60 Employees Of Ultra-Wealthy Families Reveal The Most Absurd Things They Witnessed

A couple of random things...

1. I became acquainted with a big TV star. One time he's out of town and asks me to swing by his house in the Hollywood Hills to let in some workers who were dropping off a couch. Sitting on his kitchen counter was an uncashed check for $3,000,000.
2. I knew another actor, he was really big for a time in film. I'm having lunch with him and another friend at a very tony restaurant. In the middle of the meal, a guy comes over to say hello. They chat for minute or two, and then the guy leaves with bodyguards and jumps into a black SUV with two more SUVs as escorts. I say, "Who was that?" The actor doesn't even blink. "Oh, the King of Spain."
3. An ex of mine had a big job in publicity for a major studio. One time an actor, a guy known more for indies and being a character actor, had been cast in an enormous franchise. At one point, he and his wife call her demanding the studio private jet because they wanted to bring their dogs with them to a press junket in NYC and they didn't like the idea of their dogs riding with the luggage on a commercial flight.
4. Good friend of mine was a finance guy at a big investment bank. They were taking a company public. Every morning he'd go to a meeting in a boardroom at the top of a skyscraper in San Francisco. Literally packed with investment bankers and attorneys. Before the meeting could start, the tech CEO would stand in front of the room with a doctor in a white coat who would guide him through a timed regimen of supplements, vitamins, juice shots and other s**t laid out on a silver tray. During the process, which would often last 10 minutes or more, no one was allowed to speak. So all these Type A lawyers and bankers were forced to sit in silence. This CEO is one of the richest men in the world. Not Elon Musk.

This is prolly pretty tame but one of my clients is a billionaire and I happened to see her kids "allowances" printed out on a sheet of paper when we were meeting once.


The smallest allowance on that paper was $250,000 a year.  The person receiving this allowance was a 6 month old grandchild.  The childs parents allowance was 10 times that amount.


***A year!***.

I was a nanny for a brief time for an ultra-wealthy family in NYC - like a two-story penthouse overlooking Central Park, where the elevator opened directly to their house with it's own separate elevator for the two floors of the penthouse. They had another entire apartment they owned on a lower floor that was the kids "playroom."

The little boy was interested in claymation, and I was tasked with buying software and learning how to do claymation so he and I could make a movie.

So much was asked with absolutely no direction - organize the office (in what way?), buy software that is educational and that the kids will like (I've known them for a day, what would they like?), pick out a movie and restaurant for us to go to (what movie time? for the kids too? what kind of food do you like? any allergies?) , and make dinner for us (even though they had a full-time chef).

Lots of little tests that I definitely didn't pass.

One of my homies worked for a friend of his (actually his ex's dad, lol) as, what I called, a "tortured gardener".

Both the guy and his father invented and held the patents for several medical devices that were used in hospitals all over the world since the 1950s; a few medical pumps, a pacemaker device or component, and something to do with one of the squiggle machines (I can't remember if it was the brain or heart one, lol).

My buddy's job was the out-of-touch thing. He was effectively a farmer/gardener for a half-acre crop of the guy's own multigenerationally cultivated no-name strain of m*******a (as in, they had been growing and smoking one strain, passed down like an heirloom).

So every year my friend would spend every weekend for a few months to go work this secret half-acre field tucked away somewhere in the hills of Appalachia. Painstakingly treat and feed and trim and do all the things to make sure every plant was perfect. Like raising 500-1,000 beautiful skunky children every year.

And every year he had to watch this guy do his harvest walkthrough, pick out 5 plants that "called to him" for harvest, and then my buddy had to cull the rest of his babies...every year.

Millions of dollars worth of the best strain I've ever had the pleasure of smoking (because homie always got to take some home), just razed, mulched, and composted while my buddy harvests a mere 20-30lbs each year for the guy's personal use.

Because, I mean, what's a few million of dirty money every year when your family pulls $10M *each month* just by maintaining a few patents?

Knew a guy who spent probably close to $2M to buy a 3.5 acre lot, nearly clear cut it and convert it to a private park. When it was done he threw a party there and it was up for sale shortly after.

Met this couple in Manila, Philippines. They told me they went out the previous night to grab dinner in Hong Kong. Private jet back later that evening.

I went to a mutual friend's house to hang out one evening. I had been told that he was obscenely wealthy, but the home was quite modest. It was an amazing home with spectacular finishes, but it just wasn't as large as you would expect from someone with that kind of wealth. I did learn that the house was a fully "clean" home that created more energy than it used, so the extra energy it generated was given to the city. The thing that absolutely stopped me in my tracks though was in the middle of the living room, lit up by lights around it was an original Jackson Pollock painting. There was no protection around it, though I assume that there were hidden alarms.

