Originally posted by @Scott Trench:
Interesting Philosophy!
Suppose that Sarah and John both enter their adult lives making the same income, and work at the same job, right across from one another.
Suppose that Sarah spends her commute listening to the BiggerPockets Podcast, drives a 2000 Honda Civic, and buys first a house-hack, then a duplex, then 100 doors over 15 years.
Suppose that John drives a Lexus, listens to Taylor Swift while driving it, and buys a fancy home in a nice neighborhood.
After 15 years, Sarah builds a net worth of nearly $4M and $200,000 in her checking account.
John is worth $100,000, with $80,000 in home equity, $15,000 in his 401(k), and $5,000 in his checking account.
Sarah is a multimillionaire with 100 doors, and more cash flow than she even wants to spend.
John is living paycheck to paycheck and spends more to maintain his lifestyle than Sarah.
Who is greedy?
Should Sarah give John some of her money and support his lifestyle?
I believe that you'll be far more successful in your search for human greed by looking at individuals with moderately high incomes and little net worth than you will by examining the motivations of self-made millionaires who built their fortunes investing in real estate.
I fully agree Scott and posted an update/clarification of my mindset behind the original post to clarify it a bit better (on a new thread, also titled "when is enough enough"). Little did I know I was touching a sacred cow or I would have spent some more time articulating my motivation a bit better on the original post, though no regrets, this has been quite enjoyable and enlightening regardless. I've actually seen your very example between myself and my last renters; I was perceived as Mr Moneybags while they made twice the income and had nothing to show for it while renting my home from me. I put my rental up for sale and put a lot of work into listing it, ended up with well over asking price. They moved to a more expensive rental and literally dropped around $10k in the process of moving to have everything done and because they went under lease on two different homes, having found one they wanted more than the first... needless to say that first security deposit was gone!
Anyway, my heart is indeed that people check their motives carefully as well as reexamine their priorities. I feel, even after reading almost every post on this thread, that we the BP community underestimate the human condition that is greed. Now let's not forget we ARE on a site called Bigger Pockets; there's going to be a natural bias here relative to the societal mean. I think we're doing ourselves a disservice by thinking of greed only as the Bernie Madoff's of this world or the celebrities of this world who blow it all like Johnny Depp. You want to know who else is a greedy person? I am. I recognize it in myself but I exercise self control. Nobody would call me greedy, but I want want want just like the next person. We almost all want the nicer car, and once that one wears off we tend to want the nicer one yet, doesn't mean we all buy it, but most of us certainly want it. I think it's a lot easier to hide that side of us when it's an investment or asset we're buying rather than a liability. It's easy to label it as noble and wise but I believe many times there's a greed that belies it if we're being honest with ourselves. I know most will disagree, that's fine. I don't ascribe a high standard to the human condition (obviously) which is probably what has me on the defensive.
All that said, I think a good benchmark of our motives is how much time we spend building wealth opposed to spending time with friends and family, volunteering, seeking the true meaning of life rather than blowing off that important question, etc. Money really doesn't make happy but man can it easily fool us.
