# the largest check i wrote, i wrote 2 minutes ago **URL:** \ **Category:** Miscellaneous and Personal Stuff I Must Share\ **Created:** [May 29, 2004, 1:55pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-largest-check-i-wrote-i-wrote-2-minutes-ago/247677 "2004-05-29T13:55:41Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 1
**Author:** ![SlickRoenick](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/e68b1a/32.png) [@SlickRoenick](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/SlickRoenick)\ **Post date:** [May 29, 2004, 1:55pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-largest-check-i-wrote-i-wrote-2-minutes-ago/247677/1 "2004-05-29T13:55:41Z")
$4869.02 and this will finally pay off my student loan from those Sallie Mae people. I feel so bad but so good. ---
**Author:** ![ioioio](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/ioioio/32/316_2.png) [@ioioio](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/ioioio)\ **Post date:** [May 29, 2004, 2:43pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-largest-check-i-wrote-i-wrote-2-minutes-ago/247677/2 "2004-05-29T14:43:52Z")
[This](http://www.cnn.com/2002/fyi/teachers.ednews/07/18/degree.dollars.ap/) may make you feel a little better. > [@](#): > > WASHINGTON (AP) – If you are a high school student thinking about college, consider this: Someone with a bachelor’s degree earns nearly $1 million more over his or her lifetime than a high school graduate. The biggest check I ever wrote was when I closed on my house. That left me stunned for days. ---
**Author:** ![OpalCat](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/o/8edcca/32.png) [@OpalCat](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/OpalCat)\ **Post date:** [May 29, 2004, 2:53pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-largest-check-i-wrote-i-wrote-2-minutes-ago/247677/3 "2004-05-29T14:53:00Z")
I overheard a woman at the bank on Thursday writing out a check for $30,000 to “cash”. I don’t know what she was doing, but the teller told her to do that… ---
**Author:** ![Scribble](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/scribble/32/3317_2.png) [@Scribble](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Scribble)\ **Post date:** [May 29, 2004, 5:03pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-largest-check-i-wrote-i-wrote-2-minutes-ago/247677/4 "2004-05-29T17:03:00Z")
**OpalCat** –Congratulations on paying off your loan! I know the check amount leaves you flabbergasted, but think of the cash you won’t keep on paying in interest after this. Woo-hoo! When (and if, I feel like sometimes) I ever get my student loans paid off, I’m gonna have to find some major way to celebrate. Are you doing anything special (and special doesn’t always mean elaborate or expensive) to mark the occasion? ---
**Author:** ![SlickRoenick](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/e68b1a/32.png) [@SlickRoenick](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/SlickRoenick)\ **Post date:** [May 29, 2004, 5:07pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-largest-check-i-wrote-i-wrote-2-minutes-ago/247677/5 "2004-05-29T17:07:21Z")
> [@Scribble](#): > > **OpalCat** –Congratulations on paying off your loan! I know the check amount leaves you flabbergasted, but think of the cash you won’t keep on paying in interest after this. Woo-hoo! > > When (and if, I feel like sometimes) I ever get my student loans paid off, I’m gonna have to find some major way to celebrate. Are you doing anything special (and special doesn’t always mean elaborate or expensive) to mark the occasion? I don’t know if you are talking to me or **Opal** but if i can find a friend who isn’t busy tonight i might go to dinner someplace. If not i’m just going to be playing SimCity 4 like always. ---
**Author:** ![OpalCat](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/o/8edcca/32.png) [@OpalCat](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/OpalCat)\ **Post date:** [May 29, 2004, 5:43pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-largest-check-i-wrote-i-wrote-2-minutes-ago/247677/6 "2004-05-29T17:43:47Z")
Wasn’t me who paid off a loan 🙂 ---
**Author:** ![Sengkelat](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/e36b37/32.png) [@Sengkelat](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Sengkelat)\ **Post date:** [May 29, 2004, 5:53pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-largest-check-i-wrote-i-wrote-2-minutes-ago/247677/7 "2004-05-29T17:53:56Z")
Biggest check I’ve written was for $5,200 to the caterer at my wedding. No, wait, the biggest one was for $50,000 to my wife’s sister. Supposedly we had to pay that much for some legal reason…Turns out there was no such obligation, so I claim the honor of biggest check that was entirely wasted. :eek: :smack: :eek: Congrats, SlickRoenick. Doesn’t it feel great to be out of debt? ---
