Stealth wealth is becoming more popular by the day. More and more people are realizing they don’t want to flaunt their wealth and rather have a quiet enjoyment of their money. Stealth wealth is a way to stay invisible from society and blend in with the average Joe Blow crowd.
When I go to the grocery store at 2pm on a Saturday, I usually wear my pajamas. I don’t care what people think of me in them but I just wear them because they’re so comfortable. When I go out, I just wear a simple t-shirt and jeans. I drive a beater car that I don’t plan on replacing unless I get in an accident.
There’s no need for me to look like I have wealth. One of my friend clears $300k per year in income. However, he drives a $50k car with a $50k note. I don’t know how he doesn’t feel suffocated by that debt that’s not doing him much good.
He does have good investment properties that are paying him every month, so he’s doing well financially.
However, I just can’t imagine having to pay for a $50k car. That $50k car is a status symbol to him and it showcases how well he’s doing compared to his peers. In actuality, he IS doing well compared to his friends. However, he could be doing so much better had he been more responsible with his car purchases.
Stealth wealth is taking over and becoming much more mainstream now. People are realizing that there’s no need to buy the latest and greatest when they can simplify their life even further. The rich don’t want to get rich by complicating their life. It’s better when their life is simpler.
What is Stealth Wealth?
Stealth wealth is the avoidance of flaunting wealth in order to stay invisible in society and blend in with the crowd. It’s a way to avoid excessive consumerism. Even if you’re a millionaire, you drive a beater car with 100,000 miles on it because the car runs just fine.
There’s no need to spend thousands of dollars on clothes every year. The ones you have are working just fine. Stealth wealth avoids all of the need to look for sales, stand in lines at crowds, and haggle with the ones selling. These are the people who know that they have enough things to upkeep their life.
They don’t go out and buy the latest car because it’s the biggest wealth killer out there. The depreciation you pay in the first year is steeper than anyone should ever pay. There’s no need to dress up in fancy clothing just for mundane everyday activities like going to the grocery store.
The clothes you are wearing works just fine. There’s no need to own 10 pairs of suits when you just have two nice ones you can work with. I currently own three very nice suits and I have no intention of buying another one. All of my furniture were hand me downs and they were some valuable furniture.
That is what the stealth wealth movement is all about. It’s learning how to live with enough and what works instead of trying to keep up with the trend of buying new things all of the time. There’s no reason to buy five of something when one of something works perfectly well.
Why You Should do Stealth Wealth: the Benefits
The first stealth wealth activity you can do is to SMASH that social share button and post to your favorite social media! Your friends might be lost on what to do with all of their newfound wealth. This is a way to help them out and set their path on the straight and narrow!
So with that said, let’s go into why you should be practicing the art of being secretly wealthy.
1) Less Unwanted Attention
Attention is good when you can profit from them. However, attention is bad for you when you can’t profit from them. There’s no reason to have unwanted attention in your life. Then life just becomes much too complicated. Family members are going to come to you with $1,000 problems when they find out you’re rich.
Your closest friends will start calling you cheap when they find out you have money and aren’t treating them. Stealth wealth avoids all of this unnecessary attention and stress you put on yourself. The rich are some of the most closely watched people in the world.
People want to give them so much attention, even if they don’t want all of the attention. There’s something freeing about living a low key, private lifestyle. There’s no need to negotiate and manage relationships with people about the money that you have. It’s much more freeing, relaxing, and stress free to do so.
2) Authentic Friendships and Relationships
When your friends are with you when you’re rich, you’ll always wonder if it’s genuine. There are people out there who will drop you like a hat if you aren’t rich and can’t do anything for them. When friends see you drive a 10 year old car and go to frugal restaurants and are still with you, they are the true friends.
It’s authentic. Stealth wealth shows you who your friends are real and who are secretly trying to use you for your money. The rich 60-year olds with 25 year old girlfriends will always be wondering if she’s with them for their personality. Or if she’s with them for their money.
