What's it like to be rich?

[Hoolajerry]

Was driving home today thinking about how if I could I would get rid of my wardrobe and start again. That is not an option. Between work, 4 dc and volunteering our lives are exceptionally busy and despite having a good income we don't have the freedom to do what we like. I was just wondering if you are truly rich what is your life like? Does someone else do all your menial tasks? Kids in private schools? Lots of holidays, shopping, eating out and activities?
Anyone actually consider themselves to be rich or is it all relative and we all actually have constraints on our daily lives that aren't actually connected to money?
Just wondering....

Don't know but I would love to be rich.

From having worked amongst them in the past, there are obvious perks like buying in help (party planners, cleaners, gardeners, chefs) new cars, holidays abroad, impressive amounts of leisure time and endless updates and renovations to houses. But this doesn’t really protect from other universal stresses, such as ill health and family or relationship issues or addiction. It’s also quite cliquey, bitchy, inward looking and sometimes lonely and purposeless. I would love to be richer than I am, but not that rich. It seems to paradoxically demand a rather constricted lifestyle.

Not in the UK. We are well off enough to never have to worry about money ever again. The biggest difference is leisure: we spend a lot of time on holiday or doing active adventures, and so do our friends. I have help from a student three hours a week with cleaning. We have a beachfront holiday home which is where we spend the summer. And another holiday home a bit further away where we go with family and friends. We take holidays in a sunny country for 4 weeks in the winter. Usually have a couple of other shorter trips a year with the kids. We both work very reduced hours, me 25, DH 10. What frees up time is living centrally. We live a 15 minute bike ride from my job.
The other difference is freedom. If I want to buy a $300 dress I can and I don't think about it aside from considering the environmental impact of the purchase. I make my own money so I'm not beholden to anyone to justify spending some of it.
You'd never know the status of our family finances by looking at me. I don't look like a wag or a Housewives of star. I just look like a professional woman.
Kids aren't in private school as I value my country's public education system and the community cohesion it is designed to promote.
We give very generously to charity. But again, you wouldn't know that by looking at me.

What do you consider to be rich?

Well for a start everyone's perception of rich is different. I would feel rich if I had 10 mill as I would need to spend 2.5m to buy a home I like in the area I like, have money for holidays etc. If people want yachts & jets though, 10m won't cut it.

In terms of problems associated with being rich I think it depends how you got the cash, earnt, inherited, won, marriage etc.

The most well off of our friendship group are the least flashy. He invented a medical machine and often looks like he was dragged through a hedge backwards. The rest of our more well-off friends are property investors or law or finance professionals. Competition between us only gets heated when it comes to mountain bikes or craftbrewing.

I think 10 million is about what you need to live a stress free life, yes.

And I'd prefer 10mill in a way to 100 mill as I think that would put you in another league & be stressful.

The most ultra-rich people I’ve ever spent any time around — billionaires, own a major European football team, racing stud, strings of polo ponies etc — struck me as basically bored and jaded.

I think we would qualify as rich. I still darn socks, get my shoes repaired, buy from charity shops and we rarely eat out. Our biggest indulgence has been to buy a piece of woodland to save it from development. Not all rich people are the same.

Don't know.. but I bet it's amazing.

I agree with @geraniumblue

I'm not rich but have many family and friends who are. They have great holidays, loads of household help, private schools etc but day to day life of school run/cooking/homework/relationship stress/admin still all there.

I'd still take it though!!

Once while delivering leaflets with dc we stopped at a gated drive way. Behind it were several very expensive cars. My ds's stared in awe. The man came out, opened the gates and let the ds's look closer. They commented how rich he must be. On hearing all 6 ds's were mine he remarked how I was the richer one.
I actually cried with pride..
*True story

I've had this discussion on another forum that I've belonged to for a long time. Several of the posters are exceedingly well off. Silicon valley type jobs, big houses in expensive areas, holiday homes, country club membership and fast cars. But not one of them acknowledges that they're rich! Even though some of the other posters are living incredibly frugal lives trying to make ends meet, these people just don't seem to be able to acknowledge that they're wealthy by 99.9% of people's standards, even if they're not among the super-rich.

That is lovely Whynosnowyet

One of my closest friends married a really rich man and lives abroad. Her life seems amazing.
They live in a huge house with several en suite bedrooms, they had an interior designer design everything for them and it looks lovely. She has a housekeeper come in every day who does all the cleaning, laundry, ironing and some cooking. They have gardeners.
They usually eat out.
They go away every school holiday.

My parents were ‘ rich ‘ but I spent my Saturday afternoons at jumble sales as a child and my lovely mum took great delight at wearing a charity shop outfit at my wedding !! We are still quite comfortable financially but I am always careful with money and work in a nursing home earning rubbish money!!

I consider myself to be rich, albeit newly so. I am not really but since I got a new job last year I have finally reached a point where I do not run out of money before the end of the month and I can buy a food shop without having to add everything up as I go round. The kids (teens) can put stuff in the trolley that they like without me having to put something else back. This is the first time in my life that I've been in this position. I am very nearly 50 so it's taken me a while.

I know someone who is incredibly wealthy- think 'Rich List' - through his own talent/hard work (and luck of course). He is not at all happy though. He seems weighed down by his wealth and quite erratic about it at times too. I really care about him (a family friend) and sometimes wish he would give it all away, or almost all, as I suspect he would be happier. But he's not stupid, he knows he could do that. Yet he doesn't.

You can tell he isn't totally sure who he can trust. And you watch people circling him because of his wealth.

The only time he seems really happy is out on a windswept hillside or similar, where money just has no relevance.

I think it's a bit different as a parent, with lots of responsibilities. I know even the small amount of help I am able to buy in (a cleaner etc) makes life so much easier. And I do think being able to have more of that (gardener, cook, housekeeper) would be amazing. But on the other hand you lose privacy and have a "staff" to manage, which comes with new problems and stresses.

@saraclara I guess that's the power of "relativity". It is bonkers though I agree.

I live in a 5 bed detached but could easily feel badly off because our neighbors have fancier cars and all the latest gadgets and a 6 bed house etc etc.... But I will never forget being a single parent and counting every penny and skipping meals ... I know that a full fridge and a warm house means we are so lucky.

You have 4 kids? Plus volunteering? And paid employment? That equates to having a rich life. 4 kids is not the way to become financially wealthy though!

'Some people are so poor all they have is money'.
I feel rich, but a lot of my client base are financially impoverished, so in my book if what you do with a food bank is donate rather than receive, you're doing ok. Stable loving relationship? Awesome! Wonderful children? Hit the jackpot!

I’m rich.

Enough to own several properties, DC in private school, full time help, DH doesn’t work, I do a few hours a week but not for money.

We eat out several times a week, holiday every school break, fly first class and I don’t have to worry about money ever.

It’s great. Of course I still have issues. But I’ve learnt that almost everything can be alleviated with money.

Relativity is interesting.

When I had £120 pcm left after bills I thought earning six figures was a dream. And that anyone with a million in the bank was rich. I didn’t appreciate the multiple strata of rich that existed:

Fly business/stay in five star hotels rich
Fly first class rich/stay in your permanently booked suite rich
Charter a jet rich/commandeer the floor golf a hotel rich
Own your own jet/stay in your home in your own private island rich

Would any of the ‘rich’ on here tell us how they became rich was it running a business, a high paying job, inheritance or lottery win?

I ran a business