What do wealthy people buy, that ordinary people know nothing about? (2015) • Hacker News Board

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

#591

Post by notsydonia » Mon, May 19, 2025, 2:45 PM UTC

esperent wrote: post #370

notsydonia wrote: post #363

You know how a person on 'average' income might sometimes browse retail sites as displacement activity, while waiting for something/someone or a side-quest etc? Ultra-wealthy people also do that but they're trawling through Sothebys or Christies - eg: https://www.sothebys.com/en/buy/luxury/books-&-manuscripts/b... They don't have time to read - say - a lengthy biography about a Civil War general but they can purchase…

> They wouldn't even have a brand on their dishwasher - it would be commissioned by an architect or interior designer quietly maintained at regular intervals by an appliance engineer I'm not sure that I buy this. It's not simple to make a bespoke appliance like a dishwasher that's better than a very high end mass produced one. Where did you get the idea that this happens from?

Sorry, I guess what I meant is that this hypothetical ultra-wealthy person wouldn't think "I am going to get a dishwasher, as such. They'd assume it would be the absolute best. If this rich person fancied themselves as a chef, they'd absolutely obsess over the oven etc and have a very clear concept in mind - eg: a high end Aga. But the real estate brochure boast of all Miele (or Bosch, whatever) kitchens would not move them, as such.

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

#592

Post by awongh » Mon, May 19, 2025, 2:45 PM UTC

canucker2016 wrote: post #99

You were a fast collegiate-level runner, became a wealthy financial adviser, who now has three sons who are doing well in high school long distance running. What do you do? You convince one of your old running buddies, who now coaches elite runners, to coach your son. The son sets the national high school indoor record for the 800m. Son decides to go pro after graduating high school. Then Covid19 hits. Access to outd…

Lance Stroll, the F1 driver also comes to mind. (Also basically every single other driver but not to the same degree)

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

#593

Post by song » Mon, May 19, 2025, 2:46 PM UTC

pjc50 wrote: post #293

coldtea wrote: post #187

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Unfortunately you need years to notice such long-term differences, unless someone tells you. Hardly rich, but that "veneer wood furniture and doors" are much better than "laminated chipwood" is common knowledge. But back in the day, poor and rich alike wouldn't look twice at either, but opt for solid wood furniture.

More generally, it can be hard to distinguish between "luxury" products that are primarily more exclusive with very little functional benefit (or in some cases more fragile!), versus products that are Actually Good. The display luxury category: anything by LVMH, Birkin bags, limited edition sneakers, Ferrari, etc The "better product for more money" category: Miele, wood furniture, Lexus etc

> The display luxury category: anything by LVMH, Birkin bags

Birkin bags are also actually better products for more money, they can last quite a while with minimum care. They are display goods for sure but there is a qualitative difference between a good quality handbag from certain brands and a much cheaper one.

Just as an example, my wife's only handbag is a balenciaga bag that she's had for 12+ years, she's been using it to carry back food from restaurants, put anything she needs in it, etc... and it's still in good shape. In the end, her bag has cost her so far 60 usd/year.

So yes, it's not obvious to people not in the know but even products that seem to be display luxury category can actually be worth it from a quality perspective.

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

#594

Post by FrankPetrilli » Mon, May 19, 2025, 2:47 PM UTC

fakedang wrote: post #589

FrankPetrilli wrote: post #570

Earlier quoted context omitted.

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 a…

https://franksboots.com/ Are you these guys? One techbro recommended these to me and my cofounder and I've never looked back. Your boots are going places, literally! Edit:- Changed link to direct.

Yes, that's my family's business, I'm glad to hear you've had such great experiences. Similar to you, I've never looked back; every time I put on trail shoes I yearn for my boots again.

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

#595

Post by fakedang » Mon, May 19, 2025, 2:47 PM UTC

TacticalCoder wrote: post #343

safety1st wrote: post #248

Earlier quoted context omitted.

