Bloomberg says Warren Buffett is one of the richest people in the world and has a net worth of $142.5 billion. He is also known for being kind. He has given away a lot of money to charity over the years, but he does not give his kids free stuff.
Susie Buffett told a story in the HBO documentary Becoming Warren Buffett that shows how thrifty her father was. It was not the first time she had talked about it.
A Globe and Mail story from 2011 said that Susie asked her dad for a $41,000 loan to fix up her kitchen after she had a baby. It was time to make room for the high chair, but Warren told her to “go to the bank like everyone else.”
In 2017, Susie told the famous cooking story again, but this time she said she was not asking for a handout. “I thought I was calling to borrow money.
He was not being asked to give her the money, she said. She was still shocked when he said no. She said, “I thought, ‘Come on, can not you do this?'”
Being known for being very thrifty, Susie joked with her mom that she sometimes worried that her dad might leave her out in the cold: “I am going to be on the cover of People magazine someday, homeless, because my dad will be like this superrich guy, and, you know, we will all be wandering around.”
It may sound strange, but Susie never thought her dad was being cheap. “I never felt like he was cheap or whatever word you want to use for him – thrifty,” she said. As a child, growing up in the Buffett family was pretty normal, even though their dad would become one of the richest people in the world.
“We grew up in this very normal sort of situation … kind of the regular father-knows-best situation,” she added. The money she and her brothers were given was quickly spent on candy and magazines.
She also talked about a funny story of her dad’s slot machine. The kids would put money in it, but he would just open the back and take it back.
Susie said in the video that her mother had a lot to do with Warren becoming more likeable over the years. “He definitely has loosened up as we have gotten older,” she noted. “I believe my mother plays a role.
It is likely that she poked him slowly for years. She also said that it was clear the kids would not change as they got older. According to Susie, Warren’s worries about money have gone away over time. “Whatever we are, we are, and it is not that bad,” she said.
She did not think it was rude that Warren was careful with her money. Susie thought that her dad’s values had made their lives better when she looked back. “I basically think he is been right,” she thought, even after she did not get the loan.
In an interview with Business Insider in 2017, Susie made it clear that she agrees with her dad’s approach to money. “I agree with his point of view that you should not give your kids a lot of money.
“By the way, that makes my dad look bad,” she said. “He has been kind to more people than they know.” What my parents did for me and what they gave us makes me very thankful.
He will not leave us $50 billion, though, and he shouldn’t. That would be a crazy thing to do.
