How can you tell is someone is faking wealth?

[Teadrinker11]

When the hell is someone genuinely wealthy rather than just trying to be all flash but when in truth there's no real money behind the facade?

It's all money, old or new, and if someone has lots of it, their wealth will not be fake
True.
I suppose on the real/fake thing, if you were going to guess whether someone faking having money would be understated or flashy, then I'd imagine a faker would be trying to be flashy, otherwise how else would people 'know' they have money?

If someone wanted to fake having money, it's more likely to be done by being seen with the superficial markers of money (eg, the right photos, being seen in the right places, being seen wearing expensive clothes, making sure people see the designer monogram, the nice car).

If the OP is referring to Inventing Anna and Tinder Swindler we’re talking about how do you fake having many tens of millions, not examples of someone who flogs MLM but got their Audi on HP. Honestly, at that amount of wealth, you fake it with great difficulty, short of committing fraud because it would be hard ti consistently fake that level of casualness about money.

@LolaSmiles if you are faking having money, you do what Anna did. So buy expensive things that help you fit in but do not cost too much money i.e. clothes. You would not buy expensive cars or jewellery as they take real money. But you could hire cabs or car services.

But a relatively small amount of money can buy you clothes that make you look the part. It is why Anna said clothes are very important. The rest was simply attitude and total shamelessness.

And you find someone, a boyfriend for example, to bankroll you being seen at the right restaurants and events.

Genuinely wealthy people will hide it and it will not be overtly obvious. Bragging about wealth (or posting on social media) has the potential to attract crime and may make other people feel bad about themselves.

Those faking it are obsessed with a perceived lifestyle and will “brag”

I loved the bit where she swanned onto the private jet she hadn't paid for. Balls of steel. 😆

I'm here for the Inventing Anna chat btw.

[quote Monopolyiscrap]@LolaSmiles I do not think you can tell the difference between clothing that is inflated in price because of the label/name unless you know the brands. But you can tell the difference in quality. That is really what I mean. So an expensive suit does look very different to a cheaper suit.[/quote]
A suit that has been made to measure or event taken in to fit looks very different. Look at mens suits and leg and arm length-those who can afford it have suits that fit them well.

I suppose on the real/fake thing, if you were going to guess whether someone faking having money would be understated or flashy, then I'd imagine a faker would be trying to be flashy, otherwise how else would people 'know' they have money?

There's an episode of Fawlty Towers that depicts the exact opposite.

A con-man comes in with a battered old suitcase, cut glass accent and calls himself Lord Whatever. Because he meets the classic stereotype (promoted on here) of the scruffy but loaded aristocracy, Basil Fawlty trusts him with all him valuables.

Basically, if you fulfil someone's idea of what a wealthy person is like, people are probably pretty easy to fool. In some cases it might be flashing the cash, in other cases it might be a fake accent and old school tie.

Anna was trying to portray a particular type of jet-setting trust fund kid. Those types DO wear all the expensive clothes and flash their bling all over Instagram, so that's exactly what she did.

She wasn't hanging out with subtle posh folk wearing moth-eaten cashmere. She was hanging out with flash types who play 'credit card roulette' when they settle a restaurant bill.

If she had been a 40 year old man trying to portray himself as a successful businessman, she'd have approached it very differently.

Knowing both, new money are more likely than old money to rub your face in it, and take the attitude that anyone could have done what they have, if they'd just worked hard enough.

The families who I know are asset rich or quietly very wealthy are the ones who are extremely conscious of the daily risk to their children of kidnappers, protesters, etc, and keep things low key for that reason.

I call it the Madonna effect - going jogging down Park Lane surrounded by 8 ex-Navy Seals dressed in black fatigues, vs the Duchess of Cambridge slipping into Waitrose with a pair of discreet female bodyguards.

I tend to think people who either flaunt it and/or are impressed by expensive flashy things are faking it, if you're super rich, you can buy whatever you want, why are you impressed by someone else's flashy stuff

A suit that has been made to measure or event taken in to fit looks very different. Look at mens suits and leg and arm length-those who can afford it have suits that fit them well
I'd agree, but haven't ever suggested nobody nobody tell the differencebetween cheap, poorly fitting clothes and expensive well-fitting ones.
It's possible to have a well fitted garment that costs ££ and a well fitted garment that is an upmarket designer costing ££££.

Whilst the difference between a cheaper, poorly fitting garment and a more expensive well-fitted one is noticeable, I'm not convinced your average person (me included btw) can tell the difference between a more expensive item that fits well and a top end designer well fitted item costing several thousands in passing.
It's entirely possible for someone to be walking around in thousands of pounds worth of clothes without screaming "look at me, I'm wearing thousands of pounds of expensive designer clothes, aren't I wealthy, please notice how rich I am".

Oh also, I remember hearing a financial advisor once saying that their clients who were really rich, often came to him wearing normal basic clothes, looking ordinary sometimes even scruffy. And his clients who were in financial difficulty all came in wearing expensive branded clothing and looking 'the part'

@HelloFrostyMorning yeah I agree with you, and no offence to people on Mumsnet (as clearly I am on here too!) but I read a lot of people on here who are 'extremely successful career women who are extremely high earning, important and powerful' and I always kind of think... if this was the case.. you wouldn't be on Mumsnet!!

@Iknowitisheresomewhere

The other things is a lot of people who lots of people would consider wealthy don't consider themselves wealthy! Because there is always someone wealthier, and wealthy people tend to have wealthy peers. Not always true of course, but, for example, anyone sending their children to private school would be considered wealthy by a lot of people.

But if you have children at private school, you will be surrounded by people who can also afford that, some of whom will be considerably wealthier.

