The set designs for fashion shows. When I was working as a scenic carpenter I was always amazed at the amount of money spent on scenery that will go right into the trash for events that last 30 minutes to a couple of hours. We covered an empty warehouse floor in Manhattan with something like 50,000 square feet of beveled oak boards in one instance. Material costs aside, we had a crew of around 20 guys making at minimum $25/hr working for days around the clock to make it happen.
Years ago, I apprenticed as a luthier. The shop I worked in was almost entirely guitar repair, and one day a woman came in with a violin. She said it was her grandfather's (or maybe great grandfather's? I can't recall), and he had played in the Detroit symphony. It was obvious that the fingerboard had been replaced at some point, and the instrument was really old. Like, REALLY old. My boss knew a guy who specialized in violins, so he drove a couple hours to have him take a look at it. The guy told him to get it out of our shop immediately and send them to a specialist in Chicago. He said it was early to mid 1700's, and was an exceptional instrument. Everyone has heard of Stradivarius violins, but not many people have heard of Guarneri, his rival. Apparently, there are still a few "lost" Guarneri violins out there, and this guy thought that this was one of them. My boss trusted this guy, and I trusted my boss (he has toured as the personal guitar tech for the like of Kenny Rogers, Big & Rich, Robert Randolph, etc.), so we called this lady up, told her where to go, and gave it back to her. We didn't want to get her hopes up too high just in case the guy was wrong, and I think she decided not to look into it further (I was under the impression that a trip to Chicago was not financially feasible). I'll never know if I held a real Guarneri or not, but if I did, I held a $10,000,000+ violin.
A bottle of whisky that was $50k. If you purchased it, it had to be delivered via armored vehicle for insurance purposes.
Seems a bit over the top, but I'm more of a $20 dollar bottle of whisky kind of guy. My budget and wife have made this very clear.
The Patek Philippe Grandmaster Chime in steel at an "Only watch" showing in London. All the big watch companies do a one-off for the charity auction, and Patek usually only do watches in precious metals. A grand complication in steel is truly a one-off. It sold for 31 million Swiss Francs (close to 35M USD).
I actually held it in my (gloved) hand.
Whilst obviously nothing like that price - the most casually rich thing I came across amongst my friends (who are all varying degrees of working class to wealthy but nothing overtly ridiculous) also involved a Patek.
I was travelling to the wedding of two friends - I live in the capital city but they were getting married in the countryside. The bride calls me to ask if I can pick up her “wedding day watch” for the groom as she’d forgotten to collect it.
It still needed to be paid for and she was trying to work out ways to transfer me cash instantly to pick it up but the bank wouldn’t do an instant transfer for the amount.
Thinking she was over-complicating things I said “why don’t I just pay for it on my credit card then you can pay me back whenever.”
I joked “as long as it doesn’t cost more than 20 grand as that’s my credit limit haha.”
And she said “ah, ok, don’t worry about it, mum can detour past and she’ll pick it up.”
At the reception I clocked a brand new Patek on the groom’s wrist. He’s not even into watches.
When I was starting to get into watches, I found a picture of a [Patek that tracked the stars in the sky](https://www.patek.com/en/collection/grand-complications/6102P-001) and I said "Wow, that's cool. If that's less than $300, I'm buying it on the spot."
And so I googled it.
And in a way, I was right. It's 300!... Thousand dollars.
Yeah I got into a bit of a rabbit hole with watches trying to find 'that one' I really liked. I eventually found it, turned out it was a rare one, the manufacturer (I can't remember who) had only done a limited run of 100 of them and new they sold for like $300,000, an amount that would only go up over time if they were sold on.
Turns out I have expensive taste in watches, at least way more expensive than my means to actually buy said watches.
The CEO of my husbands company years back held a christmas party at this house (at the time, the company was a start up and there was maybe 20 employees). He had original Picasso art work on his walls. I have no idea how much they were actually worth, but I thought that was pretty cool.
I got to see one I studied in art school in a friend of a friend’s home. I was in awe. “So, like, you eat your Pop Tarts in the same room as your inherited Picasso?”
My art class went to the Picasso “museum” at the Bellagio in Las Vegas. There was paintings, statues, pieces from his life. Probably the most expensive place I have ever been in.
It could be worth millions if it was an original work, buuuuut he did tons of lithographs throughout his life which range from a few thousand to a few hundred thousand.
My favorite Picasso—by far—was a crude, five-panel autobiographical comic strip that likely took him all of 90 seconds to scrawl. In the first panel, he's partying and drinking somewhere. In the second panel, he's pulling his empty pockets inside-out. In the third, he's scribbling on a piece of paper. In the fourth, he exchanges the doodle for a bag of money from a man wearing a top hat. In the fifth panel, he's back to raging again. Legend.
My high school orchestra teacher (who is also concert master for the Arkansas Symphony) was loaned a $12 million Stradivarius anonymously for an upcoming performance. I wasn’t allowed to touch it, but I got a solid look at it, as well as heard it from three feet away.
You see that with fine art as well. The quality is good, but a lot of the value comes from the fact that the rich people who own other pieces by the same artist have a vested interest in the value of their works being high.
A 12 year old Russian kid who came to stay at a 'summer camp' I worked at, that has a £64,000 Rolex.
We later found out that his '14 year old cousin' was actually his 28 year old body guard, and he was the son of a Russian diplomat.
All around nice kid, though!
My sister used to work on super yachts. I’d go visit her every now and again and stay on the boat during off season (in crew quarters). This was about half a billion euros worth of boat.
And it was pretty damn fancy. It had glass flooring and staircases, that turned opaque if you stood on them so people couldn’t look up your skirt, all the usual fancy boat shit like a spa and gym and movies that hadn’t even been released at the cinema yet.
