"Normal People" Are Sharing The Secret Things Rich People Spend Money On That Most Of Us Would Never Think Of, And I Have Never Felt More Broke
By Angelica Martinez,
2024-08-29
There are two kinds of people in this world: those who say money can't solve all problems and those who consider that notion to be complete bullshit. Recently, u/ Crocodile_Banger took to r/AskReddit to pose an excellent question about what exactly money can get the uber-rich that most of us "normal people" have no idea about or access to. Here are 19 wild examples people shared:
1. "Luxury ice cubes. Gläce Luxury Ice Co produces perfectly square ice blocks for “minimum dilution and maximum cooling." Hand-carved and completely clear, these cubes are sold in bags of 40, and each bag costs $ 325 ."
2. "I do IT for the hilariously rich in LA. My favorite thing you can buy is a $300,000 theater streaming device that allows you to watch just-released movies directly in your home theater. It requires a background check and a huge amount of money, but then any movie released in theaters is directly uploaded into your system, and then you can watch it at home in your own little movie theater."
3. "There are companies that sell books by the foot, usually leather bound. It’s for decorating, so your in-home library is stocked with books. Normally, you can pick genres or just let the company fill your shelves. You just give them the length of your shelves and your color scheme, and they send you books in bindings that harmonize with your room's color pallet."
4. "Citizenship in other countries. Costs about as much as a house for less desirable countries and about as much as starting a small business for the nicer ones."
5. "Concierge medicine. You get your own dedicated doctor, perhaps your own whole clinic. You never wait for tests. You never wait for an appointment. Your doctor will make house calls and even diagnose and prescribe over the phone."
6. "Pet cloning. My ex-boss got his dog cloned for $100K."
7. "Personal concierge services. People can pay an annual fee of several thousand dollars and be able to request help getting...anything. Hard-to-get concert tickets, dinner reservations, you name it."
8. "Most major airports have a special VIP terminal for super rich VIPs who get to bypass all of the riff-raff in the main terminals and wait for their private jets in luxury. I am not talking about a first-class lounge. Those are for the wanna-be rich people. I am referring to a more special setup for the chosen few that is almost never discussed or advertised."
9. "Private island getaways. Imagine a whole island to yourself where the only worry is which beach to lounge on."
10. "I live in a wealthy community. We get advertisements for wild things. I have neighbors who pay someone to wash their garbage cans every week after the garbage gets picked up. When you have a professional garbage can cleaning service swinging by on a weekly basis, you likely have too much money."
11. "The biggest thing is time. Need to get to London for a meeting? Leave for the airport, and your plane/charter will be waiting for you. Need a haircut? A person will come to your house to do it for you. Think of the things you go out to do on a daily basis, and imagine having people to do all that for you. Need a new phone? Peter will get you the latest iPhone, programmed and working the way yours was before. Drop it in the toilet? It's OK, he bought five."
12. "Relationships. I once worked at an Olympic horse ranch in Colorado. The owner was from Seattle and was friends with someone who played guitar with Kurt Cobain. Then, talking to one of the riders, he revealed they had been at a party over the weekend that Mark Zuckerberg had also been at. That’s when it hit me — when you’re rich, you just know everyone or know someone who knows them. Six degrees of separation is only for the masses. For the elites, it is closer to two or one."
13. "I'm not sure what the correct term is, but having something along the lines of a household (or family?) manager. I grew up with a kid whose parents were extremely well-off because they owned a chain of casinos. Every single thing in their lives was managed by some lady and her assistant/team. When I say everything, I mean everything: foreign trips, domestic trips, doctor appointments, dinner reservations, sports practices, meetings with attorneys, business meetings, grocery delivery, household duties, get-togethers, every. single. minute. detail. Their entire days were pre-planned from start to finish, weeks and months in advance. All they had to do was just...exist. Their lives were essentially on auto-pilot."
14. "Completely custom cars. At the lower end, this means you sit down with, for example, a Rolls Royce rep and go over choices. They will arrange a custom paint color and guarantee no other car will get that shade. Ditto for upholstery, dash treatment, etc. In the middle, the likes of Lamborghini and Koenigsegg have lists of billionaire car collectors. When they come up with a concept, they consult with the members of that list before any metal gets shaped. When they release the latest hypecar and say only 25 will be made, that's because only 25 billionaires said they wanted one. Being able to say you have a 1 of 25 car is valuable over and above the car itself. At the very high end, you can call them and pitch your own concepts, and they will build a complete one-of-one car for you."
15. "Access. My friends and I flew from DC to Dallas to watch a Redskins vs. Cowboys game before they moved to the new stadium. Last minute, a well-connected friend joined and didn’t have a ticket to the game. Next thing we knew, some guy was standing at the stadium holding a sign with our names on it."
16. "Special hospital suites. When I worked for a major medical center, they had a special floor for rich people who could afford to pay more. It was nicer with more up-to-date equipment, had connected rooms for visitors, and even a dedicated cook and dietician who would tailor every meal to the patient's specific tastes within their medical diet (such as liquid, mechanically soft, low sodium, etc., and accounting for allergies, vs normal hospital food that isn't even really seasoned to avoid stuff like allergies)."
18. "We all know that a lot of wealthy people own nice yachts. What a lot of people may not know is that many of these yachts aren't taken across the ocean. Wealthy people hire yacht transportation services to move their yachts around. A larger ship will pick up the yacht and ferry it to the desired location. The wealthy person will fly to that location on a private jet and then head over to the yacht to party. They don't actually travel in it."
19. "Even more money. Once you have enough money, you can pay people to use your money to make more money. Doing so, you can pay them and still end up with more money than you started with, without doing much to get it."
Do you work with or know an uber-rich person? If so, tell us about the absolutely wild things they can (or do!) spend money on that 99% of us have no idea about. You can spill the tea in the comments below or via this 100% anonymous form , whichever suits your fancy.
Note: Submissions have been edited for length and/or clarity.
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