The Best Money I've Ever "Wasted"

Financial planners spend a lot of time talking about return on investment. We compare charges, analyse performance, and calculate opportunity cost. So it might surprise you to learn that one of my best-ever investments made almost no financial sense.

It became far more than somewhere to cook — particularly during lockdown.

Seven years ago, we bought a BBQ hut. It wasn't cheap. By the time we had paid for the hut itself, the groundworks, electrics, television, and furnishings, we had spent a considerable sum. Measured purely as a financial investment, the spreadsheet would have told us not to buy it. That money could have been invested, and given enough time, it might have grown significantly.

I’m very glad we ignored the spreadsheet.

For several years, the hut became a central part of our routine. Most Sundays, we’d light the barbecue, watch football, invite family or friends over, and spend hours talking, eating, and laughing together. It gave us a deliberate reason to slow down at the end of each week. Eventually, my wife declared she’d had enough of burgers every Sunday, which forced us to get creative. The BBQ evolved into a proper outdoor kitchen where we experimented with everything from slow-cooked chillies to stews in a cast-iron Dutch oven.

Then Covid arrived, and Leicester experienced some of the longest and strictest local lockdowns in the country. For months on end, our Sunday routine barely changed, but it suddenly mattered far more. Restaurants were closed, holidays were cancelled, and entertainment was non-existent. But we could escape to the BBQ hut. We watched television, streamed Glastonbury, cooked together, and simply enjoyed being somewhere that wasn’t the kitchen or the living room. Looking back, I honestly don't know how we’d have coped without it. Nobody could have factored that value into a financial model before we bought it.

Today, we don't use it every Sunday. Life has changed, the boys are older, and weekends are busier. Sometimes weeks pass without us lighting the barbecue—and that's perfectly okay. I don't judge the purchase by how often we use it today; I judge it by the memories it created over seven years, and especially by the comfort it provided during an extraordinary period of our lives. That is something no portfolio statement could ever capture.

For us, it was a BBQ hut. For someone else, it might be a campervan, a golf membership, or something equally difficult to justify purely on paper. Financially, these things may make little sense. Life can produce a rather different return.

As a financial planner, I still believe that investing for the future is essential. But money has another purpose entirely. Sometimes its greatest return isn't found in compound growth, but in family conversations that last longer than expected, Sunday afternoons with people who matter to you, and a space that gives you room to breathe when the world feels overwhelming.

Not every purchase needs to maximise your wealth. Sometimes, the best purchases simply maximise your life. When I look back at that BBQ hut, I don't see the money spent—I see seven years of memories.

I'd buy it again tomorrow.

Join me each Friday for Tomorrow’s Notes — one thoughtful email about money, time and making the most of what comes next.