Lately, many people have shared their struggles after lending money to family members, but my problem was the opposite. I faced trouble after borrowing VND16 million from my own siblings in 2008. I needed cash at the time, so I asked them for some cash. When they lent me the money, there was no discussion about when or how the debt should be settled.
A couple of months passed and I had used all my savings on my house when they suddenly demanded repayment. Without any prior agreement, they claimed I owed them one tael of gold, which was worth around VND16 million when I borrowed money from them. However, by the time they asked me to repay them, gold prices had risen to nearly VND19 million per tael.
I was speechless. The only reason I needed the loan was because I was struggling financially. I was young and inexperienced at the time, and I never thought to set clear terms with relatives. I assumed that there was no need to be cautious because we were family.
Furthermore, I had already spent it all on construction materials, so I could not simply return it to them. At that moment, I realized I had been deceived. I had no choice but to plead for more time to repay the debt.
Almost a year later, I had to scrape together every possible source of money to pay them back as they demanded. By then, gold prices had soared to VND30 million per tael. To cover the difference, I had to take out a VND10 million loan from the bank, fearing that the price would rise even further if I delayed repayment.
To this day, I still do not understand why a cash loan had to be repaid in gold. And I thought we were a family.
Years later, they came to me asking for a loan. They wanted to invest in land but did not want to borrow from the bank to avoid interest. I agreed to lend them some gold that I had accumulated over the years without any interest. I only required them to return the exact amount of gold they borrowed.
However, they insisted that I sell my gold and lend them cash instead, promising to repay me in cash later. This time, I was firm.
I told them I had gold, so I would only lend them that. Whether they sold it or not was their decision. I think they were shocked to see that I was no longer as naive as I had been nearly 20 years ago. I was not going to fall for the same trick twice.
*The opinions were translated into English with the assistance of AI. Readers’ views are personal and do not necessarily match VnExpress’ viewpoints.
