The Weirdest Things People Have Witnessed In A Rich Person's Home
Reddit user Jerswar asked: 'What's the weirdest thing you've witnessed in the home of a rich person?'
It's no secret that as a person starts to make more money, they may forget how difficult they had it when there was less money coming into their bank account.
Not only are rich people often incredibly out-of-touch with the realities of most people's lives, but what they choose to prioritize and bring into their home is often pretty bizarre, too.
Already side-eyeing, Redditor Jerswar asked:
"What's the weirdest thing you've witnessed in the home of a rich person?"
Love Can't Be Bought
"Rich grandparents had a brand new house built, had a $100,000 splash pad built for their only grandchild who has never visited them at their new house."
- wyoflyboy68
"This reminds me of when my sister built her house. She had a barrier-free ground-floor apartment built in it, so my grandmother could visit. She never did."
- P44
A Separate Hoarder's House
"I had a rich neighbor growing up who'd always invite us over for parties and always insisted on giving us gifts and leftovers. They did this with every guest."
"They were also hoarders but built a separate house to keep their crap in. It was filled with whatever they bought but never used and even never got out of the packaging it was delivered in."
"They told my mom to take a box of what she wanted, and for s**ts and giggles, she did. It was a knife collection and sharpener set."
- MUSTARDUNAVAILABLE
Unusual Art
"I was at John Waters’ house for his birthday and he has a room set up as a lifelike recreation of a meth lab (it wasn’t a real meth lab, it’s an art piece)."
"He told me that when Bill Clinton visited him the secret service agents were extremely concerned about the room."
- writeleahwrite
Weird Pet Relationships
"One client had a whole separate house on their property just for their dogs. They'd referred to it as the 'dog house,' and I was expecting like maybe a little building in the yard where they kept their toys or something, but this was a fully furnished home with king-sized beds and a huge playroom on the main floor."
"They had a full training and feeding staff to care for the dogs and everything. They lived in their own house and would come over to visit. Seemed like a weird dynamic to have with your pet..."
"One client didn't have a litterbox for the cats, their cats I guess didn't like using the boxes in the basement and they didn't want to put boxes upstairs so they put down pond liner and kitty litter across an entire room in the basement and had their housekeeper run a rake through it daily."
- daabilge
Special Needs Kitty Mystery Mansion
"As a kid back in the Mesozoic Era (I'm old), my best friend and I used to play in a converted racquetball court and lounge under the old West Coast mansion her family had lived in since its construction."
"The stairs to it were hidden behind a closet off of the abandoned servants' quarters. Halfway down the stairs was a wine cellar. A decoy as the actual wine cellar for the home was under the kitchen….. Another staircase behind a rack of dusty bottles led two stories down to our giant play area beneath this."
"At the beginning of WWII, before Pearl Harbor, my friend’s paranoid WWI vet grandfather had dug out the space over fear of Japanese (or German) invasion. Her dad made the giant room regulation designed for racquetball years later. Maybe originally squash. Not sure, but the lounge area was also glassed off above it so one could look down into the court like a gallery."
"It was really neat. Also upstairs in the living room was a wall straight out of an old mystery novel. If you pushed a spot just right, the wall opened to a hidden room. Super tiny and had a button to ring certain other rooms in the house as the home had these already to call for staff. My friend's mom said it was so if someone quickly had to hide, they could alert the household of danger."
"We used to pretend to be on Nancy Drew cases all the time... so fun."
"The family was wealthy, but despite the amazing home, they lived a completely pretentious free life. Normal cars, camping vacations, frugal living as sport."
"But they were philanthropists too, especially supporting organizations like the humane society. One thing about this family’s home was all the cats. I loved kitties but had a mother who preferred her animals well-seasoned. The family had the space so they always had, and were looking to adopt out but often didn’t, at least 20 rescue cats, many with special needs."
"I’m old, I didn’t know how to write that. Special needs kitty mystery mansion really is actually an appropriate description..."
- waltersmama
"Special needs kitty mystery mansion with hidden panic rooms and decoy wine cellars is like, the best possible fever dream."
- ConneisseurOfDanger
A Unique Viewing Experience
"In Naples, FL., I was at a house with a sensory deprivation room. Flat black walls with acoustic dampening baffles, in the middle was a coffin-like bathtub. It had speakers and a flat-screen display in the lid."
