Financial Planning

What would you do if someone gave you a million dollars? Ten million dollars? A billion dollars? Infinite money? These questions come up all the time, and because it is a very practical, impending and realistic concern, I have devoted substantial thought to it.

Joanna mentioned that she has a friend whose plan, should he win 20 million bucks, is to give each of 12 friends $1.5 million. I am being generous when I say that this is the stupidest thing I have ever heard. Do you have 12 friends who are that close? You've got to be kidding me. There is no way you can say you have 12 different friends that you know 100% will be friends with you your whole life. That's literally impossible. So let's say you narrow it down to like five people. Imagine how your 6th best friend would feel. Everyone else got $1.5 million bucks, and all he got was clarity that you only saw him as your sixth best friend, even though he might have ranked you in his top three. Plus, your relationship with the friends who received money would be forever tainted. You'd always feel like they owed you a debt that was impossible to repay. Either you'd lord it over them (which would be miserable) or you would pretend you didn't care but privately become enraged when a friend did the slightest thing you didn't like (I give you $1.5 million and this is this shit you do?) Anyways, don't give your 12 best "friends" tons of money. (I like this blog to provide PSAs from time to time, and really drill down on the issues that affect us the most).

Hemanshu pointed out that it would be awkward to hang out with your existing friends - I liked his plan the best - immediately invest in real estate, including vacation homes, buy your parents something they want and go back to your regular life with not a lot more liquid capital than before you randomly got $20 million. Then, at least day to day, you're pretty much the same guy, and you can hang out with your friends without things being too strange and disjointed.

As far as what my splurge would be, I'm going with personal chef - that's my top priority. I want my house to be like the White House - I just command what I want to eat whenever I want to eat it. If I could get that perk nailed down, life would be bliss. I'd have giant tanks built into my home and stock them with lobsters and crabs and oysters and clams and scallops and prawns and mussels. I guess I don't need a live cow in the backyard - that's probably overdoing it and would surely violate neighborhood zoning restrictions, which causes a lot of logistical problems, because then you have to petition the city board, and get a lot of signatures, and make a speech which will get broadcast on channel 3 and this all sounds like too much trouble for fresh beef. Beef is normally pretty fresh anyways. I'm TBD on whether my personal chef and his sous chefs have to wear big chef hats. I know that's not comfortable, and chefs don't really wear those hats like in cartoons, but it would be hilarious, and maybe I should pay them more and just make it happen.