Anyone who’s ever scrolled Facebook Marketplace has probably come across an engagement ring or two. And anyone who’s ever clicked on one listing has probably been inundated with dozens more. Lab grown, natural, emerald cut, princess cut, white gold, yellow gold — there’s no one size fits all engagement ring on FB Marketplace. Whatever you’re looking for, you can probably find it.
But what happened in the first place? Why are these rings for sale on a platform usually used for second hand furniture? If you’ve ever been curious about the stories behind the discount rings, then you’re in luck, because we asked them.
Many people (fairly) did not want to be involved in this story. However, there were a few willing to chat. Cue the Law & Order music, because — dun, dun — these are their stories.
Those who believe in bad wedding juju, beware: some of these fairytales turned out to be nightmares.
Why people listed their engagement rings on Facebook Marketplace
Joe* listed an engagement ring on FB Marketplace for a cool $4,000 in January. Just as stunning as the oval cut, white gold ring was the deception that led to its listing.
“The reason for the sale is that I found out, by randomly seeing a message in her phone, that she was a sex worker. She was living a double life with multiple sex partners,” Joe told PEDESTRIAN.TV.
No judgement here as to the line of work, but I imagine that should’ve been something at least mentioned, not something discovered via a rogue phone notification?
Although who am I to judge? My partner still doesn’t know I lost his headphones months ago.
Any hopeless romantics who think that maybe, just maybe Joe still managed to split amicably should think again — as proven by his willingness to out his ex-fiancée.
“Would you like her name so you can put it in the article?” Joe asked us. Yikes!
Joe’s ring is still listed for sale, so there’s still a chance for it to be un-jinxed for whoever’s (un)lucky enough to snag it. Or maybe it’s better suited for a burning ceremony.
Jillian* arrived at the sale of her ring — an 18 carat rose gold diamond — from a similar place of betrayal.
“I learned that he had not been attending, or even enrolled in, the course of study I had been financially supporting since early in our relationship,” she explained.
“This deception had been taking place for well over a year. He had been misrepresenting his day-to-day life during that period, including within counselling and to our families.”
For Jillian, the bombshell that her ex was, I dunno, going on hours-long strolls instead of studying as he’d promised, left “no real space for deliberation or reconsideration”. That ring has still hasn’t been sold, but hopefully it’ll go to someone without a phantom notebook and pens.
While revelations like Joe’s made the sale of the rings feel like common sense — a well-deserved and definitive F-you to their exes — others broke off their engagements because of messier, less clear-cut reasons. In other words, life stuff.
“Honestly, the separation was as amicable as a separation could be,” Ree — who sold her emerald cut ring for $5,500 — told us.
“We both ended up wanting different things in life — I didn’t want kids, he decided he did — and it ended up being a toxic and resentful relationship. I wasn’t going to pop out a kid to keep him happy.”
Ree described the fallout of her broken engagement in practical terms. She and her ex-fiancé sold their apartment and kept their halves of the finances, with Ree deciding to list the ring simply because she was “going to Vegas soon and want[ed] the spending money”.
Get your bag, girl! Especially if that bag is one purchased on the Vegas strip!
Jillian also considered the cash boost from the sale of her ring, saying “if it covers some groceries, that feels practical and appropriate”. Double get that (grocery) bag!
While Ree’s amicable split allowed her to think pragmatically — she said she was only “a bit emotional” selling the ring because she just “had to let it go” — not everyone listed their ring so decisively.
Georgia*, who puts her broken engagement down to “two people meeting at the wrong time”, said the sentimental memories of the ring almost dissuaded her from selling it.
“[My partner] loved the ring, tears at the first sight of it, a cherished memory,” Georgia said. “Keeping the ring felt like holding onto proof that we tried… Selling it was heartbreaking.”
The memories wrapped up in the rings were mentioned by everyone we chatted to, which naturally begs the question: what if they passed all that emotional energy on to whoever purchased the ring?
“How could you not think about bad juju?” Georgia said, while Ree said she was “concerned about that”.
Georgia agreed that “what you put into the world matters”, but all three of the former fiancées believed that whatever energy they imbued on the ring ended once their engagements did.
Jillian said the ring “stopped being sacred once the relationship ended”, with Georgia adding that “the damage and pain stayed with us, not the ring”.
“It was only a witness, and if anything, I hope it gets the happy ending we didn’t,” Georgia said.
Where all these rings ended up is anyone’s guess — I imagine if it continues to go unsold, Joe’s will soon be wrapped around a voodoo doll — but the stories of what led them there will stay with each of the formerly betrothed folks for years to come.
If they’re lucky, their fairytales (or nightmares) might even be retold by a buck or a hen at an engagement party.
To any future maids of honour using this as research, my calendar is open and I do a great Kristen Wiig Bridesmaids impression.
Lead images: Supplied / iStock.
The post We Asked 4 People Selling Their Engagement Rings On FB Marketplace What Went Wrong appeared first on PEDESTRIAN.TV .