"I heard that the room cost over $100K to build."
- frank_sarno
A Christmas Village
"They had part of the house permanently decorated for Christmas and it included a fully decorated Christmas tree that was suspended upside down from the ceiling. Which was pretty awesome."
- lithecello
New Meaning to "Don't Take Your Work Home"
"My wife and I used to babysit for this wealthy couple when they went on ski trips etc."
"Except for the children's schoolbooks, there wasn't a book, magazine, or newspaper in the house."
"The man was a publisher."
- Texbadger349
The End of Laundry
"I knew someone who didn't like to do laundry so she just bought new clothes for each of her 4 kids every week. They were always high-quality or designer clothes. At the time, all her kids were 10 to 16 years old."
"What would happen if they liked an item a lot and couldn't find it again? Why not just teach the kids to do their own laundry? Why not hire a housekeeper who can do it?"
"There are so many options, other than spending thousands every month just to avoid laundry. Plus, they rarely donated it. Just bagged it up and threw it out. I never could wrap my head around it."
- coffee-jnky
Can We Be the Trivia Guy?
"I know someone who's worked for a very rich person, probably worth billions. He had more than 100 staff on site, including chefs for the staff...all while divorced and living alone. He had a 'trivia' staff member... someone hired to tell him interesting facts and stories daily. That was his only job."
"Someone else was hired to maintain his shoes. Polish, shine, the works."
"If I didn't hear it firsthand, I wouldn't have believed it."
- mambo-nr4
A Mud Room, Indeed!
"I used to work as an exterminator, mostly pest control. This had me walking through houses from the poor to the rich."
"One day, I pulled up to a four-story mansion with more rooms than I could count."
"I spoke with the lady at the door and got started. As I sprayed, I noticed there wasn’t much furniture in the house. As I went, I made a game of counting the furniture I could find. Over 50 rooms and the whole building had 13 pieces of furniture."
"Pretty odd, but then I went into the very last room, a mud room right by the door I came into."
"I stopped as I walked in, completely shocked. A huge, full-sized (alive) adult pig stretched from one end of the room to the other, resting on the tile floor. I’m talking five or six feet stretched out across the room. Flies buzzed around its head as it stared at me."
"Suddenly, the lady (who I hadn’t seen since she let me in) said, 'Oh, don’t go in there. She doesn’t like men,' and then she walked me out, paid me, and went back inside."
- Moist-Exchange2890
His Very Own Hot Wheels Garage
"Buddy of mine has a car elevator."
"Instead of just building a bigger garage, he stores his cars stacked onto each other, like some kind of Hot Wheels accessory. It's very surreal."
- SmackEh
Make Yourself at Home
"My friend's dad growing up was one of the top lawyers in our state. Their house was so d**n big, I got confused (lost as h**l) on all the staircases they had everywhere. They would split in a few places and lead to banisters that had different connections to different parts of the house."
"They had a room just for dishes. Her mom had a huge room for sewing and another for different crafts. They both had an office. Many guest rooms. A small kitchen in one part with a sink, coffee pot, and fridge. Their main bathroom for guests had heated floors and rainfall showers and everything. I LOVED HER SHOWER."
"Her room had a balcony and a table outside."
"They had a pool and hot tub. Horses and a barn and lots of cute barn cats."
"I was very poor and had a messed up situation in my childhood. I stayed there a lot and they would even take me for weeks in the summer because my mother was not there. They are really great people."
" They didn't give handouts or anything, I would literally scoop up horse shit and clean stalls and help with everything for those horses when I stayed. I wanted to help."
"They had a maid, but we still cleaned up after ourselves. Their kitchen was gigantic, and I always loved the fancy pasta water arm over the stove. I had so much fun cooking with her mom and us having the big dinners (Easter, Thanksgiving, and Christmas) with them."
"They were so magnificent and beyond anything I would have ever experienced without them. I got my first pair of cowboy boots from them for Christmas. Her dad bought me a plane ticket one time out of the blue because I wanted to visit my grandmother. Never forget them."
- xNinjaNoPants
So Much Wasted Food
"A very rich person I know does not eat leftover food. They will cook a feast and after, everything goes straight in the garbage no matter how much is left over."
- duckduckroosebolton
"My husband won’t eat leftovers because he thinks it will give him diarrhea. His family is preoccupied with food poisoning but doesn’t know any of the actual food safety rules."
