Great point! Look at the Bitcoin rush! Admins are now multi-millionaires!

There is a third type. Not me as i fit the first category you described and added to that i have never in my 60 years lived in town and could not abide the stink and racket. The 3rd type though is near and dear to my heart as it where i come from. This type is actual down to earth salt of the earth farmers. I come from a family of farm people that are not private and are very plugged in and active in their community and many of my relatives are this. My parents who are in their 90s still live this way. They don't farm anymore per say but they are very social, plugged in and connected to their rural community and they know everyone and everyone knows them. They still live on their own in a little bungalow on the 3 section farm where my dad settled in 1955. He still puts around the farm doing whatever he wants - blowing snow or moving bales around and the family respects that as he has earned it (but the corporation that he founded and that he still owns actually owns the farm and has hired hands that do all the real farming on the original farm plus various other places he acquired over the years). He is also a classic rags to riches man as we came from nothing straight off the boat from Holland after WW2 and went from hand to mouth with no running water in my childhood to basically affluent by the time i hit my 20s. No idea what my old man is worth and don't care as i have charted my own course but i know he loves driving his Cadillac around the fields to give guests tours. He is 93 and just passed his mandatory road test that is required for someone his age in our part of the world. My mom just passed hers as well and she is 90. It's great for them but not sure i would get in a vehicle if either one of them is driving - just saying.

Love it.

Same here in Houston, there 1-2 million dollars houses everywhere. How is there enough people with the required salaries to own all of these homes?

300+ annually and a paid off house could get you into a 1-2 million dollar house pretty easily.

That’s a great question. Had a neighbor who sold his place, doesn’t make a lot of money (public info, govt employee) but he’s about to mortgage a 800-900k property. He doesn’t come from money, he’s borrowed money in the past from other neighbors and he didn’t make a bucket of money on the sale of his previous property. I think it’s a mixture of folks like previously mentioned and others that are making poor financial decisions and banks allow it.

My best friend lives in the Bluffview area of Dallas with his girl, their house is $10m. The art in the house is probably over double that. Her parents live on around 18 acres on Strait and their house is over $35m. They are oil and gas money.




$30m home he is doing something big to make it in the top 10 most expensive homes in DFW, hell Dirks house is only around $9m....

My AC guy told me this exact same thing. One in particular that I always remember was a huge multi million dollar home in HP/UP. He said the outside was beautiful, inside had nearly zero furniture. His firm required the partners to host at their homes every so often, So this guy would pay to rent and stage his home. All a facade.

After you have the basics in life, plus more, what else do you need?
A good home, food, decent clothes and a vehicle, decent healthcare, some savings for the future.
I grew up in affluent North Dallas. Got a good education, learned how to work and have lifelong friends. Have a great family, love my kids and wife.
But I’ve seen wealth cripple a lot of people, some lost their lives.

Don’t get me wrong, we’ve done very well but our priorities were never the accumulation of more and more.
Money is just money and things, just things.

Count your blessings.

Less than 1% of Americans have their home paid off, regardless of what it costs.

I used to be a real estate agent and the amount of people who would stretch their budgets to the absolute limit was astounding. Not because they had to, I could get that, but because they wanted to. "I'm a North side kind of girl," etc. Paying double or triple the prices of nicer older homes just to be in a vinyl sided box on the "rich side of town." I never understood it.

I know oilfield and federal guys that can't even be at home, because the only way they can make it is by working holidays/nights/overtime. Making 200k doesn't help when you spend 250k.

^^Yep, 'house of cards. The ones that are the loudest about how much money they have are lying through their teeth.

Correct, Ese oversimplifies the scenario some, quite a bit. Debt servicing on a $2M+ home at 300K salary is extremely leveraged and I did also indicate simultaneous purchasing of multimillion dollar ranches too.

You misunderstood, the guy said 1-2 million..... I said 300+ annually. A paid off house that someone bought in their 30s for 350k could very easily be worth 600+ 20 years later. Put 600k on 1m house, and finance 400k on 300k annually is easy. The reason i said 300+ annually is you'll need more like 400k for 1.5m, and 500k for the 2 mil house

Been in over 10 thousands or more homes in the area

Never seen that before......

RedRanger, what is their secret sauce, again I'm talking new builds at today's pricing, $2-5M new builds, additionally buying $2-5M+ ranches too. Is this mostly just top 1-2% wealth I'm seeing, the upper crust or something other than that?

People work and make bank is what is going on, and probably double incomes as well.

Cheap houses in our area are a thing of the past, Texas was known for forever where you could get a great deal on a house.

Pre pandemic small homes were was going for $200K, Now of days it is $500K for a Single Story 1800 Sq ft home in my area.

I am amazed at how high house have climbed since the Recession of 2008.