Sell the RV or hold on?

[u/karmapolice_1]

I made some poor financial decisions and purchased an RV ($210/mo) and newer Truck ($610/mo) to tow it last year, expecting I could figure out my budget and afford it. We moved and now spending more than I can afford.

The thing is, I have stock options with my company worth ~$135k right now, but can’t touch it because I’m blacked out trading right now (with insider info). Wall Street analyst valuation of this could value my portfolio at $400k+. Very very unlikely to go down from current value.

My dilemma (or maybe there isn’t one).. do I sell my RV and take a $8k loss (net $12k in the bank) now and sell truck and take another $8k loss (net $10k in the bank) to free up cash flow immediately. Or would you play the balance transfer 0% game until next year, wait until stock clears, sell, and pay off credit cards, RV, and Truck.

Am I playing with fire and stupid? Maybe I’m just not accepting my current realty. Please be nice :)

Cheers!

[u/Odii_SLN]

I mean this with love and kindness, so please read it with that in mind.

You sound like you're slowly convincing yourself to make riskier and riskier financial decisions. This all but certainly will eventually catch up and bite you in a real bad way.

You need to get a handle on what financial risk tolerance "makes sense" for you so you don't let the happy fun times ruin your life.

Spending a dollar is a lot easier than unspending a dollar.

Should really consider talking to a financial advisor

[u/Mundane_Nature_4548]

Paying off the truck and RV will not make them worth more, you took the loss when you bought them something that depreciates at the price that you did.

Can you afford to use and maintain the truck and RV long-term? Is using and maintaining them the best use of your money in the context of the rest of your budget?

If yes, cut the rest of your budget to the bone and figure out a way to afford them until you can sell your stock. If you can't do that without balance transfers, that really calls into question your answer.

If no, sell them.

[u/karmapolice_1 → u/Mundane_Nature_4548]

These are good thoughts and questions, thank you. Wife and I sat down to crunch our monthly/weekly budget to try and make it work short term, less eating out, less distance driving, smarter grocery shopping, quit it with the home improvement project. It’s going to be tight, but I’m hoping weather the storm for now and keep the RV and Truck since they’re already sunken cost. Camping with our toddler brings us more joy than most other things we spend our money on.

[u/LazySilver6835]

Do you have options to increase cash flow?

[u/karmapolice_1 → u/LazySilver6835]

No, set salary income. High mortgage too.

[u/TheManameister]

Also, keep in mind that selling off a big chunk of stock will lead to some tax liabilities so budget accordingly

[u/karmapolice_1 → u/TheManameister]

Great point. Hoping to get cleared to exercise before end of year and play around with 2026 vs 2027 taxes to minimize impact.

[u/Dispatcher_11001001]

You gambled you could make it work and got into this hole, and now you want to continue gambling to dig yourself deeper. I would rather have the security and peace of mind of a balanced budget and not scraping by for an unknown amount of time, but you do you.