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EAS893 t1_j3rnw03 wrote

Reply to comment by Elbynerual in [OC] Mr. Buffett - The Older The Wealthier by LeverageShares

I don't think that's accurate.

His first fund started with something like 100k in around 1950 which is something like 1.2 million today, but it wasn't a "gift" it was assets under management he convinced investors to let him manage for them.

He definitely has a lot of privilege from his background. He's literally the son of a multiterm US House of Representative member and has attended multiple Ivy League Universities. He had connections to be able to find those investors that were mostly luck and circumstances of birth, and if you listen to any interviews with the guy you'll hear that he acknowledges this "ovarian lottery" as he calls it.

That said, with his returns, he still would have ended up wealthy even without those initial investors and just investing his own money, it just probably wouldn't be centibillionaire level wealthy.

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twisted_cistern t1_j3tfns1 wrote

I'm a house sitter and I've had customers offer to put their money under my management. It doesn't have to be family connections.

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Elbynerual t1_j3ro0lc wrote

I'm not referring to his first fund. I'm referring to his first money

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EAS893 t1_j3royuu wrote

What money are you referencing? Do you just mean the fact that he had parents capable of taking care of him?

I'm asking, because having read a decent bit about this particular guy, I don't remember anything that stuck out to me in his life as a "windfall" of sorts like you're describing aside from just being born to a family with political connections.

It legitimately didn't seem like he had much handed to him that the average upper middle class person wouldn't have also had handed to them. There's privilege from being from that background for sure, but most upper middle class people don't become multi-billionaires.

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