Rich kids are invariably portrayed as spoiled, obnoxious brats. But let's be honest: deep down, we all wanted to be that kid with the platinum credit card and personal chauffeur. And we still do, but hopefully we'd be able to display better manners than the kids in the stories below. Money makes people crazy, and these outrageous rich kids are no exception.
123. Time for an upgrade
109. Should have used air miles
Girl at work told me she hated her Dad. I asked why. She said he keeps asking for money since she used his credit card for a Euro trip and left him an 80 grand bill from last year.
108. What a gentleman
First day as a librarian in a private school, I help a 7 year old with the printer and he offers to tip me.
107. Hope he had insurance
I went to college with a guy who totaled five Mustangs in a year. I don't think he was sober enough to remember any of them.
106. She must work really hard
I use to have a friend who would constantly say "I love when my dad gives me money," and "If I ask for a certain amount of money my parents always give me $50 extra." This girl then bought an apartment boasting about it on Facebook and how proud she was of herself because at 23 she was able to afford a home at such a young age all on her own. Still makes me want to face plant into a pile of jagged rocks.
105. Talent isn't everything
My personal favorite was in college - kid down the hall from me bought a brand new Fender Stratocaster and played with it for a day and got bored and sold it to me case and all for $20. I still have it and play it fifteen years later. It's a great guitar.
104. A fraternity with principles
When I was in college a friend that was heavy in the frat life told me about a freshman that got kicked out for having a servant flown to town to do the hazing chores he was supposed to do.
103. Show him to the donor clinic
One time a college dorm mate next door was stressing his dad hadn’t yet given him money for the month, and $1000 wasn’t going to last him for the week.
Meanwhile I’m having to donate plasma to afford my next meal. Life just be like that.
102. Cleaning service
One of my flatmates in uni was a Chinese girl who asked us all if our washing was being done. She just threw all her clothes and towels outside her room door and was expecting them all to magically get cleaned. That was an eye opener.
101. That looks used
There was this rich kid in our class who was literally disgusted by us buying used stuff (like computer parts) on ebay. Once during a conversation I said I bought on eBay memory module for my PC and he said to me that I should have a little dignity, and if I buy used stuff I should keep it to myself.
100. One man's trash
I know a garbage man that works in rich neighborhoods, and takes out trash around move-out time for the uber-rich-kid university. Every year, he finds 200-300 game consoles (the newest ones) and sometimes desktop PCs. The kids don't want to take them home, they just throw them all out. He makes a good ~40k a year on ebay - he just cleans stuff up and sells it - nice supplementary income.
99. Black diamond tantrum thrower
A 14-year-old in full volume cursing meltdown ("WHERE THE [BLEEP] IS HE!!???") because the pilot of the private helicopter that had brought him there had gone off to get a cup of coffee. The kid was done skiing for the day and found it totally unacceptable that he had to wait 10 minutes before he got flown home.
98. Among the upper crust
I was that poor kid who ended up getting a scholarship to a ridiculous private school.
The one thing that stood out massively for me was probably how much people cared about what everyone else's parents did. Like your parents' achievements counted for yourself.
"My daddy just brought a new plane." (Yes a literal statement)
"So what does your dad do?"
When I replied "nothing" they laughed and thought I was being cool about it.
97. Entitled to a lawyer
There’s a lot of rich kids in my particular business program in university.
I met this one girl a few months ago at a social. We were chatting a bit about our program and she proudly told me about how she threatens to sue the school whenever things don’t go her way. She also said something to the effect of: “They have to take the threat seriously because they know I actually have the means to follow through, haha.”
96. Can't give her back
A girl in my school was "surprised" by her parents in the school's parking lot with a new BMW. A freaking BMW. Everyone who is out is basically watching this go down and she starts crying. At first we are all thinking its because she's so happy but then she runs back into the school. Apparently they were supposed to show up earlier (I'm assuming when there would be more students to witness the surprise).
I felt bad for the Dad because he looked totally embarrassed and sad about it. You know in his head he's like, "I created this monster."
