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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.
A very wealthy surgeon I worked with for 10 years had a bit of advice: “Don’t look rich!” He drove a beat up, old pickup truck and lived in a regular ranch house.
Interesting observation. But some people put stake in appearance. If you went to two doctor’s offices and one was a rather old shabby building and the other a modern structure. One had the old pickup in the driveway and the other a nice fairly new clean car, which would you be inclined to choose?
While the choice very likely has nothing to do with the quality of care you would receive, I bet you would be drawn to the nicer appearing office.
When I was managing health plans it was common to equate the cost of care with quality, which was never the case. In fact, sometimes the opposite. In one case I had, the very high fees turned out to be result of several malpractice cases the doctor had against him, but the patient insisted he was the best obstetrician and she was using him.
Speaking as a retired physician, I have found the quality of care provided by a doctor, other workers, or any professional in general does not correlate with their personal appearance, car they drive, home they own or office they work out of.
You are certainly correct to note the lack of correlation between cost and quality of care. While I personally would be turned off by “shabby” appearances, neat, clean and well maintained modest offices and cars are perfectly fine. That goes also for their personal dress and appearance.
Those of us who don’t live a “fancy” lifestyle achieve financial independence sooner, and with a smaller nest egg.
Check out today’s Get Educated, Act, on the home page. It’s about pausing, and thinking before making a financial decision. I call it mental-pause, and it has helped me to separate wants from needs. It’s saved me a lot of money over the years.
You are living per Thoreau’s motto, as am I, “simplicity, simplicity, simplicity.”
thanks, Mark. Your post today reminded me of the book “The Millionaire Next Door”. Chris
Surprising as it might seem, I’ve never read the book. When I think about it, I’ve never read any books on investing. Most of my thinking around money has been shaped by Morningstar, the UK site Monevator, my natural frugality, and investment advice from Vanguard newsletters over the years.
Does that mean you haven’t read any books by Jonathan Clements?
I hadn’t heard of Jonathan Clements until I stumbled upon Humble Dollar about 18 months ago. Since then, I’ve only read his articles on the site.
My favorite JC book is the international version How to Think About Money published by Harriman House (UK) . If you loan it out you may never get it back. Great read for me.
I read a borrowed copy of the book over 25 years ago, and have often quoted it in my posts. It’s
interesting that I borrowed it from my daughter’s high school boyfriend; I thought it pretty strange that a school kid would own that book. Today he is a successful financial advisor and my son-in-law.
I read that book when it first came out, and just read it again a few months ago. His other books are a good read also. Sad that his life was shortened by an automobile accident. I used to live not too far from him in the same suburb of Atlanta.
Took the words right out of my keyboard. That book made a big impression on me (in paperback, of course).
I borrowed it from the library…
I never read it – I figured the bus fare to the library was not frugal enough 😉
OK that’s a joke – I remember reading a precis much like Die with Nothing and kinda thought “that’s common sense”.
Of course the not developing fancy tastes needs to survive various life circumstances like partners, peer pressure and probably needs some intrinsic self-confidence.