Like a lot of folks on this thread- I was once an art seller at a gallery in a small but wealthy and touristy area. I had 2 separate customers fall in love with huge paintings that they didn't currently have a place for, and both independently said they'd "just keep it in storage until they bought a house that had room for it". Not the most out of touch thing on here, but definitely hard to wrap my head around as someone who couldn't afford a storage unit at the time, much less several houses.

Old high school acquaintance became a live in chef for Miami rich n famous types. He told this particular client only ate from "the largest sized Nutella jar," which was some 40oz behemoth.

He was out doing the shopping, since they were out of the large size he got two of the ~20oz jars - and was fired for it.

Family has a summer cabin. They get 5 brand new 4wd vehicles delivered every year to this cabin and the old ones hauled off. They can go 5+ years without ever visiting the cabin. Whether they touched the old ones or not, new cars are delivered every spring.

I dont work for them. But im a field mechanic and have dealt with the company owner multiple times. His valuation is 700 million or so.

I was setting up a crusher for them on their new site. Guy pulls in with the machine running throwing small rocks ( recycling concrete gets messy and dusty ). He pulls up to us in his Bently so he doesnt need to walk. Talks to us for a few minutes about when we can really put it into production. Drives around the machine, driving through bits of metal rebar, jagged stones. Then just turns around and drives away.

Apparently hes backed into equipment multiple times doing that. Wont get out and shake your hand. Just rolls the window down, barks some questions, drives around and leaves.

Foreign royalty living on the CA coast. They just completed a $20m home next to their main residence, for their "house staff" and armed security to stay in when they are in country.

The living quarters are what I would essentially consider barracks, and they are sequestered to the "back of the house" because the front of the house with the premium amenities, luxury finishes, view of the ocean, etc., is a pool lounge area for the royals.

Inspecting a client property and being told by the house manager to not step on the entry rug (you know the rug that's right inside the main door) because it was a $40k rug. I had to walk around it.

There was a thread a while back with a similar theme, but about living near the ultra wealthy, and the wild things they did with their money.

One Redditor mentioned that their neighbor came over to ask if it would be okay to park some cars on their lawn because they were hosting a party and expected a lot of attendees. The Redditor agreed and was shocked to see that their lawn was dug up, resurfaced for parking, and then dug up again after the party, and resodded with some extravagantly expensive grass sod imported from the Dakotas.

I was a nanny. They asked me to work on thanksgiving. I was new in the city with no plans so I was happy for the holiday pay.

I was taken to grandparents house for the big family meal. The family I worked for was well off. But grandpa was loaded. Estate rich. Owned a sports team. When I got there and was introduced I was promptly called “nanny” by everyone who actually addressed me.

Their baby and I were relegated to some room in the “maids quarters” in the basement. The parents would come in, grab baby to parade around for about ten minutes and then bring back to me.

They suddenly remembered about mid-afternoon (but only once the baby was down for his long nap!) that they had promised to give me a break and feed me. They led me to the kitchen (again behind closed doors. Very upstairs/downstairs. You get the idea) and gave me a plate of food that one of the maids had fetched for me. Not even reheated, which almost seemed hostile from that household’s staff.

It was a completely WILD experience for me coming from a southern small town. Don’t get me wrong. I was not offended - I was there to work, not socialize. But anyone I knew back home in real life would have been FLOORED and thought all of that incredibly rude. And actually, refusing to even attempt to use my name, which was told to them, WAS super rude.

It was my first introduction to the fact that rich people don’t have better manners. They just have different manners. And only to certain people.

I know someone who had a Tang Dynasty Camel statue and the matching driver statues. She “fixed” the chipped foot on the camel with some household glue and a chunk of a terra cotta broken off of a generic flower pot. Said she simply enjoyed looking at what I called “Alexander Camilton” and she didn’t care about properly preserving the antiquity.

Buddy is property/farm manager for an ultra wealthy family. They have a boat with massive expensive outboard motors. One of the motors broke and the repairs were taking too long for him so he just bought another motor without hesitation.

They found a Native American burial on their land and just decided to keep the bones for themselves and store them under their bed.

I worked for a billionaire Chinese family in northeast China. Five story home with both an elevator and a spiral staircase going up all five floors with a crystal chandelier running down the length. 10 armed security guards patrolling around the home. All food delivered to their home by semi, imported from the US.

The craziest thing was a massive aquarium in the basement which had small sharks. Sounds unreal but yep.

Stealing from designers who brought racks of expensive clothes to billionaire family. Just kept the clothes and had enough security and comms teams to ensure the family never saw or heard from the designers again.