95. This really tops the cake
My college roommate's mom gave him $1400 "for the weekend" just randomly. He blew through the whole thing by Saturday asked his mom for more money and was screaming at her because "she promised $1400 for the weekend" and he spent most of what she gave him on Friday which isn't a part of the weekend.
94. Gotta stay dry
Once had a flatmate craving for Japanese food. He went to Japan for dinner. He used his Macbook as an umbrella on a rainy day. He bought another friend the same watch as his because he kept complimenting it. It's crazy for someone who can't even afford a phone.
93. They do grow on trees
A Saudi guy in the UK got in a crash, with light damage to one side of brand new Mercedes. He called for one of his assistants to come get him, even though the car was in good enough condition to drive. My friend rolled up on call with his tow truck and asked the guy where he wanted the car towed. The guy gave him the keys and said "Keep it, I don't want it."
92. Ah, bless
My girlfriend's family is wealthy, and she’s working her way to it. But, she was waiting to get a chance for a promotion and the words “I cannot believe anyone would make somebody work for almost a year to get a promotion” came out of her mouth. And I laughed.
91. Petty cash
A long time ago I was dating a rich girl, not insane rich, but rich enough. Well, I'm from Norway and we have a recycling system for plastic bottles (you get like 10 cents per bottle). Her family had a literal mountain of empty bottles and crates in their warehouse (they had a warehouse). I asked her dad "umm, whaddya gonna do with these?" for which he replied something like "oh, those are from our employees staff parties from a couple years back, I just haven't had the time to get rid of them". Logically I told him that I'd recycle them for a percentage. He said "keep it all, guy." So I did, I had to do multiple trips to several different stores, but it ended up being like $1300 bucks, which was insane money for me at the time. I bought a guitar with it.
I realize now it's not a CRAZY story, but for me it was insane to earn that much money for 4-5 hours of work because her family couldn't be bothered to do it.
90. Big fish, small pond
In Alaska, we have a family that owns some furniture stores. The kid has been on the commercials most of his life, probably in his mid-late 30s now.
I was working for a grocery store up here, where I was friends with the girl that worked the customer service desk. The guy from the commercials comes up and was trying to return something without a receipt. Policy was to check ID, apparently he didn’t have his.
“Don’t you know who I am?????”
“No, sir. And even if I did, I would still need your ID.”
“I’m (blah blah), my family owns (furniture store).”
“Okay, well I still need your ID.”
She called me to tell me about it after he left ticked off. She really had no clue who he was, so she asked me if I knew him.
89. Smells like money
I had two friends in college who were from the Unites Arab Emirates. They were brothers, and their parents were sending them to school in the US. They were actually pretty cool and down to earth... if not a good bit weird. They knew I didn't have a ton of money and couldn't afford to do the cool stuff they did, so they covered me all the time. Crazy stuff, like renting a private plane to go to a concert, black cars with drivers, expensive dinners in exclusive clubs.
On the weird side... they slaughtered a goat in the bathtub to make a traditional Arabian dinner. And they wore far too much Drakkar.
88. The other 99%
Sitting in a group discussion in college, and having one kid whine that his parents were so disadvantaged that they only brought home $500k a year (20 years ago). I sat there and kept quiet, because my family only had $30k a year. I was only there because of scholarships and financial aid.
The worse thing is all of the sympathy this kid got from the other people in the class. The school was so proud of their racial diversity, but 95% of the students came from families in the top 1% of income.
For what it's worth, I fought for it later. I landed a spot on a student/admin advisory board, and pushed them hard to stop patting themselves on the back for textbook diversity (since they were already majority female and minority white/non-Hispanic) and focus on economic diversity. Not sure if I made a difference though.
87. All about the wheels
Girl I went to high school with got a Mercedes for her 16th birthday. She moaned about the fact that she didn't get a Lexus, because her name was Lexi and she thought it would be "Sooooo cool!" for Lexi to drive a Lexus with a custom license plate saying "Lexi".
Her parents did cave and buy her a Lexus for her 17th birthday.
My college roommate threw a massive tantrum, like on the floor screaming and crying, because her parents got her a used truck for graduation. It was a 2013 truck with less than 10k miles that was fully upgraded/loaded with every possible add on. We graduated in 2014.....the car was maybe a year old. She already had a 2009 Range Rover.