On a personal level I know several guys who are worth $10-30M, one who's worth probably $40M, and one who's worth around $700M, this is LNW. Not much in the Reddit reply checks out for me. It's true that the $700M guy socializes with "Senators/Congressmen/community leaders." He travels a lot, and comfortably, but has no ownership in a jet. He retired young-ish and no longer works so maybe that's why. He doesn't flash…

I was invited for coffee at a friend's friend. He seemed a pretty regular guy, very friendly: kids playing in the pool. Nothing out of the ordinary except as many house employees as adult guests (and house employees where calling guests by their name). I happened to know the artist Jeff Koons: not a big fan of the "inflated balloon dogs" but I do like his ballerinas. Well... Turns out the dude had one house destroyed…

> But yup: buying x times the exact same car when times comes to change cars is kinda just weird.

Not really, decision fatigue is a thing.

My colleague actually took me out car shopping a couple of weeks back, to the Ferrari showroom because apparently to get some models, you need to be one of their favorite customers or a referral from one. We also visited a Lamborghini showroom next (which apparently didn't have such restrictions). But deciding between their cars was so tough, and I really wanted to get an EV instead for my daily driver, that I just ended up renewing on my rental Honda Civic for a few more months lol. I could buy these cars, but I tend to be vested in things I buy, and suffer from FOMO for not buying the rest, so might as well postpone the decision to when I can afford to hold them all together and give them time to maintain them.

There's also the real problem with rose tinted glasses. For example, I was a huge fan of the Testarossa ever since I was a kid, but just one drive inside one showed me how badly designed it actually is in the interior.

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

#596

Post by madaxe_again » Mon, May 19, 2025, 2:48 PM UTC

lm28469 wrote: post #499

madaxe_again wrote: post #424

Earlier quoted context omitted.

8% is an awful return in today’s markets. 30% is eminently achievable with foresight and an appetite for risk. I started investing a decade ago with about £100k, as that was all I could afford to risk, and have a return of between 20% and 200% year to year. Shit, you’ll get 15-20% cash-on-cash just running an Airbnb, which is what provides our day-to-day living income.

Cool, do you know about statistics and survivor bias ? If it was that easy why isn't everyone a millionaire ? Why doesn't everyone make 20-200% per year ? If you can guarantee 20-200% of return per year consistently over 10-20 years go to wall street they'll pay you millionS per year to work for them There is a big gap between "I'm in the top 1% earners and lucked out in the market" and "Literally every software engi…

Yes, I understand statistics and survivorship bias - I’m a mathematical physicist by training. I’m also a pretty average schlub.

Most people aren’t wealthy because they don’t even try, and instead run on a treadmill until they drop dead.

I have no interest in going to work on Wall Street or anything similar.

My entire investing philosophy is basically based on this site. There is constant signal here on what will be big in 5-10 years, and all that’s required is that you get in before the press start talking about it, too.

A $10k investment in NVDA 10 years ago is worth $2.6M now - and if you were paying attention 10 years ago, when CUDA was fairly new and shiny and rapidly gaining mindshare, you would have noticed that they were inevitably going to own the ML/AI space, and that this shit was going to be huge.

This is also why I said $1M, not $100k - because I have managed exceptional returns - but with 10x the starting capital even moderately good returns can grow rapidly. I’ve also bet on some absolute lemons where I’ve lost every last red cent.

Either way, it seems that many would sooner be bitter than do something to improve their situation, which is sadly very common, and again, why not everybody is a millionaire.

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

#597

Post by fakedang » Mon, May 19, 2025, 2:50 PM UTC

FrankPetrilli wrote: post #594

fakedang wrote: post #589

Earlier quoted context omitted.

https://franksboots.com/ Are you these guys? One techbro recommended these to me and my cofounder and I've never looked back. Your boots are going places, literally! Edit:- Changed link to direct.

Yes, that's my family's business, I'm glad to hear you've had such great experiences. Similar to you, I've never looked back; every time I put on trail shoes I yearn for my boots again.

Your boots have withstood the Amazon forest and the floodwaters in Kerala, India, is all I'll say. Nothing more.