You don’t want a superficial relationship with someone. You want a real genuine connection and relationship with someone who’s going to stick by your side through thick and thin. There’s no guarantee that the person you meet will have your back when it matters and counts the most.
3) Saves Money
The biggest and obvious benefits of wealth wealth is that it saves money. Not only does it simplifies your life, it saves money along the way. That’s winning both ways. The last time that I bought new clothes was four years ago. I haven’t bought new clothes since then.
Remote work made it unnecessary to look your best, anyway. Even then, the clothes I have are perfectly fine. I also haven’t bought new shoes in over four years as well. The shoe collection I have is durable and very good. I have no desire to buy another one, especially when I’m already happy with my purchases.
All of this frugality allows me to save and invest more of my money into the stock market. I don’t mind investing my money into the stock market where my future self will gladly thank my past self for doing. It just feels so good when you save so much money. It snowballs into mountains after decades.
Not saving money is one of the biggest financial mistakes you can make.
4) Minimalism
Simple living is a lot better than complex living. I recently made the move from Houston, TX to Austin TX. Along the move, I realized just how much unnecessary stuff I was hoarding. I threw all of them away. There was no need for me to have so many clothes that I haven’t worn since high school.
The more stuff that I threw away, the better I felt. There was less stress on me. There was less undue burden on my shoulders. It’s like someone lifted the burden and now I can actually walk normally. Stealth wealth allows you to practice the minimalism that’s so helpful and beneficial.
When you feel like you own your life is when you feel so much better. Minimalistic lifestyle where you stay nimble and flexible just isn’t a bad way to live. Somewhere along the way, I lost it because I started hoarding stuff. I no longer feel tied down because of my stuff. I feel complete ownership of my being.
5) People Give You Sympathy Instead of Ripping You Off
When you get in a car accident and you’re driving an expensive $100,000 car, there’s no sympathy. If you sue the other driver and the jury sees that you’re well off financially, people don’t give you sympathy. They know you can afford to take the hit. In fact, some juries will rule against you even if you’re right!
They think rich people just can’t be victims!! Stealth wealth avoids all that. When they see you driving a 10 year old beater car, they start to give you more sympathy. They know you need this money and want to award you as much as possible. Sympathy goes a longer way than you think.
That’s when others want to see you win. They are in your corner and want to see you get ahead in life. They’re not going to rip you off because they know it’ll be like taking candy from a baby. It just doesn’t feel right to them. You want people rooting for you to win instead of rooting for you to lose to keep everything “fair”.
6) Preserves the Environment
Stealth wealth is when you don’t overbuy for your life. You buy just the right amount of stuff because you have enough. You don’t care to have the latest iPhone because the one you have works perfectly fine. It’s an easy way to preserve the environment and the best way, at that.
Whether we know it or not, our footprint in the world is massive. So if we can help preserve the Earth and at the same time make us more money, I don’t see anything wrong with that. Stealth wealth is the best of both worlds. There’s less need to go out and drive to a place, too.
Further reducing the need to emit carbon dioxide in the world. There’s no need to believe the corporate marketing myth that you need more stuff in order to be happy. You have enough happiness on your own living the way you are. You dictate your own happiness, not someone else.
How to Practice Stealth Wealth:
So then, now you must be asking, how exactly do I practice stealth wealth? Sign me up! The ways to practice it are:
Stealth Wealth Way #1: Don’t Buy Designer Clothes
When you have clothes that work perfectly fine, then there’s no need to buy the latest designer clothes. I still wear shirts from my college days. Proudly and with no regrets. Designer clothes is the biggest way to give off the “I’m rich” vibe. Even if you aren’t rich, when people see you wearing Gucci shirts, people judge you.
They think you’re richer than you actually are or as rich as you actually are. The shirts that I wear are shirts that I bought 5 years ago. I have no desire to actually buy designer clothes or fancy clothing because the events that I attend aren’t that formal anyway.