86. The Lamborghini parade
There was this family that had two children who attended the elementary school that was connected to my middle school. Every day the two parents would leave the house and drive separately to pick up their two kids before returning home.
I should mention at this point that they each drove a Lamborghini, one black and one orange, back-to-back in the pick up line to get their kids from elementary school.
At first I thought they were just being showy, but then I realized that they were two seaters, so this was really the only way to do it.
85. Daddy's home
Dad bought his college-aged daughter a house in a VERY nice neighborhood so that she and her friends could live rent free while they attended university. He remodeled the entire house. In all he probably spent close to $2 million. Two weeks after moving in, they left a candle burning while they went to the store to get snacks for a football game. Came home and the house was on fire. A month later, it was good a new for them to move back in.
84. Yeah, that's harsh punishment
My ex wife used to drive a 1998 Honda Accord. She treated it like crap and so one day I got into it to drive somewhere and I noticed that it was falling apart.
I had two options; junkyard or sell it, and so I put it on Craigslist for $250. I thought it could go to a low income family that had someone with some knowhow who could semi restore it, but when I meet the buyer he was not who I expected. He pulled up in a brand new Escalade and told me that his son was spoiled. His son had crashed a BMW, Mercedes, and an Audi and so he was done buying him nice cars. Turns out, this guy purchased my car as a way of torturing his son.
83. It’s the motion of the ocean
I grew up attending a private school in a developing country so a lot of my classmates were in the 1% of the country.
Whenever we'd be swimming in the school pool one friend of ours in particular would always remark that swimming is more fun if the pool has a current or waves. To which I had no idea what he was talking about and generally thought he was just being imaginative.
One day he invited me over to his house for swimming and... he had a 50 foot indoor pool that generated a current/waves.
He wasn't lying. They are a lot more fun.
82. It's complicated
One of my coworker, kind of not really friends, years ago made a comment that's stuck with me as the most out-of-touch thing I have ever heard anyone say in person: "I mean, who trusts portugese cleaning people?"
There are layers of entitlement and snoot in there, but the thing is that he was complaining about legitimate and relatable "my parents hate me and blame me for everything" things. His parents really did blame him for whatever the cleaning team broke.
I'm still not sure how to feel about it--he had legitimate hardships that I can understand, expressed from a frame of reference that I cannot.
81. It's a tragedy
This happened a couple of weeks ago at the Infiniti dealership.
I was in the waiting room with a very well dressed lady for our loaner cars. She left the waiting room to look at her loaner and came back crying. She said she drives a fully loaded qx80 and they gave her a qx60 with nothing in it. I said sorry that happened and asked how long she was going to have the loaner for. She said a couple of hours. I wanted to tell her to suck it up but instead I sat there quiet thinking how life must be easy for her to cry over a loaner car.
80. Money for nothing
I knew a trust fund girl whose dad gave her the money to start a company. She lost it when she went on vacation for 6 months and forgot she was supposed to pay her employees all the time. She assumed they would not get paid for 6 months and be there when she got back. I quizzed her on this for a few minutes and it was clear she had no idea what a job was.
79. They inspire gratitude
I used to work for a restaurant that celebrated free pancake day. On free pancake day I had the most interesting encounter. This college kid comes in and takes an entire 4 person table all to himself. Sets up a Mac book brings out a Mac air puts on headphones connected to his iPhone. He won't take off his headphones to order and won't look at me. Just wants the free pancakes and water. He stays for over two hours during our busiest day. Finally we are getting ready to end the event and are collecting donations for the local children's hospital. I stop by his table and let him know. He puts up one finger and makes a big show of shutting his laptop. Pausing his music and finally takes his headphones off. Turns to me and says "I don't think people should get free stuff." Then sets everything back up and makes this shoo gesture at me.
I thank God every day I don't wake up being that guy.
78. Culture shock
A friend I met at Uni flew from Auckland to London for a week to go shopping. Clothes were cheaper in London, so to him it made sense. His parents were from Singapore and had no idea just how much cheaper cars were in New Zealand. So when he said he needed $70k for a Toyota Corolla they gave him the money and he bought a used BMW M3.
