30 Things Rich People Buy That The Rest Of Us Don't Even Know Exist

Chocolate. I just saw a video where the people who harvest cacao have no idea what is made from them. Poor them. But some cool dude brought them chocolate, which is nice.

Maybe not "rich" people, but a surprising amount of my friends who are very poor (as in have been homeless before) had not heard of nor tasted raspberries before.

Planning. Being rich means you have opportunity. Which means you can do whatever you want. Which means it feels stupid to have mediocre vacations, cars, clothes, coffee, dinners, school for your kids, etc. So you pay for planning. Real estate brokers who put you in good neighborhoods. Travel agencies that make sure you go to Venice on exactly the right time of year to have the best time. Concierge services that ensure you a great dinner every time etc.

One thing that surprised me, interacting with rich New Yorkers who would summer near where my grandfather lived: there is a level of wealth where it is expected that everyone has multiple homes, and as such there is very little possessiveness tied to home ownership. Want to stay in some obscure part of the world for a year? Someone will likely loan you the use of their fabulous but well-hidden home in that region because why wouldn't they? In fact, there are people who specialize in creating those homes, decorating them and making sure they are secure... knowing full well that, outside of a quick visit to inspect the property, it's very likely that the owner may never visit it again.

Of course, you're expected to do the same. Collecting homes in fantastic locations is no longer just about going there yourself, but about having the right "currency" to loan to others.

So, while homes aren't surprising, and even the idea the rich own exotic homes in exotic places is commonly understood, the whole idea of the fluid nature of home ownership at that tier of society is rarely understood.

Edit: say->stay typo.

I'm not rich, but I live in a very very rich town. My neighbor has a helicopter sitting in his back yard, that kind of rich. People here buy some truly ridiculous things.

* Don't you hate, for example, when you get on your private jet to go across the country, but as soon as you get there you need to go rent a car? Well, people around here don't have that problem. They pay a service to ship their Ferraris and Lamborghinis to their destinations ahead of time so they can drive them when they get there. Yeah.

* I've been to family parties and events where famous people are simply summoned and show up. I count this as something they buy, because I think they are very often paid. Literally two weeks ago Laura Bush made an appearance at my friends family barbecue. A month or so before that, Tom Selleck came by for a dinner party.

* Sometimes they buy theme parks or things like that for a day. They just rent it out a while in advance and then throw a huge party. It's just as awesome as it sounds, all of the workers are there, but there's no lines. There is alcohol being served by waiters too, because it's a private event.

* They can by lessons from professional athletes or dinners from famous chefs. Sure you're not going to get Tom Brady to teach you how to play football, but Teddy Bridgewater? Sure, anytime. My neighbors kid, who absolutely hates golf, got personal lessons from Vijay Singh. For those of you that don't know, hes a pretty big deal. Rich people do this just to say they did though. They'll get a professional dedicated instructor who coaches the likes of Tiger Woods if they want to actually get good, but they just want to say they got a lesson and a picture with Vijay Singh.

* A lot of my friends have two or three exact copies of their phones in case one breaks. That in itself ins't all that expensive, but it just goes to show their mentality towards money. Who needs a silly thing like insurance when you could just buy three more? Crack a phone? No problem, got a fresh one in my pocket. Crash your McLaren? No problem, got a fresh on in the garage.

* Some times you have to buy 'people'. Not exactly what it sounds like, but say you're having trouble with your homes computer system (most people here have huge house wide computer terminals, I have no idea how they work), well then you need to go out an buy a personal IT guy for your house. From now on, you are his only client and his job is to reset your router once a week. Rich people don't have time for such things.*

* If you need literally anything as a rich person, you can basically buy it even if it doesn't exist. A parking lot for example. My neighbor once had a big party, but didn't have enough room for everyone to leave their exotic cars so my dad let him use our front yard to park some of them. Literally a day later he had our entire lawn resodded with grass imported from North Dakota. There are no problems if you have enough money, only creative solutions.

* A lot of rich people live surprisingly modest too. They're in the minority, but they exist. As a kid I used to work for a guy who owned an exotic car dealership. Even though he had about a dozen Ferraris and Lamborghinis, he perfected to drive an Acura sedan as his everyday car. Not even a particularly nice one. Even though there are better options within their budget, a lot of rich people sill prefer the 'average' things we use.

EDIT: I'd prefer not to say where I live, but I will say that one person guessed it. A lot got bordering towns.

My dad's rich but he doesn't spend much and we've lived a middle class life even though we could be living a much lavish life. No complaints at all though.

But because of my dad's wealth I am friends with wealthy people and I have friends who live pretty wild. If I go to a club with one of my friends the bouncer will know my friend and just let us in, even when half of us are underage and we have no girls with us.

I also dated a girl whose dad was the CEO of a very large federal funded nonprofit. I'm not allowed to mention names of politicians but I'll tell you that House of Cards has a lot of truth to it.

There's also the friends I had who were f*****g idiots but still got into top notch universities. and then there were the other not so friendly kids at my private high school whose fathers would give so much money to our high school that these kids could get away with pretty much anything. Racism, cheating and skipping class.

And me witnessing all this was weird because the way my dad raised my family with a "save first" mentality, I never really asked for things that much. But yeah. Rich white people crazy!

Heated driveways.

A lot of people have multiple cars but rich people have cars specifically for the weekend. During the week you drive your average S-Class/Lexus/7-Series that you don't mind subjecting to cruel traffic, but from Thursday to Sunday you drive your weekend car. These fall on three spectrums- antiques, sports cars, or luxury cars. I don't know much about the antiques, but I love going for drives in the area on Fridays just to LOOK at the Rolls Royce Phantoms and Lambos. Lambos/Ferraris are usually driven by younger rich people (Arabs and athletes) and are seen at night usually racing. The luxury cars are the old people. Maseratis are not weekend cars, they're work cars. And every Saturday morning there's a car show in our town.

Also banks. If you're rich, you usually are a preferred customer at multiple big name banks. They know you by name and know your family and you can give upper level management personal calls for help.

Real estate as an investment.

You used to be able to rent a disabled person at Disneyland to get past the lines.