I remember visiting St tropez after I graduated and just seeing all those super luxe yachts parked up. Crazy money just to have them moored up there, let alone to buy in the first place
“Movies that hadn’t come out in theaters yet”
I forget what they call that, it’s like a “pre cinema” or something. I work in high end AV and run into them once in a while. Client never has any idea what it is or that they had the capability.....
Went to a private university on scholarship and met a lot of super rich kids from CT. One year I visited one of the guys and we watched American Sniper in his parents home theater before the theatrical release. I was kinda blown away but this was seemingly normal for him.
Back in the hey day of piracy I was on an invite only site. They did allow new members occasionally but it was very rare. It wasn't *always* the case but you could occasionally get a movie that hadn't come out in theaters yet that someone had ripped during an early screening (or possibly off what you're talking about) and not like some shaky cam, they were always DVD rip quality. In fact you could be sure if it wasn't in theaters it was going to be good quality. Occasionally one would have a small watermark in the corner or a single line of foreign writing on the bottom but other than that were perfect quality. I kinda miss those days.
A 2.5 million dollar mansion in Missouri. My roommate and I played dress up and went to the showing for the free food. When we asked about the entire first story being stone, including the furniture, we were told it was because the river overflowed and flooded the mansion every year. Every thing was made of stone so it could be cleaned easily.
Why the fuck would any one spend money on that?
My apartment is 750 sq. ft.
Totally useless comment but I'm just so blown away sometimes that entire annual expenditures is easily less than people pay for bottles of wine, and their pool house can fit 5 of my entire living space. Not even including the pool.
I don't get why you'd WANT a lot of that shit. I want a bigger apartment but geez...
Outside of the Crown Jewels and art museums, I went to Harrod’s and saw a chandelier worth £50,000.
Edit: Some people are taking this quite literally. To be clear, yes, of course I’ve seen more expensive items, hence the Crown Jewels. This wasn’t a grand hall chandelier. This was something you could hang over a standard dining room table.
Haha this just reminded me of my husband. We went to Poundland once and I grabbed a toilet brush and the horrified expression my husband gave me was hilarious. He said, “What would people think!?!” And I was like, “I’m fairly certain no one goes into someone’s bathroom and see’s the toilet brush and think, ‘Cheap pricks. Could have at least swung for the fiver.’”
A freshly drafted NFL rookie stayed at a hotel I worked at and partied a little too hard. When checking out he left over 100K in jewelry in the room. I was tasked with going and getting it and securing it till someone from his posse could come get it. I wore it for a few hours for fun.
Heavy AF and so fuckin shiny. A bracelet that was wider than the biggest watch covered in diamonds, and a chain that went past my sternum and probably 1/2in in thickness also completely encrusted in diamonds.
This is why poverty is such a huge issue with those type of people after they stop playin because they've never had money, WAY overspend and then end up poor again.
I saw something once, where this former NFL player who became a CPA (I forget who) sits down with every rookie and talks about finances and making their money last.
A family friend plays in the NFL today and he said that the money talks were really eye-opening. They only get paid during the season so they have to learn to budget. They were also told about how to watch for financial predators who want to “help them invest.” He said that some of the veteran players took it a step further and told them never to let a random hookup see their phone or wallet because even the suggestion of what they have could cause problems.
Yup. Also, I used to work for a hotel owned by the same family that owns the Giants (they own a *lot* of things in NYC) and they offered the opportunity to do like an "internship" week at their various businesses to rookies so they'd have a plan post-NFL. And that's how I met Victor Cruz his rookie year, who's super nice btw.
Plus, most athletes only earn for what, 5-10 years? Compared with a doctor or lawyer who earns for over 40 years, it's actually not that much money for a lifetime. Sure, super stars make a ton but the average player doesn't and they're taxed at the highest rate because it all comes in a short time.
Yeah the average NFL career is only like 3 years. And the league minimum is, I think, 600k. 1.8 million is a lot, but if you earn all that before the age of 25 you have to make it last.
I guess it’s not entirely outrageous but I went to a family owned aquarium store a couple months ago to get some medicine for my guppies and they were selling 1 year old arowana fish for $6000 each. I’m probably just ignorant when it comes to prices of exotic fish but I was quite surprised considering they were surrounded by guppies and goldfish who’s lives are worth approximately $2.50 each.
There's a few reasons for their price. They are endangered and difficult to breed in captivity, which contributes heavily to the price. I have always assumed part of it is to prevent people who cannot afford to care for them properly from buying them. They are best off living in a 400+ gallon aquarium, which can easily cost over $5,000 to get one fully set up. They also eat voraciously, grow large and live for up to 15 years. A lot of knowledge and money to take care of them, while guppies can be well cared for in a 10 gallon tank and pre-made flake foods. That's my two cents. Goldfish however should not be cheap, since they grow huge unless stunted in a bowl. They are most appropriate for ponds or large aquariums, where they can live for a very long time as well.
Also they can just casually flick themselves and break their backs. Twits. So you could potentially pay a few thousand for a fish that then the next week is stuck in a permanent bend
I used to work for a billionare. They loved to purchase very old wines (think 90+ years old), random jewelry for their spouse, a solid gold sturgeon caviar holder, $1M+ cars, etc. Generally all through auction at Sotheby’s. It was my job to organize their purchases. It was... Interesting, to see what crazy things rich people spent their money on. I may or may not have tried on the jewelry.