When he went home for the summer he asked if I could mind the car for him - given his Dad had pretty much cut him off at that point he just said I had to pay for insurance on it and I could treat it like my own. But as a 19yo sharing a flat and barely getting by there was no way I could cover the cost of insurance - let alone petrol.
77. E for effort
My first teaching job was at a private middle school in one of the wealthiest enclaves in the United States. I taught a kid who told me he didn't finish his homework because his helicopter had stalled over the weekend so he couldn't leave his family's island. He was telling the truth. Same kid was also a huge pain who wanted to misbehave with the "cool" kids, and then would lie through his teeth while crying when held accountable. His parents knew he was a jerk and cared enough to bring me a case of wine from their vineyard as a gift every parent teacher conference or before the holidays, but they didn't care enough to discipline their kid.
I now teach at a private school in Europe and I'm absolutely gobsmacked by how many parents are happy to pay 35k per year to dump their kids into boarding so they can do nothing as students and repeat grades one/two/three times because they don't make any effort whatsoever.
76. It's not a toy
When I worked at a gas station in my early 20's. It was the hang out spot for spoiled teens to show off their new cars, try to steal beer, but generally just hang out...in a gas station parking lot. Guess they didn't have anywhere else to go.
Anyway, one douchenozzle turned 16 and his parents bought him a brand new sports car (don't ask me what it was, it just looked really expensive). By the next weekend, he totaled that car, trying to show off and do donuts in the intersection the gas station was on and just slammed right into a pole. He was fine, car demolished. Where is Karma when you need her?
Within 2 weeks, this dolt already had another BRAND NEW car! He would brag about how is parents were so stupid and he is already looking to 'upgrade' when the next model came out.
No regard for the money his parents shelled out, no regard for the possible lives he put in jeopardy with his reckless driving. I wanted to throttle him.
75. Pizza money
I had a friend and this kid's dad owns all the Little Ceasars in town. Getting free pizza whenever we wanted was nice.
Fast forward to prom dinner. I don't have a date, but I like Red Lobster so I tag along for that before going home to play WoW. Good number of us, some of us share entrees because they're pretty darn big.
Kid wants mozza sticks. He orders a chicken burger with mozza sticks instead of fries. The dinner goes normally, and everything is being cleared. There's no bite out of his burger.
"Do you want me to pack it up?"
"No just throw it out."
I ended up getting the burger and the waitress ended up getting a 300% tip since his dad gave him a fifty and the kid has no concept of money.
74. It's all relative
Grew up wealthy, lived in a large house in a nice area, went on nice vacations once a year and flew across country to see family at least once every two years. I didn’t have any real concept of money growing up.
My friends all came from different background due to the school I attended but I never put much thought into why my friend lived in a small apartment where they shared a bedroom with their sibling and I had my own bedroom with a private bathroom in a big house in the suburbs. Our father even joined a country club, though we weren’t very active in it.
I figured it out sometime in high school.
Anyway my younger brother didn’t quite get the memo. I was talking to him one day and comparing something to the size of our house. In a very serious tone he informed me “Our house is small. We’re poor.” I really didn’t know how to respond to that. Years later at almost 30 I think he still thinks the same.
The best I can come up with is compared to some of his friends we were poor and by the time he got to high school the neighborhood was mostly large McMansions. Our house was built in the 60s and wasn’t the biggest or the smallest when we moved it. It may have been one of the smallest by the time I left for college and my brother started high school.
73. In hot water
I'm from a lower class background and got into a top university in the UK where I joined the scuba club. I'm an instructor, paid for all my training and kit myself but you could see my kit had been well used. Still safe and functional, just faded, frayed around the edges etc.
One of the senior members (so he must have been nearly mid twenties) pointed out how beaten one items of kit looked and asked why I didn't replace it. I was genuinely confused. It worked, it was safe, all good to keep using in my books. He kept pointing out how it looked and I point blank told him I didn't have £500 to drop on something just because what I had didn't look pretty any more.
He then asked why didn't I just ask my parents to buy me a new one.