Hmm I think I would consider someone who was wealthy but didn't consider themselves wealthy, a bit of a dick tbh!

@didshedidntshe

There are millions of people on MN. As this thread shows, you can’t assume anything. I think it’s naïve at best (& offensive at worst) to assume all the women on this site are unsuccessful, unimportant low-earners.

There are millions of people on MN. As this thread shows, you can’t assume anything.

Quite. I find it baffling when people make sweeping statements about MNers' class, wealth, education, jobs etc.

Some people really are apparently stupid enough to think that seeing, for example, quite a lot of threads about private schools means that 'MNers are rich and send their dc to private schools', ignoring the gazillions of threads about state schools (not to mention the even more gazillions of threads which aren't even about schools, but where the state schooling of posters' dc is mentioned in passing).

It's just paranoia and either snobbery or inverted snobbery. Some people can't seem to cope with reading posts about people with different lifestyles, salaries or backgrounds from them without deciding that MN is entirely full of the wrong kind of people!

@EatSleepRantRepeat

Knowing both, new money are more likely than old money to rub your face in it, and take the attitude that anyone could have done what they have, if they'd just worked hard enough.

The families who I know are asset rich or quietly very wealthy are the ones who are extremely conscious of the daily risk to their children of kidnappers, protesters, etc, and keep things low key for that reason.

I call it the Madonna effect - going jogging down Park Lane surrounded by 8 ex-Navy Seals dressed in black fatigues, vs the Duchess of Cambridge slipping into Waitrose with a pair of discreet female bodyguards.

And yet the D of C was roundly mocked in the recent past for being one of the social-climbing 'Wisteria Sisters', and William's friends used to mocked her mother by hissing 'Doors to manual' and those mysterious 'palace sources' described CM as 'pushy, twee and terribly middle-class'.

[quote MadameHeisenberg]@didshedidntshe

There are millions of people on MN. As this thread shows, you can’t assume anything. I think it’s naïve at best (& offensive at worst) to assume all the women on this site are unsuccessful, unimportant low-earners.[/quote]
You're assuming that I meant that everyone must be the complete opposite of successful and must be poor unsuccessful and unimportant. There's a middle ground. I just don't believe that people who are that 'important' successful, high achieving and high earning are a. Bragging about it and b. Commenting on Mumsnet. Im not saying that everyone on Mumsnet is poor and unsuccessful.

I work for UHNWI and they have no time to spend on online forums. In contrast, I earn a comfortable salary but am certainly not rich and I have plenty of time to spend here :)

And yet the D of C was roundly mocked in the recent past for being one of the social-climbing 'Wisteria Sisters', and William's friends used to mocked her mother by hissing 'Doors to manual' and those mysterious 'palace sources' described CM as 'pushy, twee and terribly middle-class

If you believe the tabloids, which I don't. All I can go from are my own experiences.

Well it very much depends on your definitions of ‘successful’, ‘high-achieving’, ‘high-earning’, doesn’t it?

I doubt there are many ultra high net worth people on here, because there aren’t that many ultra high net worth people, period. But I’m sure there’s a fair few with important jobs, careers and pretty high salaries (in 6 figures, not 7). I expect the socioeconomic status of MN more or less reflects that of society at large - so a Gaussian curve, but probably without the outliers (i.e. the HNW and very poor).

The wealthiest man I've known owns an eye watering amount of land - think Prince Charles and his Duchy levels of land and is one of the most respected professionals in his field so can literally name a wage for any work undertaken.

The last time I saw him, he was driving a battered volvo that must have had over 100,000 miles on the clock and was using a rope to hold up his cord trousers. You'd never believe he was wealthy, but he's worth millions with plenty of liquid assets, not just physical ones.

My mother's enduring theory is that the rich stay rich by not spending money!

@MadameHeisenberg

Well it very much depends on your definitions of ‘successful’, ‘high-achieving’, ‘high-earning’, doesn’t it?

I doubt there are many ultra high net worth people on here, because there aren’t that many ultra high net worth people, period. But I’m sure there’s a fair few with important jobs, careers and pretty high salaries (in 6 figures, not 7). I expect the socioeconomic status of MN more or less reflects that of society at large - so a Gaussian curve, but probably without the outliers (i.e. the HNW and very poor).

Tbh I would consider 6 figures high earning, and I also still don't really believe people earning 6 figure salaries would be on online forums especially considering the amount of people on her who claim that.. 🤷🏼‍♀️ if you earn £80k for example then you're in the top 5% of earners in the UK.. I just don't believe that the top 5% of earners in the country are all traipsing through Mumsnet

@EatSleepRantRepeat I have seen the Royals driving around in very expensive cars with security in very rural Scotland. They used a little used track near Balmoral a lot, which was the quickest way to my holiday home. It was in the middle of nowhere. The cars were very flashy and obviously expensive.
And Kate popping into a shop and being photographed is so obviously a PR stunt. Not blaming her for it, but don't be so naive. It is never a proper pap shot, but always a lovely posed flattering photo.

[quote Monopolyiscrap]@EatSleepRantRepeat I have seen the Royals driving around in very expensive cars with security in very rural Scotland. They used a little used track near Balmoral a lot, which was the quickest way to my holiday home. It was in the middle of nowhere. The cars were very flashy and obviously expensive.
And Kate popping into a shop and being photographed is so obviously a PR stunt. Not blaming her for it, but don't be so naive. It is never a proper pap shot, but always a lovely posed flattering photo.[/quote]
Bright red Ferraris, perhaps? Super loud Lambos you can hear across the glens? Or the usual black range rover type cars which can cope with the weight of bulletproof glass and armouring?