**Author:** ![Scarlett67](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/scarlett67/32/7387_2.png) [@Scarlett67](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Scarlett67)\ **Post date:** [May 29, 2004, 6:05pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-largest-check-i-wrote-i-wrote-2-minutes-ago/247677/8 "2004-05-29T18:05:25Z")
> [@Scribble](#): > > When (and if, I feel like sometimes) I ever get my student loans paid off, I’m gonna have to find some major way to celebrate. I paid off my car and my student loans in the same month—and two months later Mr. S lost his job. ☹ Moral: Don’t party too hard! ---
**Author:** ![Scribble](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/scribble/32/3317_2.png) [@Scribble](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Scribble)\ **Post date:** [May 29, 2004, 6:10pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-largest-check-i-wrote-i-wrote-2-minutes-ago/247677/9 "2004-05-29T18:10:41Z")
> [@I](#): > > **OpalCat** –Congratulations on paying off your loan! I meant **SlickRoenick**. I’m not sure how I managed to mess _that_ up. Sorry. Congrats, _ **SlickRoenick** _, on paying off your loans. ---
**Author:** ![OpalCat](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/o/8edcca/32.png) [@OpalCat](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/OpalCat)\ **Post date:** [May 29, 2004, 6:12pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-largest-check-i-wrote-i-wrote-2-minutes-ago/247677/10 "2004-05-29T18:12:07Z")
> [@Sengkelat](#): > > No, wait, the biggest one was for $50,000 to my wife’s sister. Supposedly we had to pay that much for some legal reason…Turns out there was no such obligation, so I claim the honor of biggest check that was entirely wasted. :eek: :smack: :eek: Holy crap! I’ve never had that much money, let alone wasted it! ---
**Author:** ![Incubus](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/i/c68b51/32.png) [@Incubus](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Incubus)\ **Post date:** [May 30, 2004, 1:13am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-largest-check-i-wrote-i-wrote-2-minutes-ago/247677/11 "2004-05-30T01:13:48Z")
I paid my car off last month, it is a great feeling. True, the car isn’t the best car in the world, but it is _ALL MINE_, the most valuable possession I ever owned ($6500 car) It makes me feel really confident when I move out next year that I will have ZERO debts; I own my own car and payed for school up front instead of getting loans. Its like knowing you are entering the real world with a clean slate. And I look forward to trying to avoid financial mistakes rather than trying to recover from past ones. ---
**Author:** ![friedo](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/f/8edcca/32.png) [@friedo](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/friedo)\ **Post date:** [May 30, 2004, 2:14am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-largest-check-i-wrote-i-wrote-2-minutes-ago/247677/12 "2004-05-30T02:14:07Z")
Biggest check I ever wrote was to buy a mutual fund for $3000. (I now have significantly more than that in that account. Hooray for me.) In a few years, if I can manage to hang on to my current job, I’ll be able to buy a house. I imagine the downpayment check for that will be quite the whopper indeed. ---
**Author:** ![LurkMeister](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/3da27b/32.png) [@LurkMeister](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/LurkMeister)\ **Post date:** [May 30, 2004, 6:26am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-largest-check-i-wrote-i-wrote-2-minutes-ago/247677/13 "2004-05-30T06:26:16Z")
In late February, over a three day period, I wrote four checks totalling just over $33,000.00 to pay off all my credit card debt and a loan I’d taken out to pay for having my garage re-sided and re-roofed. Two of those were for over $10,000.00. Most money I’ve ever paid out in that short a time. ---
**Author:** ![kittenblue](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/k/ba8739/32.png) [@kittenblue](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/kittenblue)\ **Post date:** [May 30, 2004, 1:03pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-largest-check-i-wrote-i-wrote-2-minutes-ago/247677/14 "2004-05-30T13:03:26Z")
Congratulations! Once the sick feeling passes, you’ll feel so much better! (I always get an upset stomach when I write a check for more than $100) The largest check I ever wrote was for a new car…$15,000 and some change. Even though we were getting the car financed, the dealership made us write a check for the total, since they were letting us take the car home and they wouldn’t get the funds from our credit union for a few days (hey, it was the 80’s!) Ex-husband made me write the check, even though I told him I’d get sick. But since at this point in our marriage he had only written three checks and would have to be reminded how to write one (very embarassing in front of the salesman) I wrote it. I made them promise they wouldn’t deposit it…there was only a couple hundred in the account…and they promised, said they knew they had to wait for the credit union check. I made them staple it to the paper using 8 staples, and write a note on the surrounding paper saying DO NOT DEPOSIT. We went home, and I spent the rest of the evening in bed, nauseous and headachey. Of course, they deposited the check the next day, it bounced, and I raised hell. Apparently the girl who does all the financial stuff very carefully removed all 8 staples, ignored the note, ignored what the saleman wrote, ignored all the other paperwork that detailed the situation and deposited it. They did pay our overdraft fees, and the salesman was very embarassed by the situation, but I never did get an explanation from the woman in the office as to why, why, why she did that. So it wasn’t enough being physically ill for three hours from just writing a check, I had to get sick to my stomach from all the attendant hassle, too. ---