"Oh well, more for me."
- jendet010
"My brother-in-law’s family does this but they are middle class. It’s such a waste!"
- outlawjoseymeow
An Art Enthusiast
"Not weird but a Van Gogh, just chillin' in the hallway. I took a selfie with the flash on, whoops."
- Raccoon_Expert_69
"When I did executive level IT support years back, I found a Monet dangling haphazardly on an office chair in the CEO's extra office (which was unused for storage, and had an extra desktop computer I would sometimes use for quick tasks when on that floor)."
"Another time, I was admiring a Joan Miro coffee table book in his main office, and when his assistant noticed, he showed me into a side room I didn’t realize was there, which had a mini gallery of original Miro drawings."
- spymusicspy
It's amazing what people will spend money on when they have the money to spare. It would be so interesting to see how much more a person would explore a hobby if they had the money to spend.
People Who Know Someone Super Rich Explain What Makes Them Different
Reddit user sunnybestie asked: 'To people who have also worked with multimillionaires or billionaires, what is something different they do from ordinary people?'
The super wealthy aren't like most people.
How can they be?
They live in a world of rarefied air most people will never even glimpse.
That privilege inevitably warps perspectives.
Reddit user sunnybestie asked:
"To people who have also worked with multimillionaires or billionaires, what is something different they do from ordinary people?"
To Drive...
"Years ago a friend of mine’s dad was trying to sell his start-up company and picked-up an investor at the airport."
"He was proud of his classic Rolls Royce and noticed the investor looking around, playing with the air vents."
"So he said 'Is this your first time in a Rolls Royce?'.”
"The guy said no, but it was his first time in the front seat."
~ LanceFree
...Or Not To Drive
"I used to do in person one on one market research interviews with luxury car owners and one thing that struck me after hundreds of interviews was that the only people who drove Rolls Royce's themselves were self made 'new money' wealthy people."
"The old money people all HAD Rolls Royce's but they were driven around in them because one of the reasons that you get a Rolls is the incredible back seat. If the old money were driving themselves, then they would have luxury cars but they very rarely drove Rolls."
"It may have been one of those social faux pax to wealthy old money to be in the same seat as their drivers or something like that but I never actually asked about it."
~ alwaysfailatlife
Sharing Is Caring
"Well the owner of my small company is incredibly wealthy but also rad as f*ck and he drives a literal tank on property all the time just for the fun of it."
"He also owns a very old, gorgeous estate from an extremely influential family (think Vanderbilts) and we throw parties there. But on top of it, he lets his employeees borrow it for events."
"So my husband and I are throwing an anniversary party (never had a reception) in 2024. We have the entire estate and all 10 bedrooms for a whole weekend and it isn’t costing us a single dime.
"If I didn’t work for the company, the cost of the venue would be upwards of $25k for the day."
"I never expected someone so incredibly wealthy to be so down to earth and generous. It’s exactly who I would strive to be at that level of wealth."
~ HistoricalHeart
"Hire a private chef for a casual Tuesday lunch with her girlfriends..."
"$2k, just like that."
~ Tall-Poem-6808
"About 25 years ago, a friend of my dad was turning 65 and treated 50 of his best friends to fly 1st class to London for 5 days, INCLUDING tickets to Phantom of the Opera for all."
"One of his products was just picked up by Walmart for exclusive sale, and he wanted to spend a small bit of his good fortune."
~ perfect_square
Time Is Money
"He managed time very differently than anyone I was used to. E.g., our meeting with him began precisely on schedule, lasted 30 minutes, and there was no chit chat."
"Before this meeting we had a pre-meeting with his admin to discuss expectations. The admin explained that we had to be on time, no introductions/titles just name, no small talk, no marketing, be prepared to answer technical and financial questions quickly and succintly."
"For this latter, if there were numbers we had to know precisely which page of the material had the information."
"When the meeting took place we were brought in exactly—to the second—at the start time. Sat down and within 30 seconds he was asking us all manner of questions."
"I had to field technical questions that appear to be asked not so much for whether my answer was right, but that I didn't hesitate. I also gained a healthy respect for my manager as he was SHARP and answered quickly and accurately."
~ frank-sarno
Simple And Not So Simple Pleasures
"When in elementary school my son's friend's dad was one of the 2 founders of Capital One."
"Mom had a secretary for play dates."