Yes. Because in my twenties, after having worked part or full time for seven years, I will totally ask my single parent on disability benefits to buy me new toys.
The guy was completely baffled.
Jen Batler
72. Prep school posh
I went to a private school with a gigantic discount because my father has taught there for nearly 20 years at this point. Oh the stories I could tell. One kid flew to Florida for a dentist appointment. One kid bought a Jeep with a credit card. At one point we had an ATM on campus for some reason. Someone found a receipt for a withdrawal from a checking account which still had $900,000 in it. I went on a field trip where we stayed in a hotel for a few nights and my roommate couldn't understand why I didn't want to go to a different hotel where we would both pay $100 per night when I only had $100 to last the entire week. I could go on.
71. Back at it again
My old roommate had been doing an internship with Nike in Portland over the summer. When he got back for our last semester, I had a breakdown about not saving enough money for my last semester. Then he shared, nonchalantly eating his chips and salsa, that he had been charging thousands of dollars in Nike Limited Edition shoes, Gucci products, and drinks to his credit card for the past 4 months. His response was “It’ll all work out, I just need to send me bills to my parents I keep forgetting to do that.”
70. Expensive KD
I attended a boarding school for 8th and 9th grade and lived across the hall from the kid of a major CEO. This kid was a little brat to say the least. On multiple occasions, he would walk into my room while I was doing homework or whatever and would start going through my clothing and ridiculing my taste in belts. “This belt is so cheap. Why don’t you get Gucci?” I would respond “I like that belt... and I don’t need Gucci to look nice.” I remember once he was saying he didn’t want to microwave Mac and cheese anymore, and he offered me $50 to make him Mac and cheese whenever he wanted, I accepted instantly. Barely made any, well worth the $50.
69. It can swing both ways
Ghaith Harstany
60. No sweat off his back
I have a friend of a friend, more of an acquaintance. He's not rich anymore but he grew up with rich parents and was super spoiled and misbehaved all the time till he was 25ish, then got kicked out.
Nowadays he lives on my buddy's couch and he's a nice enough guy but he tends to get trashed and when he's trashed he becomes an animal. Breaks things (usually accidents, sometimes on purpose), gets real nasty, sometimes starts physical fights. I don't know how my friend deals with it.
He also is slowly learning the value of a dollar. Before he would wreck a car his parents bought him and completely shrug it off cause they'd buy him a new one the next week. Nowadays he's at least a bit more financially aware even if he blows all his money on liquor.
One time he got arrested at like 3am when he was banging on the windows of a closed taco bell and the cops got called on him after he tripped the alarm somehow, and he's still trashed in his mugshot but smiling as if he just won a million bucks. The dude is an enigma, consequences are all but lost on him. Makes for some funny stories I suppose though.
59. Nice if you can get it
I was in a theology class where we were talking about compromises.
Teacher: What are some compromises your parents have made?
Very rich girl: My mom wanted to go to Hawaii and my dad wanted to go to Mexico so we went to the Bahamas instead.
Going to private school makes life full of these stories, like earlier this week when I asked why this girl who I sit by was gone. Her friend then told me "She's skipping this week because she wanted to go to the Bruno Mars and Pitbull concert in Hawaii." Or another one last year this girl got too stressed out with school so she went to Lithuania with her dad for a month... I have no idea how she made up all her school work.
58. Back to driver's ed
I had a scholarship to private school for my secondary education (11-18.) We were by no means poor, but compared to the people who were paying full school fees I was a peasant. The vast majority of the students were wealthy, and about half of them were spoilt little brats.
Most of the kids got given cars for their 17th birthday in anticipation of passing their driving tests. One boy in particular in my year had a September birthday, so was one of the first to take his test; and he had a huge house/garden, so he already knew how to drive (you can drive on private land at any age here.)
On the day he passed his test, he got dropped off back at his school in his shiny new sports car (I don't know what type it was, but everyone else seemed impressed.) He picked up a couple of friends to go for a spin, and before he got ~100m up the road, he completely wrecked the car.
His dad bought him a new one the next day and he complained that it was the wrong colour.
