sentimental value
Sentimental value is the extra worth your heart adds to something, over and above what a buyer would ever pay for it in cash.
In plain English
A man sells his old Toyota Camry for ₦2.8 million without a single look back, but he will not sell his late father's wristwatch for ₦2.8 million either, even though the watch stopped working years ago and does nothing for him but sit in a drawer.
That is the whole puzzle of sentimental value. Two objects, both replaceable in theory, both worth something in naira if you took them to a market, and yet one leaves the house easily and the other feels like it would take a piece of you with it.
In Lagos, think of the woman who keeps her mother's sewing machine even though it has not stitched a single thing in ten years and takes up space she badly needs. A machine like that might fetch ₦15,000 from a scrap buyer, but she will tell you, quite firmly, that it is not for sale.
In London, a Nigerian man in his forties still has the first suit he wore to his graduation, bought for £120 back when £120 felt like a mountain. It no longer fits, the fabric has dated badly, but it hangs in his wardrobe because it holds the memory of a mother who saved for months to buy it.
This is not foolishness. Money is not only about price, it is also about meaning, and a wise person knows the difference between the two so they never confuse them. The trouble starts only when sentimental value is used to justify a decision that is really about something else, like refusing to sell a failing family business simply because your grandfather started it, while the losses calmly eat your savings.
So sentimental value is real, it is human, and it deserves respect. The skill is knowing when you are holding onto something because it truly matters to your heart, and when you are simply avoiding a decision that your head has already made.
A brother in Manchester is offered ₦400,000 for his late father's old radio by a collector. The radio barely works, and ₦400,000 would help with rent, but he says no, because turning that dial reminds him of Saturday mornings with his father. That gap between the offer and his refusal is sentimental value in action.
Questions people ask
Is sentimental value a bad thing for my finances?
Not at all, it only becomes a problem when it stops you from making a decision your situation clearly needs, like holding a losing investment or an expensive asset simply because it feels attached to a person or a memory.
How do I know if I am being sentimental or just avoiding a hard decision?
Ask yourself honestly whether keeping the item or the investment is helping your life move forward, or whether you are using the memory attached to it as an excuse to avoid a choice that would otherwise be obvious.
Can sentimental value ever be turned into actual money?
Sometimes, if there is a genuine collector's market for the item, but most of the time its worth lives only in your mind and your family's story, and that is perfectly fine, since not everything needs a price tag.
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