**Author:** ![AngelicGemma](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/439d5e/32.png) [@AngelicGemma](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/AngelicGemma)\ **Post date:** [May 30, 2004, 8:49pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-largest-check-i-wrote-i-wrote-2-minutes-ago/247677/15 "2004-05-30T20:49:38Z")
If you fancy writing any more checks my student loan loan needs paying off. No? It was worth a shot. 🙂 Seriously though, congrats! ---
**Author:** ![chrisk](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/6de8d8/32.png) [@chrisk](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/chrisk)\ **Post date:** [May 31, 2004, 2:30am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-largest-check-i-wrote-i-wrote-2-minutes-ago/247677/16 "2004-05-31T02:30:36Z")
> [@kittenblue](#): > > (I always get an upset stomach when I write a check for more than $100) Boy, you’d have problems paying rent on an apartment around here. 🙂 For some reason, rent and cheques are just always linked in my mind… maybe because electronic banking has taken over so much of the rest, but in this area rent seems to traditionally remain a cheque thing. I probably have written fourteen or fifteen cheques a year for the past three years, and you can probably guess what most of them were for. 🙂 Not sure what the BIGGEST cheque I ever wrote out personally was… probably wasn’t any more than $700 or so. Biggest cheque I ever had made out on my behalf was a cashier’s cheque (IIRC) to pay for my first computer, a little compaq laptop, when I was leaving university. A bit over $2000 (That laptop has pretty much died now, alas. My new laptop, over four grand, was paid by mastercard and the mastercard bill was paid using internet banking. 🙂 ) Okay, I’m done now LOL. ---
**Author:** ![Bookkeeper](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/bookkeeper/32/281_2.png) [@Bookkeeper](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Bookkeeper)\ **Post date:** [May 31, 2004, 7:43pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-largest-check-i-wrote-i-wrote-2-minutes-ago/247677/17 "2004-05-31T19:43:44Z")
The largest cheque I’ve ever written was for $500,000,000. (Written electronically and on my employer’s account, but still a bit of a thrill at the time!) ---
**Author:** ![friedo](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/f/8edcca/32.png) [@friedo](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/friedo)\ **Post date:** [May 31, 2004, 7:48pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-largest-check-i-wrote-i-wrote-2-minutes-ago/247677/18 "2004-05-31T19:48:04Z")
So, does your employer know what happened to their half billion dollars yet? 🙂 ---
**Author:** ![SlickRoenick](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/e68b1a/32.png) [@SlickRoenick](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/SlickRoenick)\ **Post date:** [June 1, 2004, 2:13am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-largest-check-i-wrote-i-wrote-2-minutes-ago/247677/19 "2004-06-01T02:13:32Z")
Thanks everyone. It is indeed a good feeling, actually it’s a two-fold good feeling for me. Now that Sallie Mae can’t collect from me anymore i can start saving even more money for LASIK once the summer is over! No student loan, no eye glasses anymore, small credit cards, $10,000 still left on car loan (should be paid off in around 2 years) . . .i think i’m in good shape for another 1 - 2 years then i can get a house. ---
**Author:** ![JavaMaven1](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/j/cab0a1/32.png) [@JavaMaven1](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/JavaMaven1)\ **Post date:** [June 1, 2004, 4:05am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-largest-check-i-wrote-i-wrote-2-minutes-ago/247677/20 "2004-06-01T04:05:20Z")
The largest personal check I’ve written was for $107,000 (give or take a few dollars). My father-in-law and I are in business (it’s a little side thing we’re doing, but we’re not making enough money to give up our day jobs) with purchasing and selling real estate, and sometimes a big check ends up into my account from the sale/refinancing of a property, and I turn around and write a check for him. I do have to say, it’s kinda nice to check my bank account and see six digits in there, even though it’s not really mine to spend. [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-largest-check-i-wrote-i-wrote-2-minutes-ago/247677.md?page=2)