"Dad would fly to London to watch Tottenham football matches—had a permanent seat. Their London house was next to J.K. Rowling's."
"You couldn't tell by the way they dressed or their cars. But their vacations were the big difference."
"Their son loved a mango juice sold maybe 10-15min from their house. I always made sure we had some at mine."
"I send it to him via Amazon occasionally."
~ dcgradc
Higher Expectations
"One old money rich person treated me to a fancy meal and she was super polite and nice and tipped well, what struck me was the decisiveness and confidence that everyone there would cater to her, and they did. She wanted x dish that they didn't make that day and they made it.
"The one that sticks with me was at the end she said "I want a cappuccino with (something) I want them to put a design on it" like I've gotten cute cappuccinos in my life, it doesn't even cost extra."
"It never occurred to me to just ask for everything I want all the time."
"This was the same person that on a business trip hugged me after the flight 'I did it!' Me: 'Oh was this your first time in economy' and she goes 'No, flying commercial'."
~ woman_thorned
"The expectation that someone else will always cater to you is spot-on."
"I work at a really fancy hotel within walking distance of an ivy league university, and the super wealthy people just... expect certain things."
"Most people around them who aren't their friends or family are considered 'the help' (even if they don't say it out loud)."
"They also feel pretty entitled to things, like they will just walk up behind the bar and grab a bottle of wine that they want."
~ Dana_Scully_MD
Fines Are Payment To Do Whatever You Want
"In SoCal there's been a little problem with water so fines were instituted for overuse. $10k/month for really excessive use—water management thought this would really put a stop to wasting water!"
"Folks with enormous lawns at their 2nd or 3rd home in Palm Springs considered $120k/year a 'gardening expense' and continued on as before. It wasn't even a blip on their radar."
"Things did improve a bit when the whole situation was 'named & shamed' in the media... but I bet they're back to the lawns again by now."
~ qpgmr
"For a rich person, anything illegal that results in a fine can be ignored because they do it then just pay the fine."
"Lawyers and political donations are there for the rest."
~ bk2947
"Punishable with a fine' means 'legal for a price'."
~ fightingfish278
"Wealth allows people to express their pre-existing antisocial tendencies."
"Some of us go out of our way not to make life harder for others. Others just don’t give a damn."
"We let the wealthy ones get away with it because of their money."
~ iuseallthebandwidth
Delegate The Mundane
"That's the thing with the extremely wealthy, an overwhelming portion of the time and effort that ordinary people expend just maintaining their lives are taken care of by other people."
"It's very easy to find the time for social and leisure activity when someone else is taking care of all of the mundane sh*t for you."
~ tacknosaddle
"That's the real answer: they have people who handle things for them."
"I dated a gal whose family was 'well off'—dad had sold a company you've heard of for about $600,000,000."
"The whole family had a 'professional assistant', Janice. If someone needed something arranged, text Janice."
"Seven course catered dinner on Christmas Eve? Text Janice. Prep the semi-private jet for a flight cross-country? Janice will set it up."
"Need the oil changed in the Chrysler Town & Country minivan (seriously)? Janice will have it done. Need access to the family's private ranch outside of Aspen? You'll work with the caretaker, and Janice will coordinate."
"I got to spend some time with Janice and she was paid very fairly for her work."
~ persondude27
It's certainly an entirely different way of life. Wish we could text Janice for some things, though!
Do you have any stories to add? Let us know in the comments below.
We are now aware that the distribution of wealth is severely skewed to the top one percent of the population, and rich people have a completely different perception of how the world works and what's "hard" than middle- and lower-class people do.
But what's so disheartening is how their beliefs and limited understanding of hardship trickle down to their children, and how those children are interacting in society is honestly shocking.
Redditor WaterWire asked:
"What's the worst case of 'rich kid syndrome' that you've ever seen?"
The Jet Doesn't Count
"I used to work with someone who proclaimed to be an environmentalist. She was very preachy."
"Once I had a can of Coke on my desk. She said, 'You're going to recycle that, right?'"
"She used her father's personal jet all the time. Once, just to fly from NYC to Boston to see a baseball game."
- LiterallyOutToLunch
Disposable Cars
"A girl I went to school with crashed and totaled six cars in three years and her parents continued buying her better newer cars because every accident 'wasn’t her fault' and if she had stuff like a backup camera and sensors they 'wouldn’t have happened.'"