One of my friends had a wedding in December 2021. I didn’t mind buying a kurta to dress for the occasion then. However, it takes a special occasion like that for me to spend money. Otherwise, I’m completely OK with the clothes that I’m wearing currently.
Stealth Wealth Way #2: Don’t Buy the Most Expensive Watch
I buy watches from Nordstrom Rack. They have reasonable and great watches at a discounted price because no one else wanted them. The watch that I have is was $150 and it lasts me years to come. All I have to do is swap out the batteries here and then. That’s it.
The watch that i do have looks like a million dollars though! I pick good watches at a reasonable price that has a very good design associated with them. There’s no need for me to buy a Rolex because, well, I have no desire to. Whether I find out the time from my phone or whether I find out the time from my watch, it’s the same thing.
Take careful note of what watch you wear. They may seriously destroy your stealth wealth goals and set you off a path of consumerism. It’s become much more of a fashion statement so people are more than willing to pay good money for them. However, it’s a money trap.
Stealth Wealth Way #3: Drive a Beater Car
Cars are just used to go from Point A to Point B. Nothing more and nothing less. There’s no need to have the flashiest car because you don’t get any extra points or rewards for doing so. The car that I drove before I got in a car accident was a 2015 Nissan Versa Note SV. It’s one of the cheapest cars out there.
However, it’s also one of the most reliable cars out there, too. It hasn’t given my any problems at all. All I had to do was swap out the battery and tires and I was good to go in the entire six years that I owned it. The car got totaled at 76,000 miles but I’m confident I could’ve driven it more.
I easily could’ve driven that car into the ground at 200,000 miles but it wasn’t meant to be. When I was in the market to buy another car, I didn’t go out with a new car either. I bought another Nissan car with the cheapest price for the cleanest title I could find in the entire city. I was happy with the purchase.
Stealth Wealth Way #4: Don’t Talk About Money
Stealth wealth means you don’t talk about how much you paid for it. When your neighbors see you paid $1,000 for a new flat screen TV, they start to put you in the rich category. They figure, well if you can afford a $1,000 TV, chances are, you can afford a lot other finer things in life!
The ones with real money don’t talk about how much their income is, how much they paid for something, and the like. They are afraid they will be silo’d into the rich category. A category they don’t want to be categorized at. The ones who are secretly rich don’t talk about money often.
It makes them uncomfortable to talk about money because they’re afraid of looking so rich to the outside world. One investment banker I interviewed with talked about how he played tennis in the country club. Nothing about how much it costs. That was enough said already.
Stealth Wealth Way #5: Attribute Success to Luck
The ones who are stealth wealth practitioners attribute their success to luck. They don’t talk about the years of hard work it took to get to where they are. The sacrifices they made along the way. They attribute to to luck, which makes others think that they’re not arrogant or bragging.
The ones who are secretly wealthy want to garner support from as much people as they can. They know that humble attracts more people than arrogant. They don’t talk about how they had to work two jobs to put them through college. No. They talk about how lucky they were to be born to great parents.
The many people who became successful deserve their success and then some. However, it’s what they attribute their success to that makes all the difference in the world to someone else’s eyes. Being humble makes people take more sympathy towards you and they want to give you more support.
Stealth Wealth Way #6: Support Other People’s Successes
There was a time when my parents told me how much better I’m doing financially than them. Then my dad shared his income with me. I realized that I made more money than him in nominal terms! What a steal! However, what I failed to realize was how much it means on a location adjusted basis.
In fact, if you adjust for location, I actually make significant less money than him. He was the real stealth wealth practitioner! By celebrating and supporting other people’s successes, you take the spotlight out of your own. Then all of the attention goes to the other person.
When your friends have huge wins, celebrate their success more than you expect them to celebrate yours. That’s how you stay secretly rich and wealthy. The ones who are successful don’t get jealous and bitter that someone else has success in their life as well.
Stealth Wealth Way #7: Pretend You Don’t Know
When you always have that toothy grin and talk about how you don’t know anything, then people start to underestimate you. Which is great! They expect so little from you. Talk about how you don’t know because the alternative makes people resent you. When you’re a know-it-all, people aren’t excited to talk to you.
