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What do wealthy people buy, that ordinary people know nothing about? (2015)

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Re: What do wealthy people buy, that ordinary people know nothing about? (2015)

#561

Post by ape4 »

noboostforyou wrote: post #537
alexey-salmin wrote: post #176

The referenced reply is dull. It's very pretentious but just reiterates common knowledge, it doesn't convey any useful information. For example I wish someone told me about the existence of Miele kitchen equipment before I accidentally rented an apartment of a well-to-do woman. She renovated it for herself but then rented out when circumstances changed. Similarly it took me a long time to realize just how much better…

> Price is 3-4 times higher but it lasts 5-10 times longer and is much more pleasant to use. "The reason that the rich were so rich, Vimes reasoned, was because they managed to spend less money. Take boots, for example. ... A really good pair of leather boots cost fifty dollars. But an affordable pair of boots, which were sort of OK for a season or two and then leaked like hell when the cardboard gave out, cost about…

Probably $200 for a good pair of boots

Re: What do wealthy people buy, that ordinary people know nothing about? (2015)

#562

Post by gammarator »

alexey-salmin wrote: post #176

The referenced reply is dull. It's very pretentious but just reiterates common knowledge, it doesn't convey any useful information. For example I wish someone told me about the existence of Miele kitchen equipment before I accidentally rented an apartment of a well-to-do woman. She renovated it for herself but then rented out when circumstances changed. Similarly it took me a long time to realize just how much better…

> veneer wood furniture

If I were wealthy, I’d be getting solid hardwood…

Re: What do wealthy people buy, that ordinary people know nothing about? (2015)

#563

Post by bluGill »

detourdog wrote: post #330
Koshima wrote: post #318

I’ve noticed this as well. It’s surprising how often the true value of certain high-quality items isn’t obvious until you’ve experienced them firsthand. It’s not just about status, but often about longevity, comfort, or simply a better user experience. For example, things like handmade leather shoes, solid wood furniture, or even high-end kitchen tools like Miele or Sub-Zero appliances can feel like overkill until yo…

My theory is that the appliance market has developed a low cost tier of products that are poorly developed and produced. This tier of products have minimal quality standards and the thinking is the the consumer will replace it or move. I had to purchase appliances for apartments and the first wave of products were breaking within a couple of years. I ended up purchasing appliances from high-end European companies in…

Appliances have several different class and price is not a good indication of what class things are in. Cheap apartments want the cheapest appliances that will last and those people have the accountants to figure out what those are. However right next to the cheap appliances that last are cheap appliances that won't and often there is nobody that will tell you which is which. The you get into the mid range, where again there is junk and good stuff right next to each other. At the highest prices quality goes down just because there are not enough sales to figure out what is going to break and update the design in the early part of the sales cycle to fix issues.

Re: What do wealthy people buy, that ordinary people know nothing about? (2015)

#564

Post by anon-3988 »

I would love to say that I would not do any of these superficial things but I have clearly raised my standards of living after earning good wages. Thankfully its not "linear", I think.

But I think I am self conscious enough that I am always asking if I should really be doing or buying stuff that I can perfectly afford. Do I really need that new phone? I have a perfectly serviceable phone, what do I really get from these stuff that is totally within my mean.

However, it is more nuanced than that. For example, I think VVIP SHOULD be taking private flights instead of commercial ones. Should CEOs of big companies really be sharing flights with literal whos across the Atlantic? Probably not. But should these private jets have indoor tennis court or whatever it is they have? Also probably not.

Re: What do wealthy people buy, that ordinary people know nothing about? (2015)

#565

Post by Damogran6 »

rfrey wrote: post #525
Damogran6 wrote: post #512

Earlier quoted context omitted.

In covid had a whirlpool dishwasher that lasted less than 3 years (4 subsystems failing all at the same time)...it was either wait 2-X months for the Miele we wanted, or pay twice as much to have it today. ($2k vs $1k) I'm uncomfortably enamored with this dishwasher. (Bought it over a Bosch as the percentage needing repair in the first year was 8% instead of 12% and I was flat done with it.) The dishwasher is fully e…

Do I understand from this that they lock you into... proprietary soap?

Stockholders are all about the after-sale subscription model.

The convenience outweighs the cost at this point. I'm not proud about it.

Re: What do wealthy people buy, that ordinary people know nothing about? (2015)

#566

Post by flerchin »

bane wrote: post #488

Grew up poor, made it a little in life - could maybe retire now. The things I and the people I grew up with don't know how to do at all can be shocking. People who grew up similarly and ended up in middle class seem to be similar unless they put real time into it: - how to buy stocks, what ETFs are, what a 401(k) is, etc. - hiring people to clean your house, do yard work, etc. - traveling out of the country, or in ma…

I think a cleaning person and lawn guy should be more like $3500-$5k per year.