"She got into a fender bender in the school parking lot and her dad showed up with a wad of cash and paid the other student off."
- nosenseofpermanence
A Simple Grade Change
"When I was in college for my grad degree and I was working as a T.A. (teacher's assistant), during a specific term I was helping my professor with some admin duties for one of his post-grad courses he taught for a different field than mine, and we had this one student who was arguing that she wanted a higher final grade than the one she had gotten."
"We listened to her explanation to see if there was any merit to her request and there was something that needed to be changed, but it basically boiled down to, 'I think my grade is too low and I deserve a higher grade because I say so,' and we simply told her that after reviewing her performance we could confirm that her final grade was correct and there was nothing to be done about it."
"She completely lost it and transformed into a Super Karen and after arguing for a bit, she stormed off and started emailing me and the professor and copying everybody in the email chain: her program director, the department head, the head of our registry office, Will Hunting, the security guard, the librarian, etc., and every email she sent was progressively ruder and more entitled than its predecessor because everybody kept telling her that she was unfortunately in the wrong and there was nothing to be done about it."
"Eventually, she sent a really smug email where she said something to the effect that since everybody was a dumba** and incompetent at our jobs, we had forced her to copy her father who was really close friends with the dean to the email, so we were f**ked and we had to do as she said or daddy would get us all fired. Keep in mind, this was a grad student in her mid-twenties."
"The highest ranking person in the email chain replied, reiterating that we were all very sorry, but she was in the wrong, her grade was correct, and it would not be changed."
"Then her father replied to the email chain and just said, 'There you go, dear. I hope you learn from this.'"
"She didn't reply anymore after her daddy's email, and the matter was closed. To this day, I like to imagine that dear old dad tore her a new one for dragging him into her bulls**t and making him look bad in front of a bunch of professors from a well-known university where his BFF was the dean because she, his grown-a** daughter, chose to behave like a spoiled brat."
- Tough_Stretch
First. World. Problems.
"I'll never forget a former friend stamping her foot and crying because 'Dad sold the jet and I have to take a commercial flight to our raaaaanch.'"
- tnrivergirl
The Cost of Priorities
"An 'Influencer' wondering why other people in their home country don't spend their life traveling like them."
- OrderIntegration
"I love the 'I’d rather have a passport full of stamps than a house full of expensive things!' schtick."
"Most of my furniture is from the free section of Craigslist and I would be thrilled if I ever get to a point where I can afford an international trip every few years."
- TogarSucks
No Help At All
"Not me, but a friend of mine was an assistant trainer at a Panera store. They hired a teenager who was only working there to meet people, and one day had a group leave a huge mess in the dining room."
"Apparently the teen turned to my friend and said, 'Should we get the help to clean that?'"
"My friend had to explain that they were the help. He quit not long after."
- SailorVenus23
Garage Entitlement
"I was complaining about having to clear off my car from the foot of snow we'd gotten. A guy at work told me there was no way I had to clean off my car. I definitely did and it took a long time."
"Him: Well then, it's your own fault for not parking in the garage."
"Me: I don't have a garage."
"Him: Everyone has a garage."
"I'm like, look out the window next time you are driving?"
- Okay-Cheetah-9125
The Intrusive Thoughts Won
"A senior rich kid in my HS was driving his dad's Jaguar when his buddy asked him what would happen if he threw into reverse at 60 miles per hour. So they tried it and essentially blew the transmission and the motor up."
"A few months later, he got a Porsche for Christmas."
- New_Section_9374
Humbling Experiences
"I had a guy work for me in the military. He thought he didn’t have to do anything because his parents would just 'call their friends.' He ended up getting kicked out for LSD and cocaine use."
- ElfLordSpoon
"I did my mandatory military service when I turned 18, seven years ago. I cleaned s**t more than once, and my father had prepared me for it by saying, 'In the military, it doesn’t matter who you are, you’re still going to clean toilets.'"
"Only a few of my mates from back then knew who my family was and that was after a lengthy, alcohol involving, conversation/interrogation, lol (laughing out loud). You don’t wanna be standing out."
- RolexWearInGray
Unrealistic Shopping
"A therapist once asked me how much money I spent on clothes each year."
"I told her about 100 to 200 dollars, depending on the year and what was needed."
"Her response was, 'You can’t even get one dress for 100 dollars' and then proceeded to tell me that maybe I didn’t value myself enough."