They want to be the one to educate and teach, not the other way around. Now, you can’t overdo this. Otherwise, people are going to see right through you. However, you can generally say how little you know because it makes you less of a threat. That’s stealth wealth.
It makes you blend into the crowd of “average”. You’re not expected to know anything. When all of that pressure to perform and expectations is off your shoulders, that’s ironically when you actually start to do better. And exceed expectations. Talk about how little you know and downplay exactly how much you know.
Stealth Wealth Way #8: Don’t Reveal Your Income or Wealth
This goes along nicely with the stealth wealth rule of not talking about money. The way to stay secretly rich is to not reveal your income and wealth in the first place. Then when you decline a dinner invitation to a fancy restaurant, it makes sense to people. “Oh, he’s ashamed to talk about money”.
“Maybe he doesn’t want to talk about money because he doesn’t have a lot of it”. Is what people start to say and think. The private wealth are oftentimes the most wealthiest. Your income is no one else’s business but your own. It’s your job to maximize and grow that income as much as possible.
It’s not your job on telling other people about it. Stay secretly wealthy by remaining private and keeping some things a secret. The more mysterious you are, the more people want to know about you. You don’t need to tell people everything. There are some things you can keep to yourself.
Stealth Wealth Way #9: Attribute it to “Family Money”
One of my former MD’s gave an analyst group of us a ride. He was riding in a very clean and almost brand new BMW. I made a smart comment that, “oh, so this is how the other half lives”. He immediately attributed it to “family money”. He was a managing director for christ’s sakes! I bet he was clearing at least $300k per year.
I bet he could’ve easily afforded the BMW car. However, by attributing to his family’s money, he’s taking all the attention out of himself. He’s shifting the spotlight away from him to his family. When you attribute your wealth and status to something other than yourself, people want you more.
Stealth wealth is all about talking about how great other people are. And downplaying how great you are. People are more accepting of that than the opposite. People will forgive you for being the underdog, people will never forgive you for being a winner. Jealousy runs real.
Stealth Wealth: My Story
My stealth wealth story is a simple one. I grew up in a middle class family. It’s not like there wasn’t any food on the table. However, we weren’t outrageously wealthy. I didn’t have a car until I was 21 years old. No high school car graduation gifts for me. I was completely OK with that.
Growing up in that kind of lifestyle, I knew just how important one dollar was to my life and my future life. Therefore, I penny pinched as much as I could. Additionally, I knew how to dress down so that I attract less attention to myself. So when I first started my personal finance journey, it was easy for me to dress modestly.
There was no need to buy the newest clothing. Then once I got into that mindset, going into the saving mode mindset came easier as well. Once my net worth started to climb to hundreds of thousand of dollars, I had no need to upgrade my lifestyle, as well. There was no need for me to practice lifestyle creep.
Even as my net worth hit $400,000, I still dress with the same t-shirt and jeans I’ve had for the past four years. I have no desire to change up my lifestyle either. I am perfectly happy and am content with the life that I created for myself and the life that I am creating.
Stealth wealth is one of the best ways to live a less stressful life. There are more people who wants to practice it every day and the popularity is only growing from here. The question is, do you want to join the crowd as well? It’s certainly not for everyone. However, I still highly recommend it.
How to Practice Stealth Wealth: Shortlist
- Don’t buy designer clothes
- Take note of watches
- Drive a beater car
- Don’t talk about money
- Attribute success to luck
- Support other people’s successes
- Pretend you don’t know
- Don’t reveal your income or wealth
- Attribute it to “family money”
“Even if you’re a millionaire, you drive a beater car with 100,000 miles on it because the car runs just fine.” → Or you could be a pro like me and drive a car with over 230,000 miles! 😀
For real, though, great summary. Less unwanted attention while also preserving the environment and ensuring that your relationships are authentic? That’s a triple-win!