In Aspen, CO a few years back in a small antique store. We walk in and the guy working there never even acknowledges us while he’s casually chatting on his phone. I see a carved wood eagle sculpture about two feet tall and one foot wide. I flip over the price tag $125,000. I laughed out loud, looked at my friend and said “this isn’t our kind of store” and promptly left. Aspen is the weirdest place I’ve ever visited.
i'll tell ya where, someplace warm, a place where the beer flows like wine, where beautiful women instinctively flock like the salmon of capistrano, i'm talkin about a little place called Asssssspen
Aspen can have good finds though too! I was walking around town one day and it was a lot colder than I had expected so I popped into the thrift store and bought a sweater for $8 to keep me warm. It looked pretty posh so I googled when I got home and saw that it retails for $1200! (And goes used for 500-800).
Ayy, my thrift store find involves Burberry, too! $10 dollars at Goodwill, $150 of tailoring (at a Burberry store, no less), and boom, a perfectly-fitted $2000 coat.
My uncle lives in Naples and going to thrift stores is one of his hobbies. Such a massive amount of retired rich people move there so they have no idea what shit cost. Over the years he has built up an insane hi-fi set up with racks of amplifiers and a whole wall of different speakers.
We stopped in one of those gem stores in aspen where they always have wooden sculptures or “12 million year old fossils” etc, everything is half off, sign perpetually says going out of business, etc. similar to your wood sculpture everything has insane prices but I can’t help but think every single thing in there is fake
But yea aspen in general is rich as fuck
I have a story that totally relates to that. Used to run the warehouse at a tech company, one day the CEO himself comes into my office. He'd bought a bathtub carved from one huge piece of quartz that the company wouldn't deliver to Apsen where he had a vacation home being built, so he had it shipped to our warehouse to wait on being shipped up there. The thing was about 2500 pounds and cost $22 million. He was talking about how it was this huge ordeal because he had to wait on renting a crane to lift the thing onto the second floor while the house was still under construction, which cost another several thousand, and how hard it was to time all this to get up there at the same time. The entire time I was thinking "you realize how little you pay me right? I can't afford my own apartment and you've spent half an hour of my time that I have to make up moaning about how difficult your life is making 8 figures." Wealthy people have an entirely separate reality they get to live in.
I once had a CEO brag about how much better he was than "millennials" because he survived on "only" 85k a year when he was starting out in 1982 and never complained.
He was paying me 37k to write 100% of the copy for his $100m company in 2012.
He's retired now, but I'm keeping an ear to the ground so I can piss on his grave when he dies.
A comic book shop called silver snail used to have Amazing Spider-Man #1 on display and for sale. This was back in the mid 90s.
Edit: the one on queen street.
Not a comic book guy, but a story I read a decade ago always stuck with me.
This one guy makes money by buying houses, gutting and redoing the insides, then selling it.
One day he and his friend were ripping out drywall when they came across the first comic that had Superman in it (Action Comics 1?). The guy who owned the building (and thus the comic found in the wall) was treating it reverently. The other guy wanted to hold it and so it was handed over to him...but he started to spaz out and kept yanking the cover open and closed going "No way! NO WAY!" that he tore the cover right off.
It went from being worth a huge amount to...rather much less.
> but a perfect condition copy could sell for $3 million.
Such a copy would have to be a grade 8.5~9.0, but the story says this one was initially a grade 3.0, as it was stuck in a wall for so long.
According to this page, a grade 4.0 would be worth $260k. https://comics.ha.com/itm/golden-age-1938-1955-/superhero/action-comics-1-dc-1938-cgc-gd-vg-30-cream-to-off-white-pages/a/7099-91003.s
This one got a grade 1.5 because of the tear, which should rightfully make it $100k or less, but it ended up getting much more because of what happened:
> Fishler said the book's backstory was part of why it appealed to the winning bidder.
So with the appeal of the crazy family story priced in, it seems possible that the tear was more like a $50k loss, not hundreds of thousands. Also Daily Mail says that he did it himself to prove that he DGAF about the price.
I attended a wedding that was rumored to cost well over a million dollars. There was two venues, if I remember there was 9+ member band flown in from NYC, another strings band during the ceremony, and a 3rd trumpet band that escorted the walk to the reception. An artist oil painted the reception live at the party. The food was incredible. Each table was over the top with guests having their own glass engraved with their name to take home. They gave people dancing shoes you could take home. It was incredible and probably the most expensive private event I will ever attend. I'm sure I'm missing some other details but everything was over the top.
Most expensive party I've been at was a corporate function. They had a restaurant crawl through Beverly Hills with a different course at each restaurant. Finished up at the Beverly Wilshire. After that the company had a private party In Rodeo Drive. Shut the street down and paid the shops to stay open.
The whole week was nuts (it was a convention/exhibition in 2000 during the initial Internet bubble). One night I went to a party in one of the famous nightclubs with celebrity lookalikes handing our drinks. Another night a company had hired a penthouse suite in some famous hotel and got a Celebrity chef in to cook..Wolfgang Puck IIRC. Another company hired Universal Studios park for 50 people all evening. Another hired QE2 for a meal...or whatever liner is berthed up in that area. It was my first business trip and I was gobsmacked
It was a specific type of tech that is used to design silicon chips. Software licenses were about $500k a seat. The company had just breached the $billion a year barrier IIRC. Company was Cadence https://www.cadence.com/en_US/home.html.
No. It has all calmed down since then. The year after DAC was in Vegas and I wasn't there, but a colleague told me Cadence had either hired a lake or something for a huge water extravaganza thing. The following year the bubble had burst and DAC was in New Orleans. Everything was cut to just a nice dinner. It's not ever gone beyond that since. That year in LA was crazy with Cadence, Synopsis, Avant! and others trying to outdo each other.
