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> He's sharing a three bedroom apartment with two roommates. that was before he made a company and then sold it for $22m.
by zemo 6y ago
> He's sharing a three bedroom apartment with two roommates.
that was before he made a company and then sold it for $22m.
- aerovistae 6y ago.... Which the story implies had nothing to do with his later happiness.
- zemo 6y agoyes. the point is that fuck you money is a lifestyle, not a number.
- HarryHirsch 6y agoWhat? Good for Derek that he never had any kind of unexpected expense that exceeded his savings.
- annoyingnoob 6y agoHomelessness can be a lifestyle too, but most don't choose it. He could have saved more money in the same amount of time by sleeping on a park bench. We all have our limits.
- zemo 6y agoit's funny to me how worked up people on this website are getting about a mundane platitude.
- mattnewton 6y agoI think people worried about how much they feel they need to spend, are upset when "just spend less money" is presented as sage advice from millionaires on how to be happy. It's hard not to feel offended when the obvious implication from the advice seems to be that you are being frivolous and that's why you feel anxious and poor.
- zemo 6y agothe point of the article is that he started spending less money -before- becoming a millionaire; that he became a millionaire -as a direct consequence- of spending less money, not the other way around.
- mattnewton 6y agoNot sure if this is what you meant, but the point of the article is that he achieved the feeling of financial freedom that millionaires have by spending less money - "what it was like to get rich". I think there are pretty big differences between feeling like a millionaire and being one. And presumably the author does as well, because they kept many of the millions he got from selling his company.
- mattnewton 6y agoHeaven forbid you or people you care about ever contract a serious health condition, a major car accident, or want to have children.
- true_religion 6y agoIf that happens, then even being relatively rich won’t help you. Let’s say I have 2 million dollars, but my three kids are born with genetic heart defects requiring 1.5 million in surgery each. Well, since I have the money, I will eventually be forced to spend it as insurance is limited, and government assistance prioritizes those with less resources. Being rich won’t save you from disaster leading to poverty, it only makes things easier in normal life.
- mattnewton 6y agoThere is always the possibility of a wipeout event, but being relatively poor means than much smaller problems can have the same effect. For a recent personal example, I had a relative reach out to me, unable to make their mortgage because of a few thousands of dollars in unexpected hardship. I never lost sleep over it, but if I was fixated on my burn rate like this article suggests, that could have ballooned into a much larger problem of bankruptcy and/or homelessness quickly. It's a matter of degree. This advice forces you to treat potentially minor unplanned hardships on the order of thousands of dollars the same way as 1.5 million dollar wipeout problems. My point is, if you have a great safety net and nobody else is depending on you, sure, fixate on your burn rate. But if not, this advice seems bad.
- aerovistae 6y agoAh, disagree, poor argument. That would only apply to the absolute far end of medical circumstances. The vast majority of medical needs cannot bankrupt a millionaire with insurance and using those rare cases to imply that having money doesn't make much difference is disingenuous. The vast majority of normal circumstances are covered by having a job with medical insurance. And those normal circumstances can ruin people without insurance (e.g. a diabetic without insulin.)