Re: What do wealthy people buy, that ordinary people know nothing about? (2015)

#567

Post by bluGill »

canucker2016 wrote: post #84
ofcourseyoudo wrote: post #80

This is a great answer. But I'm curious what the answer would look like if every strata in it was not "things you can buy" but "things you can do with the money" ... if the "IMPACT" section was delineated at each level. One of the things I envy the most about my rich friends is their capacity to be generous. They can materialize their compassion on a regular basis without having to balance their budget. I'd like to s…

Automation is for less wealthy rich people - so the company can serve more users. When you are rich, you get a real person who speaks your language well and has the authority/power to get things done. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/High-net-worth_individual

Even wealthy in the US tend to have much less servants than they would have in the past. Labor is too expensive, and the large middle class has made automation just as good and sometimes better. Sure I could hire someone to turn on my lights - but the switch on the wall works well and isn't much effort (compare to the lamp lighter of the past which did work that would be annoying).

Re: What do wealthy people buy, that ordinary people know nothing about? (2015)

#568

Post by is_true »

resource_waste wrote: post #440
sublinear wrote: post #400

I'm gonna go out on a limb here and say "being rich" is not a personality or set of preferences. Lavish spending is still seen as pointlessly insecure by anyone on any budget. Many things are good enough for anyone. Relevant Andy Warhol quote: "Sometimes you fantasize that people who are really up there and rich and living it up have something you don’t have, that their things must be better than your things because…

>Lavish spending is still seen as pointlessly insecure by anyone on any budget. I seen and lived this until I got my wake up call. I was regular upper middle class, I would laugh at people who thought I was poor for having an Android because I could easily afford a $1000 iphone, I just didnt want it. Then I got into philosophy and inevitably Stoicism, where I found happiness within. Then I read too much philosophy an…

Where are you from? I find that some countries in Europe try to make their citizens behave like that.

Re: What do wealthy people buy, that ordinary people know nothing about? (2015)

#569

Post by mrguyorama »

fragmede wrote: post #461
bluGill wrote: post #444

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Most of them don't have a contract. And most homes wouldn't want the type of appliance that needs a service contract anyway.

On a thread about what the rich people do, not being able to afford a service contract isn't something the rich do. Ever have a IT person on call for your own house because you're to busy being rich? At some level of rich you want the service contract.

Eh, that level of rich doesn't care about a service contract. If their hyper-fancy, whatever gadget filled dishwasher/oven dies randomly because it's made like cheap shit and all the features are just checking boxes, they don't care, they can have it replaced within an hour, so the cook will just have to deal with only a single oven until then.

Which is why the rich are terribly undiscerning purchasers: the downside for them is some wasted pocket change. The time it took to consider the purchase already earned them more money than they will spend.

The appliances themselves however absolutely are built and designed to be serviced regularly to meet their expected lifespans.

Re: What do wealthy people buy, that ordinary people know nothing about? (2015)

#570

Post by FrankPetrilli »

ackbar03 wrote: post #544
noboostforyou wrote: post #537

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Price is 3-4 times higher but it lasts 5-10 times longer and is much more pleasant to use. "The reason that the rich were so rich, Vimes reasoned, was because they managed to spend less money. Take boots, for example. ... A really good pair of leather boots cost fifty dollars. But an affordable pair of boots, which were sort of OK for a season or two and then leaked like hell when the cardboard gave out, cost about…

I'm curious about this though, does a rich man actually wear the same pair of boots for 10 years? That being said, I've noticed that a lot of clothes that I bought 10 years ago or so are of pretty high quality compared to today, (and no, they are not rich man's clothes). Some of them I actually have been wearing for more than 10 years now.

Oh hey I'm uniquely positioned to answer this; though I'm in tech (and at this point frankly speaking well-compensated) my family have been bootmakers for decades.

I'm sitting at a tech office right now wearing a pair of boots that my father made for me in 2015 - regardless, they're absolutely spotless and I'd wear them to a formal event without hesitation. Every 6 months or so when I'm by his store I shine them up and put in a fresh pair of leather laces. Every 3 or so years, he re-soles them when the soles eventually wear out and lose traction. Eventually they'll require a rebuild, but they've got probably another 5-10 years of daily wear in them before that. I've got a few more pairs I swap between every so often, like a pair with OD green canvas that looks nice with khakis, but these solid black ones are my daily wear.

While 10 years sounds like a good run for boots, my father has a pair at ~35 years old now that he still wears frequently. IIRC they've been through one or two rebuilds and few re-soles in that time.

Were these commodity sneakers, I'd be purchasing a new pair every few months. Even nice running or trail shoes only tend to last a few hundred miles in my experience, but I've put tens of thousands on these and will get ten thousand more easily. Re-soles and rebuilds aren't free, but they're less than a replacement and put years of lifetime back on the boot. They're also comfortable as hell and fit me like a glove.

So in short: yeah, rich men do wear the same pair of boots for 10 years, or even far longer.

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