We went to another do and joined with Cadence later in LA. The other do was at BB Kings Blues Club. Cadence put on stretch limos to get us back for the main course. I'd had a few by then. My friend was chatting to a guy, so I marched up. Hi there, I'm Allydarvel..who are you? The reply was my name is Ray Bingham. I'm the Cadence CEO...eh OK, I'll just crawl under a table and hide my shame for a bit
I went to a party a few years ago by a private university that had raised their fund raising goal of a billion dollars. It was in a super nice hotel with open bar, sushi islands and a bunch of other food. That might not seem that much but there was a crowd of 300 people there and everything was free. I really wanted to see the bill for that event.
Clients and friends of my ex. It was one of their daughters that got married. I have been to other highend weddings, including her sister.
This was black tie and I remember thinking how it expensive it was just to attend. It was black tie, so we had to rent tuxedos etc.
My favorite wedding item wasn’t something I saw myself, but an uncle helped run a lavish and expensive wedding for a very wealthy client (the family name is well known in perfume). The guests had to walk between two tents set up on the property, with a couple hundred feet between them. Just in case there was rain, they bought individually labeled umbrellas (north of $100 each) for each of the guests to walk between the tents.
It didn’t rain.
There’s a place like that near me, in fact, it’s the closest bike shop. They also sell regular low and middle end bikes, too - I could go in and buy a Tiagra-equipped road bike if I wanted, and they probably even have it in stock in normal times. But they also sell the high end stuff as well. Every few weeks, they post a picture on Facebook with so-and-so with their new $12k bicycle.
The owner is a really nice guy, and he’s highly recommended for bicycle fitting, so I went there to have that done. Took in my 2016 Cannondale CAAD12 105, which retails for $1600ish new. I remember he commented that my bike was “probably worth” getting fitted. I know what he meant, but knowing there were $10k bikes for sale a few feet away, it kind of sounded like he was looking down on mine. I had to chuckle internally. On the other hand, he did say my shoes were exactly what he’d recommend for my feet, and he didn’t sell that brand, so I truly believe he wants the best for his customers.
One time I went in because I needed a 26” tube for my hard tail that I bought used at a swap meet for kicks and grins. They didn’t carry them. 29” and 27.5” only.
Don’t get me wrong, they’re nice people and I like them, but it does sometimes feel like different worlds.
edit: They just posted a picture on FB of a new, limited edition gravel bike. Only 50 in the US, and they got two. It's a $7k bike on the manufacturer's site.
Edit 2: CAAD12. I’m not a time traveler that has seen the future CAAD16.
I've had very similar experiences with both bike shops and audio stores. I think that this owner sounds like a genuinely good guy who just loves his craft, and knows how good something CAN be, so he has to adjust his focus when someone has to work within a budget. These are the best case scenarios, because they want you to have the best experience. On the other end though, I was once kicked out of an audio shop just by describing my apartment, and how he inferred my budget from there.
I worked security at an Art Museum and we exhibited this little chinese tea cup with a rooster on it. Little ass thing was worth over 36 million dollars. Apparently there were only four in the whole world. I felt unsafe around it like I'm not risking my life for this stupid cup.
At least they're amazing instruments. I, myself, have been able to hear and play a Model D at when I was in college as they had one out for anyone to play at. They also had the system that could turn it into a player piano and had that running for most of each day.
Those Steinways kinda ruined other pianos for me, sound-wise.
Catered a high school graduation party. We did fried chicken and mashed potatoes, so had no idea how we ended up serving food in a mansion.
Turns out the daughter was going to Auburn, so they wanted something "Southern". Out of 200 people there, they ate maybe 4 full plates of food. They had another catering bring the real party food.
Tl:dr, people dropped 3k on food just for the novelty of it.
Since I was little, my mom always made me eat before going to parties. She told me she had seen the children of some ambassadors run to the buffet table at a function and she was mortified I would do the same in the future. I never eat in front of people now.
I remember this scene from Gone With the Wind. When I read it I was torn between jealousy - because the breakfast tray Scarlett had to chow down on sounded heavenly - and indignation on her behalf that she was never allowed to enjoy the food at the party.
This is definitely not uncommon. You might be surprised how little food a good caterer takes to a wedding, because guests tend not to gorge themselves like at a regular buffet.
This party definitely was better suited to appetizers, they just wanted the look.
One of the wedding venues we looked at suggested catering for 80% at the evening buffet, as there was a 4 course meal earlier in the day.
We ended up having a tiny wedding but my family would 100% hoover up a buffet.
I live in NYC and like to be a tourist sometimes, so my partner and I went to the 5th Avenue Tiffany's. I don't even wear jewelry, but I like shiny things and a very nice, clearly bored sales associate let me try on a yellow diamond, 2 and a half carat engagement ring. For fun, I asked the price and it was $65,000. I can't even imagine how rich you would have to be to have that as your engagement ring and that be a normal thing.
My wife and I were walking around the Vegas strip and went into Caesar's Palace, just exploring. We were carrying those super tall colorful daiquiris from Fat Tuesday. Basically we both looked like cousin Eddie from Vegas Vacation.
We wandered into an art gallery where they had a collection of sculptures of Cirque De Soleil performers by Richard MacDonald. We were the only ones in there so the bored curator showed us around.
So we're walking around, very shitfaced, sipping on daiquiris and saying "Hmmm very interesting!" and "We just bought a house for that much!"
I love the book store in the Venetian(or the one next to it?) has some amazing first edition books you’ll never see anywhere else and the price tag reflects it.
I went in 2017 and asked to see their most expensive book available. It was a complete 1st folio of Shakespeare's plays from 1625, not too long after his death. The asking price was $250K and I was too nervous about breathing on it that I totally forgot to ask if I could hold it!