57. A charmed life
My ex best friend. I remember that when we were fourteen, she lost her Pandora bracelet, which was full of charms, at school (for a total of €500). So she called her mum and was like: "Mum, I need a new Pandora bracelet," and the mum just answered: "Okay, sweetie. We'll go buy one this afternoon alright?" and then she hung up.
This happened twice a year, for three years. I don't talk to her much anymore, so I don't know if she has lost any more bracelets or not. I wouldn't even want to know to be honest. I feel like I could choke.
Oh, she also broke something like...every phone she ever bought after only a year? And they weren't cheap ones either.
I mean come on. You should treasure the things your parents buy for you. My family doesn't exactly have a lot of money so maybe I'm too touchy on this subject, but still. Usually, when my parents buy me a phone, I keep it for three years or more, because it's an expensive item. I'd feel too bad if I ever were to break one.
Don't know what it's like to lose a Pandora bracelet though. I don't think my parents could afford one.
56. He had a free ride
I knew these twins in high school. On their birthday, I think it was 17, they get matching pickup trucks. Like the suped up larger than life cool-looking black ones.
Twin #1 is the brat, and smashes his in some remarkable timeframe, I want to say same day. It was crazy though. His parents decide not to get him another one (though I'm sure insurance probably covered it even if it was his fault) but regardless he is going to learn a lesson.
So he took his brother's truck and crashed it ON PURPOSE. If he can't have one, neither can his brother.
So much recklessness, spite, and downright illegal to boot.
55. She's a keeper
I live in a town that sits on the shore of a really big (not great, but still big) lake. My friends and I decided a few years ago to buy a boat we could take out onto the open water. None of us are "poor" but none of us have a lot of extra money on the side so we did it as cheap as we could. We bought a decent boat that was over 30 years old and spent two years rebuilding the engine, refinishing some of the interior, and generally getting the thing ship shape. We were super proud of the fact that we managed to get a fully functional and reliable boat together for a little under 5 grand.
Here is where the story starts: We were out on the boat on a beautiful Saturday drinking beers and cruising the beaches for girls that might want a ride on our new boat (this is why any straight man owns a boat). We pulled up to a beach and anchored and eventually a few girls waded out to us to see if they could have a couple beers. One thing led to another and they were climbing aboard to head out for a spin.
This is when I notice one of the girls was not really excited to be on the boat. We got to the middle of the lake and started swimming off the boat, having a good time, except for that one girl. My friend asked her what was wrong. She replied "I don't even feel safe on this piece of crap! That's my grandmother's island over there, drop me off NOW!" We were hurt that we had put so much effort into the boat and she dismissed it as a piece of garbage but whatever it is kind of a beater.
We dropped her off on the island... the dock had over 5 million dollars in boats parked at it. The girl sucked but grandma was awesome, she brought us all ashore for beers and food and berated her granddaughter for being such a snob. Little old lady (80+) lives out there alone all summer. We go back to the island all the time to help granny with the yard work and such (in exchange for hanging out on a private island) but I haven't talked to the granddaughter since.
54. Fool us once
A guy I met in my early 20's was the richest person I've ever known. His dad was CFO for a big bank, but died when my friend was 14. He grew up in a massive mansion, had his rent paid for in a luxury rental building, and had unlimited funds for illegal substances.
Eventually, his mom forced him to go to rehab, which he did for a couple of months. One day, while he was at rehab, my roommate got a call from him. He said he's outside and didn't know where else to go. He had been cutoff from his money, knew that we had an extra room, and asked if he could stay with us while he learned basic life skills (getting a job, buying groceries, cleaning, budgeting, etc...). We let him, against our better judgment.
About a month in, he had managed to stay sober, keep a job, and not be such a parasite. His mom thought he was doing better to, so she reconnected him to his money. His whole attitude and demeanor completely changed. All of a sudden it's "I don't have to stay in this apartment, living like I'm poor. I don't even have to stop using. I've got my money back!"
He left right before rent was due and basically told us to screw ourselves.
Two months later, he had the exact same situation happen. His mom cut him off again, forced him to go to rehab. He left again and called us, but this time we figured he'd rather not live in our apartment living like he's poor.
