This is a little odd, but the first thing that popped into my head was: a camper, especially one of those huge stand-alone type (as opposed to a pop-up tent camper).
Campers are so big and so expensive, and most people only use them for a small fraction of the year.
The rest of the time, you have to find a place to put it, and most people’s driveways are not large enough to store a camper.
And even if you do have enough space, an enormous camper does kinda look ugly.
(unless you have something cool like an Airstream)
I wouldn’t rule out the possibility of a camper trip one day, but Mr. FG and I have always said we’d rent one for something like that.
A boat! My husband wants one but I am not a boat person. I get migraines from too much sun. I love lakes, but the edge of them. I love kayaking too. Maybe it’s the motor part of it. Too complicated. Then we have to store it on our property. A waste of money. He isn’t the type to waste something though. He would use it all the time- that’s what I’m afraid of! Ha!
They say the happiest day in your life is the day you buy a boat. The second happiest is the day you sell the boat.
Good one, Christopher?
Winnebago travel trailers. For as much as they cost, and the work in emptying the sewage and so on, I’d have to stay in a lot of hotels to make it financially a good move. Also, I like to get up and leave a hotel, knowing someone else is going to clean the bathroom and change the sheets—I’d hate to take my dirty dishes and used sheets and towels down the road with us!
A pool. A house we lived in for a year growing up had one and I remember the maintenance not being worth it.
All the things mentioned above–and all things I’ve had personal experience with via family member’s owning them–and also a second home. I have zero interest in maintaining/furnishing/cleaning a second home. Or moving between two homes. That would be so stressful for me.
So true! Everyone always wants a second home on the beach or in the mountains…. It just seems like a lot of work to me.
That is true. I always think about how much work it takes to maintain one house (always something to improve/fix/maintain!), and I can’t imagine keeping up with two.
Definitely agree, a second home. Not. For. Me.
For many years I had two homes–it was much more stressful than I’d ever anticipated. Feeling guilty about having so much–feeling worried about what was happening to the house when I wasn’t there–worrying if I used the house enough. Of course there were many upsides as well–my children have many happy memories of the place now. They feel a pull to the beach town I love and now live in full time, which they wouldn’t have if I’d bought the beach house when they were adults.
My first thought was a porche or other high end car. My second thought was a cow. Lol.
It seems like every time I buy half a dozen gallons of milk at once, someone (which, not to stereotype but to stereotype, it’s usually a guy a decade older than my husband and me) asks if really I shouldn’t just have a milk cow. Nope. I do not need to milk a cow. That’s what the dairy famers do and I am more than happy to pay them to do it.
Beef cow, sure. They are much more self-sufficient!
Haha, those are two vastly different thoughts!
Everything mentioned previously, and anything else that’s expensive and requires upkeep. I’d much rather spend the money to rent: whether it’s a camper, boat, hotel room with a pool, vacation home, or ritzy car. Even a cow–I’d rather rent a cow than own it.
A pool. No concerns over my small children drowning, plus my husband is the person in charge of the 2 pools at the facility he works at and for maintenance reasons he has said we will never own a pool. Michigan has enough lakes anyways, right? 😉
Yep. I like that my parents have a pool. All the benefits, none of the downsides!
I wouldn’t want a pool! We have a pool here in AZ in the retirement community where we live. I love using it daily but I love not having to maintain it. Growing up, my family stayed in hotels when we vacationed which was often. We never camped and I never (NEVER) had the desire to camp. Fast forward 50 years and I started to have a strong desire to live in a tiny house because I no longer wanted a big home, yard and all the stuff that goes with it. So my husband and I decided to sell absolutely everything we owned, buy a big truck and a travel trailer to pull behind it and we are now retired full time RV-ers with very few possessions. Never in my wildest dreams did I see that myself living this way until about 5 years ago. But I wouldn’t trade it for anything! To be fair, I don’t see us as “campers” though. We are living with alllllll the same luxuries of living in a nice house except on a much smaller scale. (A/C, soft water, capabilities to bake and cook to my heart’s content, everything I could possibly want or need.) Plus we have no mortgage, no vehicle payments, no rent, (we own an RV lot in a 55+ park in AZ), no yard work, very little cleaning and some general RV maintenance. I’m now living my Tiny House dream but it’s in a camper. So besides never wanting to own a pool, it’s can also say that I will never own a big house with a yard again. It’ll be tiny home living for me!
Second home resonates with me. I have too much stuff to manage with just one home — can’t imagine “going to the lake house” or similar.
Travel trailer I could do under certain circumstances. Harvesters live in trailers all summer so that’s how I grew up. It’s so much work to move in and out! But — it’s not a separate household. It’s the same household, just in a smaller space for a significant part of the year.
Here’s a video from my friend Tracy to explain a bit; she calls hers the Cottage: https://youtu.be/2FVX14RYVTM?t=521
Also, there are two specific rooms I don’t want to own — a second living room, or a second/formal dining area.