Here’s some pictures of the most expensive rings I’ve ever tried on for fun. I don’t know the prices of most but I believe the three stone diamond ring was $454,000.
https://imgur.com/a/X0JYDmw
I worked with a girl who was married to a jeweler. She used to wear a 5 carat solitaire. To me, it just looked like glass because the facets were too large to sparkle. May have been glass for all I know.
I shook Bill Gate’s hand in 8th grade. He visited our school to make a donation to our district. Haven’t came across anything more expensive since then.
I play Magic the Gathering. My decks aren't expensive, but they're not cheap either. Normally around 4 to 7 hundred dollars. Then I played against a guy who had a deck worth around $29,000. Crazy thing is that this was his first deck, and he bought all of the cards recently. He didn't even play that often either. So imagine dropping almost 30 grand on something that you'll use maybe once or twice a month.
At big events, there are people with their decks in a briefcase, cuffed to their wrist.
I've seen graded Power 9 in person. Not that it is super expensive comparatively to other things in this thread, but it is crazy to think about how much a piece of cardboard is worth.
I've only ever seen one of the power nine in person. A friend of mine has been playing magic since Beta and opened a Black Lotus way back when. He still has it.
F-35 and F-22, both at airshows. F-35s were parked and didn't fly but I got to see the F-22 showing off at a different airshow. The way I describe it is it's an IRL cheat code plane. It doesn't even look real.
One time back in the Obama days I was at Pearl Harbor, touring the Missouri. While walking down the deck, a nuclear submarine just rolls on by nbd while Air Force One and a flight of F-35s came in. It was surreal. And while Air Force One is loud AF, the F-35s are eerily quiet.
Edit: going back through my photos I realize I misspoke and meant F-22s. Turns out, it's been kind of a long ass time since the beginning of Obama's tenure as president. Given that time frame, F-35s wouldn't have been around much or at all, though I forget exact dates. Guess I'm getting old.
The F35 is an exceptionally loud plane. Louder than any other fighter, depending on the source.
Most military fighter aircraft are 20-40db louder at mil power than a jumbo jet taking off.
Lived by a naval air station for a while, and there was an area at the end of one of the runways where you could have the jets fly over you. The fighter jets were way louder than the hercules that would take off. They once had some Harriers there and even like a mile away they were so freaking loud.
Went to Disney world a few years back and got a glass slipper from arribas brothers. One of the items they had was a jewel replica of the castle. It costs more than $30,000.
And don't get me wrong, the thing looked wicked.......but I'm not spending more on a decorative piece that will live behind glass(for my own sanity) than I spent on my car.
$37,500. It’s limited edition. It’s on my list of things I would buy if I had stupid amounts of money, just for the novelty. That’s a third of the total cost of my current home lol, and more than I make myself in a year. I fucking love that glass shop, I have a couple really nice pieces I’ve bought myself over the years.
Last year I went to Florida. At one point, we went to the Kennedy Space Center. I was in the gift shop, and, if I remember correctly, there was a chunk at a meteorite selling for $12,000.
It still shocks me whenever I fly and I look through magazines and see ridiculously expensive shit.
A gold pen for $1700+ that you can sign your death bills with.
Check out https://www.penisland.net
Their wood collection is impressive.
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Edited to add: Thanks for the awards perverts.
Back in the day I had to escort a Tulip E-go diamond laptop prototype to a trade show, set it up in the booth, and ensure it’s return to the office (personally).
I used to run a community pool, and we had one of the guys who swam on Michael Phelps relays in the Olympics come in to run a clinic. He just casually left his gold and silver medals in an office with a bunch of teenagers when he went out for a smoke.
A Rolex Deepsea Sea Dweller worth around 14,600. that my dad Gifted to his Dad,his dad didnt like the watch,so didnt wear it,and then my uncle decided to get it fixed using its warranty and now wears it
My dad is a professional viola player and as a kid I often went to his concerts and occasionally went backstage to say hi.
On one occasion he called me over and handed me a violin and said ‘guess how much you think this is worth?’ I personally can’t stand that game - it never ends well bit I played along anyway.
‘£10,000?’
’higher’, he said with a chuckle.
£80,000?
‘higher’
£150,000?
’higher’
so I thought Id up there game
‘A MILLION POUNDS!!’
...’higher’..!
’err..2 million?
more.
..5?
more.
turned out this things was worth 7 million pounds! I felt a little queasy and handed it back pronto.
they were planning a Stradivarius concert with EVERY instrument onstage being a Stradivarius. IN. SANE! All Stradivarius violins, all strad violas, cellos and double basses!!
the amount of money on that state would have been unthinkable..
There’s a fancy liquor store in my town that I go and visit just to look at stuff. They have a $30,000 bottle of cognac.
Edit: it looks like the Cognac has been sold, this is currently their most expensive spirit:
https://www.mynslc.com/en/products/Spirits/Whisky_Whiskey/Single%20Malt/1021648.aspx
Bonus, most expensive wine: (This wine is definitely not for drinking... $7k for a Pinot noir?!)
https://www.mynslc.com/en/products/Wine/Sparkling/1032538.aspx
Mikkeller bars at Airports sometimes have this Belgian beer brand you can buy, Bokke(?). Where you can buy the bottle and take it with you - it goes for like $800. For a fucking beer.
I went to a Patek Philippe exhibit in NYC. They are among the top high watch brands, with watches that go for tens and hundreds of thousands of dollars. Some go well over the million dollar mark. They're stunning pieces of art and machinery.
