Quote:
Originally Posted by MiddleAgedAl
That's absolutely what dozens and dozens of studies have shown to be true, yes. No joke.
Most (not all) people tend to compare themselves to others, so if increasing wealth puts you into a different altitude as far as lifestyle goes, then you'll soon get used to your new wealth, and it wont seem that fantastic any more, because everyone else at that level has even more. The bar gets higher.
The average American is many, many times wealthier than literally billions of others in poorer parts of the world (in an absolute sense, raw dollars net worth), and yet they do not report significantly higher levels of happiness.
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I didn't mean that as a real question. Totally agree with your post.
Quote:
Originally Posted by Billup
Even if I had a ton of money, I would probably live in a 3br 2b house on a decent plot of land, with a garage filled with cars and I'd be happy.
I get that if you have a ton of money you buy big houses and shit because you can, but how often does all the extra space get used other than burning energy and the cleaning lady out? Seems pointless.
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That's the thing. Until you have that incomprehensible amount of money, you won't know what you'll do with it. And continuing to live in a reasonable house may become tiresome when you have the means to do what ever you want with it.
This is kind of funny, to me at least. One of my lottery fantasy moments happened and like you i thought that i'd just continue to live in the house we have now. It's on 2 acres, on a ski lake, with LOTS of trees. This was how the conversation with myself went in my head....
I thought, well, we'll just really kick up the landscaping, put in a dock with a dock house and call it a day. Maybe expand our current screened in patio area with some pavers. Well, i'd like to add a room for a gym. And i know i'll have another car or two so i'll need to expand my garage from 4 spaces to 6. I'll likely have lots of cash on hand so i'll upgrade my current safe to a mac-daddy model. Well, actually, maybe i'll turn our master closet into a vault room instead of just having my gun safe in there. OR.... maybe i'll add a gun room and make that the vault room. yeah, i'll do that. Ooh... i'll build a rifle range down the side of my house. With the length of the property being 350 in depth, i can easily make a 100yd rifle range. Well, it kind of sucks to just shoot in an indoor range all the time. Maybe i'll buy a larger piece of property a little north of my house and make that my outdoor action shooting range. It's so hot here for most of the year though.... Maybe it'll be better to get a multi-thousand acre property. That way i can build an indoor range, have an outdoor range, and plenty of space to hunt as well. Still have to deal with that FL heat. I think i should just buy a ranch in Montana or Colorado. Plenty of space for shooting sports, hunting, new house designed they way i want it. Wide open roads better for driving the fleet of sweet cars, build a big ass pool that looks like it's a natural lake. yeah, that's what i'll do. Wonder how much all that would cost. googlegooglegoogle.... Hmm, looks like $50 to $100 million should cover it.
I'd like to think i'll just be content sleeping on a pile of cash in my 3 bedroom house, but i doubt it will end up that way if i had billions to burn.