"All I was thinking was, 'This b***h has never been to TJ Maxx?!'"
- FortunaLady
Very Different Backyards
"When I was in elementary school, this kid lived in the only gated community in the area, and the houses were all mansions. He was telling me a story about his tennis court in his courtyard."
"I said, 'Wait, you have a tennis court at your house?'"
"He looked genuinely shocked, and responded with, '…you don’t?'"
"It blew my mind as a little kid who had to share a room with my single mom, lol (laughing out loud)."
- Spare_Invite_8191
College Tuition
"Some girl in my college classes was genuinely shocked there were students who had to take out loans because their parents couldn’t afford to pay the 65 thousand dollars a year for tuition."
"I have a lot of extended family out in California who I’ve never met, but I sometimes hear stories from my parents who keep in touch with a few relatives out there."
"One of my distant cousins, who was like 17 at the time, intentionally totaled the new BMW his parents bought him because he wanted a Mercedes instead. Can’t remember if they ended up buying him that Mercedes or not, but they probably did. Sadly."
- Scortor
Exam Buyouts
"Rich Dude in my high school chemistry class flat out asked how big of a check his dad could write to get him out of taking a major test. He was serious. Nothing happened to him."
- GrayBox1313
Poor Packing Skills
"I had a friend who worked as a counselor at an American summer camp somewhere in Pennsylvania. He said that these kids would leave so much of their belongings because they couldn’t be bothered packing them up and they would just expect their parents to replace what they had left."
"He came away with Beats headphones, brand new shoes (although a few sizes too small), and gaming equipment."
"He also said that one day they were playing a game of flag football and one of the kids fell and grazed his cheek. This kid was some child model, so his parents had him HELICOPTERED OUT OF THE CAMP so he could get plastic surgery over the injury."
- amerika0210
Messy Kitchen Dilemma
"I had a roommate who would cook huge meals and destroy the kitchen. She would eat her meal and head to her room."
"A couple of hours later, she’d come out and be fully p**sed off that the kitchen was still a mess."
"She’d had servants most of her life and was now on her own."
- msjammies73
Though we know that the rich are often incredibly out-of-touch, these examples were still really surprising. Not only is their perception of money so different, but the disposable nature of big purchases, like vehicles, is just wild to think about.
It's easy to take our lives for granted and to forget how lucky we are in our own scenarios, but perhaps the rich experience this even more so.
When I started college, I had every intention of cooking all my meals. It became very apparent very quickly that I simply didn't have the time to accomplish this, and I became the Takeout Queen.
I ordered food constantly. Between getting a monthly "allowance" from my dad (intended to go towards groceries), finding coupons taped to my apartment door everyday, and essentially being "allowed" to tip less than handsomely since I was a college student, I was able to afford this.
When I graduated and moved into my own place, things changed. I was too old to not tip properly, I didn't get any supplementary money from my family, and I had more expenses, such as rent. Still, I continued to order food, and it became my main expense.
My friends tell me the way I order food is only meant for "rich people." I have to skimp on everything else in order to have enough saved to support this. It's definitely true, but I don't think this habit will ever change.
I'm not the only one that does "rich people stuff." Redditors do lots of things that is classified that way, despite not being rich, and they are ready to share their stories.
It all started when Redditor Abbas_Noorani 16 asked:
"What is some rich sh*t you do even though you are not rich?"
Ravenous
"Food. I buy what I want and I try new stuff. I like cooking."
– 34i79s
"Grocery shopping without concern for budget is what made me realize I had made it back in the day. Good times."
"Now I have hard budgets again and it truly sucks. You question every damn decision and convince yourself to do without or downgrade to the lowest priced quality."
– txmail
"On the same boat. The other day I looked at expensive butter that I used to stock up on without even thinking twice and sighed."
– cat101786
Monthly
"Forget to cancel my free trial."
– Adept_Insurance5550
"Damn. Thanks for the reminder."
– -Bk7
"I'm still a member of AOL."
– __SpeedRacer__
Too Hot
"I leave the fridge door open when getting the butter out even though my dad said it would cost billions and send us to the streets."
– frank-sarno
"I leave the front door open when I pop out to grab my mail. Took me years of living on my own to realize the AC bill doesn’t shoot up by hundreds of dollars if I do that."
– MelodramaticQuarter
Necessities
"Buy the good toilet paper."