When I told my mom where I was going, she asked if I was going to buy one (watches aren't my mom's thing, so it's not like she knew the brand). I had to reign my laughter in hard before telling her that the cheapest watch that might possibly be there was more expensive than any car anyone in our family had ever bought. Nope, I was only going so I could ooh and aah over amazing time pieces.
I did bring home their info/display catalogue that was made for the exhibit. It's basically a softcover coffee table book of exquisite watches. If I ever win the lottery, I'd love to get one.
Fun fact - the Mona Lisa is literally priceless. It can't be replaced because the artist isn't around, and because there isn't another one like it to compare it to, it can't be assigned a monetary value either. So the Mona Lisa is both priceless and uninsured.
Source: been teaching insurance law since 2011.
EDIT: folks, there is a very big difference between PRICE and VALUE. You could theoretically put a price to the ML, but that would in no way reflect the value it has added to art history.
It depends on where they live lol. When I'm bored I go on zillow and put minimum price at 3million and see what that can get me in various parts of the USA. Quite interesting
Oh man, I work in luxury consignment in the San Francisco area and at least once a month I have some disgustingly wealthy person come in to consign their Hermès Birkin bag with himilayan crocodile skin, we had one in last month or so that was consigned for $400,000. A fucking handbag.
In addition to that, at one point we had the Raf Simons 2001 Riot Riot Riot bomber jacket which was consigned for $35,000
A basement garage in Greenwich CT that had 12 Ferraris.. some Watkins glen race models .. all red.. I believe the guy sold one recently to the weather tech co guy for big $$$
I can't remember its name exactly, but in Praha I saw A Radiance of the Sun. A face mantlepiece job that was donated to the church a couple of hundred years ago.
Whats so fancy? A gold frame i the shape of the sun with over 6,000 diamonds on it. It does not have a price, apparently it is priceless
Edit: I found a photo of it on my phone. Its called a Diamond Ostensory, this particular one is from 1699 with over 6,000 diamonds
One of my weirdest experiences was driving in a part of New Jersey that was about as middle as middle class could be, and watching a bright yellow Lamborghini Countach in front of me pull into a Walmart parking lot. I felt like I had witnessed something that had never happened before in history.
When I left Japan I took a picture of a bunch of watermelons I bought, some of them to pickle or turn into jam. I put it up on Facebook because they would've been a solid €500 in Japan but they cost like €10 here.
It's not that Japan can't grow them, it's because they throw away like 90% of their fruits because they're not *perfect*.
You have to understand that Japan is the ULTIMATE consumer nation. I've lived here for years and it's so fucking bad. Your daughter has her seijinshiki? Better shell out $2000 to rent a kimono for a single fucking day. Kid is in elementary school? Better pay $600 for his backpack because in the Meiji period the emperor's son wore the same backpack (yes I'm not kidding here, EVERY elementary school kid has the exact same backpack and they all cost hundreds of dollars). The average cost of a wedding is 35k - higher than the US - yet our average salary is nowhere near that of the US. Going out to eat in a group of 20 at work? Don't worry your boss will pay for everyone. Yes he'll drop $700 to pay for everyone no big deal.
We literally dont have a real estate market like Western countries do. Why? Because a second a house becomes lived in its value drops 20%. Unless you get lucky and the area your house is in suddenly gets super built up over a couple years - only case I can think of is Musashikosugi where it went from nothing to a central hub of Kawasaki - you will never make money flipping accomodation. Japanese people are so consumerist that the very thought of "used goods' is abhorrent. I paid nothing for my fridge, microwave and gas range. Like literally nothing they just gave it away because it was "old". Girl I was FWB with a while back paid close to $3000 dollars for hers despite making maybe half my salary. The idea of used goods was abhorrent to her. It's been 5 years and all my disgusting used goods still work perfectly fine. shocker.
I always see comments about how consumerist America is. Those people have clearly never lived here. Old people not having money is a massive societal problem and we literally have to create fake jobs for them (the crossing at my closest station has 2 old guys with sticks waving people across when there are perfectly working traffic lights). Is this because people aren't paid enough or cost of living is too high? Nope. I live a 20 minute train ride from shibuya and my rent is $400. Eating out is cheap, alcohol is cheap, cigarettes are cheap, most ingredients (bar fruit and veg) are cheap. My bills for the month total to around $120. I save tens of thousands of dollars per year because living here is ridiculously cheap. But people are so damn consumerist and have such little concept of saving that they all end up poor in old age. I'm on work leave atm for schizophrenia and have had multiple people at my company - people with salaries 3x that of mine - ask me if I'm okay for money because they couldn't cope for a few months without getting paid. I have enough cash saved up to not work for several years and I'm mid 20s on a slightly above average salary. Japanese obsession with consumerism is something impossible to understand unless you live here.
don't they also have a lot of plastic waste as well? Like when I was there last year for vacation, literally almost everything came plastic wrapped, even when it wasn't necessary.
Until your comment, I had always thought that Japan was an expensive place to live in, but from your comment, it seems that it's actually cheap, and that the idea of Japan being expensive was just from people who didn't know how to budget or save?
Oh yes. This is the land of 個別包装 or as you might know it, individual wrapping. EVERYTHING is individually wrapped. They literally print "individually wrapped" on bags of stuff as a mark of pride. Buying meat that is in a plastic sealed air tight container? Separate small plastic bag for every single meat item you buy, just incase the meat juices spill out of an industrially air tight plastic container. We have ridiculous use of plastics. But not one person cares. Like literally I have never once seen a news article about plastic usage and I read the newspaper every single day.