53. The guitar antihero
As a kid, I was super poor. Like we had no money, and barely kept the lights on. My mother did an awesome job, and even worked 2 different jobs AND went to night school at one point to make a better future for us. I grew up without a lot of things, but It taught me a lot about what you really "need" in life, which is a roof over your head and food in your belly. Everything after that is a plus really.
I had a lot of friends who where waaay better off than me, but one kid in particular had EVERYTHING. He was a Jehova's witness, so didn't do birthdays/christmas, but would often just get stuff to kind of make up for it. At times he would whine to his mother for buying him something that he thought was "crap" or wasn't the right model of something, despite getting loads of stuff which was awesome all the time. He was that kid that had all the games/consoles/toys in the world but would moan about it.
One of the last times I hung out with him, he was shouting at his mother because she had promised him that she would buy him a new guitar [he was learning] but the time of the day had gotten late and she wan't able to go. Like it was when all the stores were shut, so it was litterally impossible. But this kid just kept chewing her out because of it, and speaking to her like she was some kind of moron. It was painful to watch, and I was like 14 at the time.
I stopped hanging around with him after that. I later heard his mother cracked and had enough of him, then kicked him out of the house. He later ended up being a shoplifter and lived in the local YMCA for a bit. In fairness I think he's back on track now, but as a kid he was a bit of a jerk.
52. High and dry
I grew up with rich kids and still keep in touch with a few of them. One guy's father owned the most prestigious law firm in town. He said his life changed the moment he called his father from jail, the second time it happened. His father said "Well, sorry to hear you got arrested, good luck", then hung up.
He said getting locked back into his cell was the singular moment that completely turned his life around.
51. Left without wheels
I knew this rich kid from high school that went off to college and partied every single night. His parents found out that he was failing basically all of his classes, so they secretly drove up early one Saturday morning with the spare set of keys to the car they had bought him and just drove off with the car.
50. That was sudden
Somewhat distant relative spent all of his university years and twenties partying hard with the ~100-120K allowance his rich company owning father gave him each year. He'd travel the world each year going to Bali, Thailand, Europe, every year Oktoberfest, just rampaging.
At 32 or so he decided to settle an upscale ski resort area of the US and open a business with his hot gold digger fiancée. When he went to transfer his money to his US bank account he noticed it only came to a few thousand dollars. He angrily asked the bank worker why she hadn't transferred the entire amount only to be told that that was the entire amount. His father had cut him off without saying anything and he just hadn't noticed.
Absolute flatline.
49. So satisfying
Rich guy in our college dorm thought he was untouchable cause his dad was some NFL player from the 90s and had not blown all his money yet! He would get freshman girls to do humiliating things, film them, and then show all his buddies the next day or so. Well one buddy was not as close as he thought and went to the RA who then went to campus police and then real police (some of those girls were underage).
It was a fun night watching the parking lot fill up with the bored cops on duty that night and haul him out of the dorms while they went and gathered his evidence!
Gene Gallin
48. Poor kid
I had a roommate my freshman year of college that came from an incredibly rich oil family from the Middle East. I remember him having the hardest time adjusting to not having someone else prepare him food. I remember waking up one morning and going to the kitchen and seeing him try to eat eggs and toast he had just prepared himself. He asked me how I normally prepare fried eggs because his tasted really crunchy. Turns out he had just cracked the egg whole into the pan and prepared it shell and all. I couldn’t stop laughing but felt really bad for the dude.
47. It doesn't buy everything
Administration and faculty at a university refused a substantial offer of endowment money from a couple that wanted their son enrolled as an art major.
Their son couldn't meet the minimum scholastic entrance requirements and he had little aptitude for art. Still, with their millions, he thought money would buy his way to an "easy degree" as an art major.
He was dumbfounded to receive a notice of non-admittance.
46. Cardboard money
I knew a guy in high school who bragged that he didn’t have to pay attention in school because his grandfather was a Vice President of the corporation that supplied the cardboard for cereal boxes for General Mills. Real gravy train, ya know.
Last I checked (since deleted Facebook) he was still working at Best Buy five years after high school, same job he had in high school.