– FrankGehryNuman
"Absolutely!"
"Good toilet paper. Can't stand cheapo toilet paper, you give yourself a surprise when your finger goes through the paper when wiping your chuff. Don't get me started on that stuff they used to have in hospitals! It was awful - sandpaper that didn't soak up but rather moved stuff 🤐"
– helensmelon
Clean And Sweep
"I have a maid that comes weekly. I've found that my sanity is worth the cost."
– Eringobraugh2021
"Weekly? Oo la la!"
– a**ypantz72
Comfort Matters
"My thermostat stays at the temperature setting of what is most comfortable to me and nothing will change that."
– Cyb3rTruk
"Lol this really outlined how different climates can be. My thought was "Yeah, I'm going to be as cozy and warm as I want and not freeze in the comfort of my own home.""
– McCoyIsFun
Double
"Some days I have two sandwiches at lunch. I smile as I watch all my fellow proletariat eating their single sandwich."
– ShambolicPaul
"Brotip: Cut your sandwich an infinite number of times and rearrange the pieces into two full sandwiches. Don't give your money away to Big Sandwich!"
– NotInherentAfterAll
Sparkling
"Paying for car cleaning."
– angydevil
"Justified, tho my dad would kill me."
– Abbas_Noorani
The Big Cheese
"I sometimes buy name brand cheese instead of the store brand."
– NeuroguyNC
"Tillamook or nothing for me! I’ll buy store brand beans and paper towels and other stuff. But not for my cheese!"
– VariegatedThumb
Replenish
"We have a garage fridge that is full of all different kinds of beverages."
– SixStinkyFingers
"It's not the fridge itself, it's keeping it stocked!"
– 4x32Studio
A House Is A Home
"I own a house...."
– 1d0m1n4t3
"Oh damn rich people sh*t."
– Abbas_Noorani
"We shouldn't be able to joke about owning a modest home being rich people sh*t. Anyone who works full time should be able to afford a home."
– 1d0m1n4t3
Write Better
"I buy the gel comfort pens. Makes me feel I'm a higher class when writing at work. Smooth crisp consistent ink."
– UltraCoolPimpDaddy
"I have gotten into arguments over people stealing my G2 .07."
– savvyspoon2
Me Too!
"I buy small trash bags for the bathroom trash bins. My whole family uses grocery bags, but I don’t like how they always rip at the bottom."
– Deleted User
It's Required!
"No Margarine in my house, Butter Only, and lots of it. My arteries think I'm rich."
– weisblattsnut
Unused
"I have HBO but I don’t watch it."
– MillionToOneShotDoc
"I have Netflix, Prime, Hulu, and Disney Plus. Don’t watch any of it. Watch YouTube all the time and I’m too stupid to get Premium."
– AngryDerf
Now, that's the definition of having money to burn!
Of course, I wouldn't know. I need to save money for my food!
No matter how empathetic we are, or how hard we try, there are just some things we can't understand without walking in someone else's shoes.
That said, people who live with more privilege can say some especially out-of-touch things.
Prepared to side-eye, Redditor BananaBR13 asked:
"What was the most out-of-touch with reality thing a rich person ever said to you?"
Invest in Property
"My boss asked me why I didn’t just buy a house in her neighborhood instead of renting an apartment. The houses there were $300-500,000 (very pricy for my area), and she was paying me nine dollars per hour…"
"I had literally just applied for food stamps."
- Far-Owl1892
Dress Shopping
"A coworker of mine was talking with a parent once (summer camp in a rich town). The parent mentioned how she loved my coworker's dress, and wanted to know where she bought it, with the stipulation that it cost under $10,000…"
"It turns out she had bought the dress on clearance for something like $10."
"When she explained this, the parent just laughed like it was a joke, saying, 'No really, how much was it?'"
"I've never seen someone thaaat out of touch."
- _Decal08_
What Paid Vacation?
"Not a quote from the person, but my sister and I were planning a weekend trip with our two cousins, and one of them just could not understand why we couldn’t make the trip longer and couldn’t seem to understand the concept of taking time off work and that we can’t just not show up whenever we feel like it."
- SensitiveCycle1098
Yeah, Because That's the Same.
"I was complaining about mortgage payments, and she said, 'I know, I finally just took the money out of savings and paid mine off so I wouldn't have to worry about it every month.'"