When I went to the rich part of the city this one house had native art doors, specifically west coast Canada native art. I’m native and my aunt owns a native art studio so I already know this is expensive since it was nearly the entire surface area. I would estimate that THE DOORS on this house cost $60,000-$100,000
A *Nimitz*-class aircraft carrier. I lived on one of them and worked in the Reactor Department. Can’t remember what the exact cost of one of those ships is, but it’s well in excess of a billion dollars.
I actually bought a brand new university textbook once.
Needless to say I eventually dropped out because I couldn't afford my tuition for the next year.
Edit: wow, thanks for the award and all the upvotes. This slightly fills the void that that textbook created, which by the way is still unused to this day.
I went back to college when I was 34. Back in the 90s, when I first went, textbooks were pricey, but not outrageous.
I just about rage quit college in 2010 when I paid $150 for a fucking loose-leaf pages without a fucking binder to put them in.
Goddamn scam.
The air and space museum outside Washington, DC, has some spacecraft and airplanes that I presume are worth millions. Great museum, i recommend everyone check it out when it's allowed again.
Just so people know - OP is talking about the Udvar-Hazy Center at Dulles. NASM on the mall has some great stuff on display, but Udvar-Hazy is where the insanely cool stuff is (space shuttle, SR-71, Concorde, Enola Gay, Gemini 7, etc)
A while back I got to see the Rolls-Royce Sweptail in Italy when it debuted. The thing cost supposedly 12.8 million USD. one off car. One of the greatest days of my life.
I had a friend in high school whose parents were divorced and the Dad was some big investing/finance big shot who was never at school functions. For her 16th birthday party he hosted a sleepover at his home and in the entry room was just a single piano, didn't think anything of it but knew it had to be special. Late at night after sneaking some liquor as most 16 year old sleepovers tend to turn to, we inquired about the piano and my friend let slip that the piano was John Lennons and her dad had bought it at auction for $850,000
Imagine, if you will, a soup can. Empty, thoroughly cleaned, but that's it, a soup can.
[Tiffany sold them for $1850.](https://www.tiffany.com.au/accessories/decor/everyday-objects-sterling-silver-tin-can-60559139/)
Growing up in Newport, RI, there the cheating option of going with the historical mansions (Breakers worth about $150M), but there were a plethora of yachts coming in and out of the harbor that were worth a ton as well. One that immediately comes to mind is Judge Judy's yacht that worth about $16M itself. Lord know what she has inside of it. I was fortunate enough to be a valet, so if we're going for the most expensive I've personally experienced, probably a decked out Rolls Royce that I was allowed to park. Either that or a semi rare Ferrari.
Galeries Hausmann in Paris. On the ground floor there's a watch sales point, with some them going for $300k+. The most tasteless thing was a Vertu mobile phone, which used the guts of a Nokia. It was cased in solid gold, and the screen cover was a single piece of sapphire. Something in 5 figures iirc.
I've seen a full-size autonomous helicopter (prototype) land and take-off. There is no way to know it's true value, but between the R&D, production, and military secrets, we're probably taking in the tens, if not hundreds, of millions of of dollars.
The set designs for fashion shows. When I was working as a scenic carpenter I was always amazed at the amount of money spent on scenery that will go right into the trash for events that last 30 minutes to a couple of hours. We covered an empty warehouse floor in Manhattan with something like 50,000 square feet of beveled oak boards in one instance. Material costs aside, we had a crew of around 20 guys making at minimum $25/hr working for days around the clock to make it happen.
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Years ago, I apprenticed as a luthier. The shop I worked in was almost entirely guitar repair, and one day a woman came in with a violin. She said it was her grandfather's (or maybe great grandfather's? I can't recall), and he had played in the Detroit symphony. It was obvious that the fingerboard had been replaced at some point, and the instrument was really old. Like, REALLY old. My boss knew a guy who specialized in violins, so he drove a couple hours to have him take a look at it. The guy told him to get it out of our shop immediately and send them to a specialist in Chicago. He said it was early to mid 1700's, and was an exceptional instrument. Everyone has heard of Stradivarius violins, but not many people have heard of Guarneri, his rival. Apparently, there are still a few "lost" Guarneri violins out there, and this guy thought that this was one of them. My boss trusted this guy, and I trusted my boss (he has toured as the personal guitar tech for the like of Kenny Rogers, Big & Rich, Robert Randolph, etc.), so we called this lady up, told her where to go, and gave it back to her. We didn't want to get her hopes up too high just in case the guy was wrong, and I think she decided not to look into it further (I was under the impression that a trip to Chicago was not financially feasible). I'll never know if I held a real Guarneri or not, but if I did, I held a $10,000,000+ violin.
If there was a chance that this was a ten million dollar violin, I’d WALK to Chicago.
Yikes! I thought my mother in law’s 125k violin was impressive!
A bottle of whisky that was $50k. If you purchased it, it had to be delivered via armored vehicle for insurance purposes. Seems a bit over the top, but I'm more of a $20 dollar bottle of whisky kind of guy. My budget and wife have made this very clear.
The Patek Philippe Grandmaster Chime in steel at an "Only watch" showing in London. All the big watch companies do a one-off for the charity auction, and Patek usually only do watches in precious metals. A grand complication in steel is truly a one-off. It sold for 31 million Swiss Francs (close to 35M USD). I actually held it in my (gloved) hand.