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

#598

Post by mrguyorama » Mon, May 19, 2025, 2:52 PM UTC

esperent wrote: post #370

notsydonia wrote: post #363

You know how a person on 'average' income might sometimes browse retail sites as displacement activity, while waiting for something/someone or a side-quest etc? Ultra-wealthy people also do that but they're trawling through Sothebys or Christies - eg: https://www.sothebys.com/en/buy/luxury/books-&-manuscripts/b... They don't have time to read - say - a lengthy biography about a Civil War general but they can purchase…

> They wouldn't even have a brand on their dishwasher - it would be commissioned by an architect or interior designer quietly maintained at regular intervals by an appliance engineer I'm not sure that I buy this. It's not simple to make a bespoke appliance like a dishwasher that's better than a very high end mass produced one. Where did you get the idea that this happens from?

It's just a normal retail dishwasher, but it's been through some third party company who "customizes" it by removing any branding and maybe adding their own, and then sell it to the rich person through about 3 steps in a chain of middleman where it eventually gets to someone who just "solves" the "I need a house" problem of the rich person.

Cathode Ray Dude on Youtube talks about this in his videos about the Niveus media center computer https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=Y2OPrGBxkD0

The rich do not give a single fuck how it functions. They have never even thought about that or considered it. If they bought a dishwasher that sucks at washing dishes, their staff will deal with that. If they bought one that breaks after a few months, it will be replaced and they probably will never know. They haven't even stepped foot in this house in months anyway.

The rich are not discerning purchasers because they do not have to be, and they think their time is way too valuable to care about simple things like "Am I spending too much on this" or "Will this widget actually work as advertised"

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

#599

Post by song » Mon, May 19, 2025, 2:53 PM UTC

rsynnott wrote: post #481

fragmede wrote: post #454

Earlier quoted context omitted.

IoT, and in the near future, arms for self loading and unloading. Who knows what advancement in UI will happen? If we knew what they were beforehand, we'd be doing then already. For example, the microwave. Older microwaves have a cumbersome enter time, hit start procedure. Newer microwaves also have a "quick start" button for 30 seconds which you can just press four times to get it to go for two minutes, or enter the…

> IoT Has no place in a dishwasher. > and in the near future, arms for self loading and unloading Pure fantasy for now; if it's ever not pure fantasy, go ahead and replace the dishwasher, I suppose? > Older microwaves have a cumbersome enter time, hit start procedure. Newer microwaves also have a "quick start" button for 30 seconds which you can just press four times to get it to go for two minutes, or enter the time…

Sidenote, I wish my washing machine had wifi, it'd allow us to see what settings our housekeeper is using and why our clothes age so much quicker than when we were doing the laundry ourselves.

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

#600

Post by notsydonia » Mon, May 19, 2025, 2:55 PM UTC

fergie wrote: post #460

notsydonia wrote: post #363

You know how a person on 'average' income might sometimes browse retail sites as displacement activity, while waiting for something/someone or a side-quest etc? Ultra-wealthy people also do that but they're trawling through Sothebys or Christies - eg: https://www.sothebys.com/en/buy/luxury/books-&-manuscripts/b... They don't have time to read - say - a lengthy biography about a Civil War general but they can purchase…

> They don't have time to read - say - a lengthy biography If theres one thing all the wealthy people in my life have it is in fact _time_, which in turn means that they take their leisure activities really, really seriously.

I disagree, although mine are clients not friends as such so you may have more insight. Running an empire or even managing a fortune you inherited is a tonne of work - there are so many people from the government, potentially bad hires, distant family members, not to mention actual criminals who think that the person's money would suit them a lot better. They have auditors to audit the auditors, barristers on call and philanthropy managers to gently explain to your 3rd cousin that your charity fund does not extend to funding their permaculture concept.

I also mean 'don't have time to read' to be a bit sarcastic - as in it's not a flex to read the best-selling biography of whoever that was reviewed favorably or might win the Pulitzer - but having acquired the guy's letters - that even the biography author could not get - that's your one-up.

There's also the evidently more ascetic end of the billionaire spectrum - eg: Peter Thiel, Michael Burry - who don't seem to be interested in luxury, as such.