45. Best outcome they could hope for.
My best moment was when I got hired by a pair of Woodside, CA parents to transition their horrible 18 year old into the realities of "real life", something that evaded both of them. My first action was to take away his platinum, limitless, credit cards. He threw a tantrum that lasted several days. "Where am I going to get money? " Get a job. "My parents will fire you." They didn't. When he realized that boundaries & budgets had been set in stone, and that he not only had to pay the bills, the rent, but taxes too, he headed straight to college to wait out the next 4 years. He is still a little jerk, but at least he has a job and an education now.
44. Glad there was a happy ending
2. What a terrible roommate
My parents bought me a laptop for my 18th birthday. It was absolutely unheard of in my family to recieve gifts as expensive or technological. I cried when my Mom handed it to me. I was meant to be moving away for university and both my mom and dad had saved up 6 months wages between them to afford it for me. We all hugged and cried and it was extremely meaningful and emotional. I went off to university.
I was in the dorms one night when my dorm mate, who was a rich white boy from long island, brings back like 2 girls and another friend. They start drinking and rolling up weed in the dorm, which I was fine with, it was university etc. I go to the bathroom down the hall, and when I get back, one of the girls has opened my laptop and is trying to log in.
I approach her and I'm like "Hey that's my laptop. I don't mind you using it I guess but let me just log you in to the guest account" - she goes to move the laptop off her lap toward me, and knocks an open bottle of wine on to it, the entire laptop being flooded with wine.
She goes "Oh! Sorry!" I'm FREAKING out!!!!! I can't believe it's happening. My roommate starts telling me to chill out and asks "Can't you just get a new one dude?"
I start patting down the laptop and I ask them, please, if it doesn't work, can you help me replace it? I need it for my classes etc. They start laughing at me! Saying "Why can't your parents get a new one for you?"
It took 2 weeks of demanding them to buy me a new one before they reluctantly did as I had to explain to the dorm manager my situation of my family being extremely poor and it being unbelivable that they were even able to get me into university let alone a new laptop. Luckily he was sympathetic and helped me arrange for a replacement.
But man, that moment of "Can't you just get a new one?" made my heart blow up. It was more painful than the laptop getting damaged itself. I looked at him and wanted to kill him. I'd never experienced rich kid syndrome as succinctly before or since. I hated that guy.
1. Gotta have those baby-back ribs
My friend is a Commercial Pilot and works for a large company that has a "flight department" consisting of several jets and turboprop airplanes. The owner's kids, and a group of their friends, were granted permission to take one of the jets from the central part of the US to the Bahamas. Upon arriving in the Bahamas they were meeting other friends and getting on a very, very large yacht for a week. They realized the yacht was equipped with fine dining food, not the type of food they liked (junk food) They ordered the Pilots to fly back through US Customs and to their hometown in the Midwest. Once there they had to pick up multiple sides of BBQ ribs, burgers, hot dogs, soda, beer and piles of other junk food and fly back to the Bahamas - and do so within a time-frame that still allowed them to leave with the yacht on time. It costs roughly $5,000 an hour to operate the jet they were using. And it never even struck the owners as something extreme.
The BBQ (ribs, pulled pork & sauce) was the main purpose for the return trip to the Midwest. If you’re from the Midwest, or a southern “BBQ city”, you know what I’m talking about. They don’t have this in FL, period. The other junk food was add on requests from other guests. The plane owner’s son had promised, in the months prior, to bring some of the BBQ he had told his other friends (who he was meeting in the Bahamas) about repeatedly throughout college. He forgot, and was getting ribbed for it. In an act of boldness he sent the plane back for it.
This is the most extreme example of how theses planes are used, and wealth flaunted, within this company. That’s with the understanding that wife shopping trips, sending a plane back to pick up a kid after school to come to FL, ballgames, hunting & fishing trips and to dine in a restaurant 3,000 miles away, is commonplace. On occasion these planes and Pilots have been used as “Angel Flights” transport ill children and family throughout the country for medical procedures. The pilots for this company aren’t paid the best, but are permitted to bring family (spouses mostly) to destinations as space and work schedule dictates. Some senior pilots can stay at company owned property nationwide if available.
José Ignacio Pompé
