My $8,000 TV Stand
By: Scott Reilly
Tags: Growing Up, Money, Videogames, Investing, Stock Market

It is rattan. It might be from the Pelican Reef collection. Down here in Florida, that is pretty popular. Our living room TV sits on top. It has three drawers. We hide old DVDs and Blu-rays in those, along with wires to electronics we will never use again.

My wife hates it and wanted to throw it away during all three of our cross-town moves. She says it’s not a TV stand. It’s more like a clothes drawer. I say honey… it’s neither.

It’s actually a memory that will serve me for the rest of my life. A deep, philosophical fable comes to mind, every time we sit down to watch a movie. This ugly, dust-collecting chest of drawers is the biggest money mistake I’ve ever made.

I’m not talking about the $500 price tag it had when I bought it 8 years ago. I. still cringe thinking I paid even that much for it in cash. I actually do a deeper analysis on the Ugly Duckling stand. I think its real ticket price might be closer to $8,000, and we absolutely hate this thing.

Back in 2009, the stock market imploded. I just started working after college and I had a little money saved up. My brother introduced me to Scottrade, an easy way to invest in stocks yourself without a broker. I had absolutely no idea what I was doing, but I’d heard you should invest in what you know. The only thing early-20s-me knew, was video games.

Take-Two Interactive was a logo I saw when firing up some of my favorites. Max Payne, Grand Theft Auto. They were responsible for the joy I felt spending so many hours immersed in virtual worlds. Even if I didn’t know whether they would be a good company to invest in, I just liked the idea of being part of what they do. I bought 45 shares at $8.78 per share in 2009.

Fast forward to 2012. I moved to Florida to pursue my life as a pirate. This was one of the most exciting times of my life. Venturing away from my hometown and making it in the real world. I was however, broke. I needed first and last months rent and I was borrowing a blow-up mattress to sleep on. I needed furniture. At the time, I looked at my dabbling in the stock market as simply gambling and a fun little way to feel like a real investor. I decided the gain I had made on my initial buy was going to outfit my living room.

I sold 44 shares at $11.98 per share for a grand total of 528 bucks! I made money! I sold every share except one. I only kept it to keep the account open. With that sale and the liquidation of my other two stocks, I had a few thousand dollars. I bought a bed, a cheap couch and the most expensive wicker tv stand ever.

Now jump ahead to 2017, when marijuana started looking like a good investment. I wanted to gamble on the stock market again. I reached out to Ameritrade to inquire about opening my account back up. The guy on the phone said there was still 100 bucks in there. Curious. I thought there was nearly 0. He said you have one share of Take-Two Interactive.

I had not looked to see how this was doing in years. I had completely forgotten about my roll of the dice from a decade ago. I will always look at my one share and smile. Today, in December of 2020 it is worth $183.39. Multiply that by 45 to get a ballpark of what I would have if I had held on to the stock. $8,252.55. My account lets me know that it has increased in value 1,988.72% Thanks for the reminder. Peter Lynch would call that a 20-banger.

What did I learn? Furniture is a bad investment. It loses its value and you’ll get sick of it over time. I put the Quasimodo stand on Offer Up at one point and got no offers. The bed was thrown away. The cheap leather couch started falling apart, but some college students came and picked it up for free. I hope it’s in some frat house somewhere and dudes are playing video games on it.

Quasi is now front and center in our living room. Hey! He’s worth 8 grand! I’ll hang on to him like my one share of Take-Two as a reminder.