liked it more”. Maybe the car didn’t have the highest pick-up or the poster didn’t match in their decor as well as another would have but they were the happiest with their purchases. Sometimes your instinct is better than your brain for some decisions.
I love the Canadian Rockies. ShawWife is from. there. We hike there almost every summer and when our kids were living with us, would take a couple of weeks a year to ski. I found a house about 20 years ago that was about C$400K. It was being finished and was the outside unit of a three house building. We would have had to rent it out and probably would not have broken even on it for the first few years. I had a sense that the market was going to be very strong and there was a physical limit on how many houses that could be built there because it was surrounded by national and provincial parks. So, it seemed like it would be a way to participate in a big growth. ShawWife really did not want to take care of it. Anyway, it would probably sell for upwards of C$2 million now. I think that was the one that got away.
I have a similar story related to a blue sapphire ring in Asheville, NC. My H said he would buy me the ring. I looked at it probably 3 times over the week we were there. FINALLY, the night before we were leaving, I decided I wanted the ring. I said “If the shop is open before we leave, I will get the ring. If not, we’ll leave without it.” Shop was not open. Full disclosure - a couple of years later we went back to Asheville, and I did get a purple sapphire ring from the same shop (which is now permanently closed).
Going WAY back in time…
My ex-H and I had an opportunity to buy a house in Chevy Chase, MD for a very reasonable price in the late 1980s. BUT, the house needed lots of updating, and it was close to being across the street from his parents. It was at the high end of what we could afford in our 20s. The houses there now sell for well over a million bucks. OOPs….
I still kick myself for not buying that beautiful Prada dress that fit like it was tailored for me and was discontinued 80% at the (now defunct) local Neiman. I could have got a lot of mileage out of it and gave it to kid to be resold, likely for more $ than I paid for it!
I’m glad you got the purple sapphire ring!
I go to the shop up north almost every time we’re there but they’ve never had anything similar since then.
I tried on a pair of black Manolo Blahnik shoes at Nieman Marcus well over 20 years ago that fit so well and looked so good. They were $400 at the time, way more than I had ever spent on a pair of shoes. I would have worn them a lot though!
My oldest friend’s grandmother lived about 30 miles from us. In 1999, she died (the grandmother, not my friend) and my friend offered us the house for around $100K. My father had just passed away and we had the money. But I thought it wasn’t practical – the grandmother had lived there for eight million years, and the house needed everything. So, we declined. 
My H always bought the nicest piece of jewelry in the hotel gift shop when he was overseas. They are really gorgeous pieces but he probably overpaid but it made him happy and they are lovely (though they mostly live in the safety deposit box).
We had liked a house and even put in an offer. Our offer was rejected. As we had liked the neighborhood, we visited the house several times and noticed a lot of no parking signs springing up & down the street. We also noticed a HUGE house being built behind the house we liked that would leave the house in shade much of the time.
The sellers asked us to make another offer but we declined. The house likely went way up in value (like more than 10x) since but we didn’t want to live in a shadow.
Happily we found a house we love shortly thereafter and bought it instead. We’ve owned this other place over 35 years.
I try very hard not to live with regret at having missed out on something. My family has a motto, if you see something you like get it, especially when on vacation.
Great timing. My “regret” is a cute outfit that I ordered. It was a top and bottom, on sale, great price. But the reviews said the top ran very small so size up. So I did, but it was too big for me. The pieces had come separately so if I kept the pants and reordered the top, I’d have to take the return top to the store, order the new top and pay shipping (which was almost half again as much as the top, and they would request the shipping be credited back but couldn’t guarantee), or I’d have to go to the store a second time to pick it up there. Decided it was not worth the hassle so returned both the top and the pants. Later regretted it, was able to find the top in my size (but the price had gone up) and the pants are now unavailable. Oh well. Bummer. My s’s mantra is “don’t live with regret”. will follow it next time.