- Frosty-Shower-7601
Yay for Trust Funds
"I overheard a girl (one of my wife’s cousins, whose dad is very, very wealthy) say, 'Yeah, things got really rough for a bit there, I even had to pull money from my trust fund.'"
" I actually laughed out loud and she looked at me disapprovingly because I wasn’t in the conversation."
"This same girl gets an allowance (separate from the trust) of $6k per month. When she turned 21, she posted on Facebook, 'Hooray everyone, I finally got a raise this week!'"
"Everyone was congratulating her on her hard work, which is funny because she doesn’t have a job, it just meant her monthly allowance increased because she got older."
- masterpate
Tales from the Gift Closet
"One time a client’s kid gave a coworker an iPad. Brand new, unopened box. My coworker was a little uncomfortable receiving such an expensive gift from a kid."
"The kid just said, 'Don’t worry, I just grabbed it out of the gift closet.'"
"We were confused, so we asked him what a gift closet is."
"Apparently, their family keeps a whole closet loaded with stuff like this - Apple Watches, cameras, iPads, etc so that whenever they need to give a gift, they always have something on hand."
- El_mochilero
Dishwashers
"In college, I was washing a bowl in the sink and someone said, 'That's the weirdest thing about college for me, not having a dishwasher.'"
"I said, 'Man, I didn't have one until high school and it was s**t so it couldn't clean pans.'"
"Him: 'Oh, I meant like someone to wash the dishes for us...'"
"Me: 'You're joking, right?'"
"He was not joking, but I got invited to their upstate place for spring break so that was cool."
- Bron_3
Oh Yes, the Nanny...
"My husband was on a business trip w some rich people in Hawaii. They asked why I didn’t come."
"He told them I was home with the kids."
"The guy said, 'Well, couldn’t the nanny just stay with them?'"
"Nice enough guy. Just out of touch for sure."
- Xceptionalcmonplcness
Gotta Have That Car
"Back when I worked in payroll, a doctor yelled at me because his administrator didn’t process his bi-monthly incentive on time so it missed his check"
" He was supposed to go pick up his new Mercedes with that money (it was 6 figures) so he threw a fit to have a check cut that day."
"Two weeks later, that same doctor did not approve a check to be cut for an hourly employee whose hours (two weeks' worth) didn’t get approved on time because it was only $1000 and they wouldn’t miss it."
"I had to go above him to get it approved because I knew that employee would definitely be negatively impacted by not being paid on time."
- jtuley77
Tell Me Something I Don't Know
"2008, Great Recession: My job was cut from full-time salary to hourly, and then my hours were cut regularly."
"My boss, the business owner who was in the midst of a company-paid whole home remodel, handed me my paycheck and said, 'Wow, you don’t make s**t!'"
- toomuchisjustenough
So Closeminded
"I didn't go to college for seven years after high school due to struggles with alcoholism and bipolar disorder."
"A kid I worked with asked me what I was doing working and going to school at 25, and when I said I took time off due to personal issues, his response was, 'Wow, if you're not making at least 100 K a year at 25, you've basically f**ked your life up.'"
- D**nGoodOwls
Why Didn't We Think of This?
"Why have roommates at all? I don't think anyone I knew had roommates. Seems like too much trouble. Just spend the extra hundred on rent and live in peace."
"Said by an 80-year-old man."
- DarthDregan
Cheaper to Replace Than to Fix
"'If your car is broken, why don't you just go buy a new car?'"
"He was dead-pan serious."
- waywardcowboy
Travel Those Feelings Away
"'Oh, you get seasonal depression? Why don’t you just go to the Caribbean for a week and the Mediterranean the next? It always helps me.'"
- spicyhooligan
Five-Figure Months
"I have a friend and she is very wealthy. She was talking about finding a charity for Christmas."
"I mentioned that there were people going places and paying off Christmas layaways. I mentioned a town I grew up in as a possibility. I told them the per capita income is 9k."
"And she said, '9k a month!!!! How do those people live!'"
"Then I had to tell her it was 9k a year. She was floored."
"She is actually a very very sweet and caring person and donates millions a year to so many wonderful places and causes."
- Aromatic_Mission_165
While these people likely meant well, it's eye-opening to see how little financially privileged people understand about how people in lower income brackets live.
Hopefully some of the people in these stories had their eyes opened and were able to make a difference, especially that last one.