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My home has a mature garden and spacious rooms. It borders a regional park and is within walking distance of the small town I live in. There’s a large hospital with a primary care facility nearby. As for curb appeal? Nothing fancy. But that lack of curb appeal let me pay 15% below the market rate for the area. Works for me.
My car is parked in a driveway with space for maybe 4 cars. It’s an 8-year-old SUV with 80,000 miles on the clock, well serviced and maintained. Nothing fancy. I bought it at one year old, saving on the big first year depreciation.
If a passer-by ever spotted me regularly, they’d see me in shorts, a t-shirt, and scruffy sneakers. Once again, nothing fancy. Spending big bucks on designer clothing doesn’t work for me.
This phrase weaves through my life. The sports facility I belong to isn’t an expensive members-only place—it’s municipally owned and managed, open to everyone. Nothing fancy. Also at least $2000 cheaper every year.
The ultimate expression of this outlook is my financial portfolio: a mix of low-cost Vanguard index funds, an annuity, a bond ladder, and some cash savings. Nothing fancy going on there. Doesn’t seem right for me to pay 1% for active management.
I won’t pretend I’m not financially comfortable. But it’s straightforward: I wouldn’t be as comfortable if I hadn’t been content with simplicity. If I hadn’t been fine with nothing fancy. The appearance of wealth has never interested me.
I’m sure flashier people might look at my life and shrug—”nothing fancy.” They’d be right. And I’m perfectly fine with that.
After all, there’s nothing fancy going on here. True wealth is not the ability to buy expensive things, but the freedom gained from not needing to buy them. That really works for me.
Your emphasis on simplicity works for me, too, Mark. At least partly due to the influence of HD, I’m focusing my spending lately more on experiences and less on acquisitions.
I think my simplicity is a by-product from childhood. Although I had a loving family, there was no excess cash for luxury. I was a teenager before a household phone line was affordable. They also never owned a car.
I suggest that true wealth has nothing to do with money. But if we are talking about money, true wealth is the ability to buy expensive, but without the need to prove it.
I remember as a kid seeing some people riding around in huge Cadillacs, often flashy convertibles, but they had hubcaps missing, dents and scratches, paint chipping and sometimes faulty mufflers and spewing blue smoke. They had their Cadillac to show the world, but they couldn’t afford to maintain it.
They were surely not wealthy, but I wonder if they knew it.
I’ve learnt not to judge. Sometimes wealthy people will buy nice cars and run them into the ground as the nitty gritty of maintenance or minor repairs etc is not materially important to them. Some will want to keep them in concourse condition. It largely depends on their own car nerdery as much it does in displaying wealth.
There’s more than a few wealthy landowners in the UK who drive around in a battered Volvo or Subaru wagon. As long as muddy dogs can be carried they are fine.