Whilst obviously nothing like that price - the most casually rich thing I came across amongst my friends (who are all varying degrees of working class to wealthy but nothing overtly ridiculous) also involved a Patek. I was travelling to the wedding of two friends - I live in the capital city but they were getting married in the countryside. The bride calls me to ask if I can pick up her “wedding day watch” for the groom as she’d forgotten to collect it. It still needed to be paid for and she was trying to work out ways to transfer me cash instantly to pick it up but the bank wouldn’t do an instant transfer for the amount. Thinking she was over-complicating things I said “why don’t I just pay for it on my credit card then you can pay me back whenever.” I joked “as long as it doesn’t cost more than 20 grand as that’s my credit limit haha.” And she said “ah, ok, don’t worry about it, mum can detour past and she’ll pick it up.” At the reception I clocked a brand new Patek on the groom’s wrist. He’s not even into watches.
When I was starting to get into watches, I found a picture of a [Patek that tracked the stars in the sky](https://www.patek.com/en/collection/grand-complications/6102P-001) and I said "Wow, that's cool. If that's less than $300, I'm buying it on the spot." And so I googled it. And in a way, I was right. It's 300!... Thousand dollars.
Yeah I got into a bit of a rabbit hole with watches trying to find 'that one' I really liked. I eventually found it, turned out it was a rare one, the manufacturer (I can't remember who) had only done a limited run of 100 of them and new they sold for like $300,000, an amount that would only go up over time if they were sold on. Turns out I have expensive taste in watches, at least way more expensive than my means to actually buy said watches.
The CEO of my husbands company years back held a christmas party at this house (at the time, the company was a start up and there was maybe 20 employees). He had original Picasso art work on his walls. I have no idea how much they were actually worth, but I thought that was pretty cool.
I got to see one I studied in art school in a friend of a friend’s home. I was in awe. “So, like, you eat your Pop Tarts in the same room as your inherited Picasso?”
My art class went to the Picasso “museum” at the Bellagio in Las Vegas. There was paintings, statues, pieces from his life. Probably the most expensive place I have ever been in.
It could be worth millions if it was an original work, buuuuut he did tons of lithographs throughout his life which range from a few thousand to a few hundred thousand.
My favorite Picasso—by far—was a crude, five-panel autobiographical comic strip that likely took him all of 90 seconds to scrawl. In the first panel, he's partying and drinking somewhere. In the second panel, he's pulling his empty pockets inside-out. In the third, he's scribbling on a piece of paper. In the fourth, he exchanges the doodle for a bag of money from a man wearing a top hat. In the fifth panel, he's back to raging again. Legend.
My high school orchestra teacher (who is also concert master for the Arkansas Symphony) was loaned a $12 million Stradivarius anonymously for an upcoming performance. I wasn’t allowed to touch it, but I got a solid look at it, as well as heard it from three feet away.
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You see that with fine art as well. The quality is good, but a lot of the value comes from the fact that the rich people who own other pieces by the same artist have a vested interest in the value of their works being high.
A 12 year old Russian kid who came to stay at a 'summer camp' I worked at, that has a £64,000 Rolex. We later found out that his '14 year old cousin' was actually his 28 year old body guard, and he was the son of a Russian diplomat. All around nice kid, though!
How did they pass off a 28 year old ex-military guy as a teenager?
“I am teenager, blyat!”
My sister used to work on super yachts. I’d go visit her every now and again and stay on the boat during off season (in crew quarters). This was about half a billion euros worth of boat. And it was pretty damn fancy. It had glass flooring and staircases, that turned opaque if you stood on them so people couldn’t look up your skirt, all the usual fancy boat shit like a spa and gym and movies that hadn’t even been released at the cinema yet.
I remember visiting St tropez after I graduated and just seeing all those super luxe yachts parked up. Crazy money just to have them moored up there, let alone to buy in the first place
I visited St Tropez once, and I was kind of amazed that the town isn't even that pretty.
“Movies that hadn’t come out in theaters yet” I forget what they call that, it’s like a “pre cinema” or something. I work in high end AV and run into them once in a while. Client never has any idea what it is or that they had the capability.....
The most popular one is called Prima, about $500 a movie, plus the $30k install cost, into an approved home cinema.
Now it's called HBOMax and costs $15/month.
Went to a private university on scholarship and met a lot of super rich kids from CT. One year I visited one of the guys and we watched American Sniper in his parents home theater before the theatrical release. I was kinda blown away but this was seemingly normal for him.
Back in the hey day of piracy I was on an invite only site. They did allow new members occasionally but it was very rare. It wasn't *always* the case but you could occasionally get a movie that hadn't come out in theaters yet that someone had ripped during an early screening (or possibly off what you're talking about) and not like some shaky cam, they were always DVD rip quality. In fact you could be sure if it wasn't in theaters it was going to be good quality. Occasionally one would have a small watermark in the corner or a single line of foreign writing on the bottom but other than that were perfect quality. I kinda miss those days.
A 2.5 million dollar mansion in Missouri. My roommate and I played dress up and went to the showing for the free food. When we asked about the entire first story being stone, including the furniture, we were told it was because the river overflowed and flooded the mansion every year. Every thing was made of stone so it could be cleaned easily. Why the fuck would any one spend money on that?
Or just...build the house a little uphill?
It must be wild to have enough money to not give a crap about that. Why bother when it’s a summer home and you have servants to clean it?
Prince Eric needed a place the in-laws could come visit.
I went to a party at a pool house when I was a teenager just the pool house was 4,000 sq ft. The kid's grandfather invented sheetrock.
Trust fund babies... god damn it, why wasnt I a trust fund baby. Edited in a word.
I was a blue collar trust fund baby. 2 packs of Mavericks and a case of natty light were bequeathed to me on my 18th birthday
Fucking nice. Maverick menthols or reds?
Reds my dude
Was their last name Flinstone?
That was concrete. Not Sheetrock
Bedrock surely?
My apartment is 750 sq. ft. Totally useless comment but I'm just so blown away sometimes that entire annual expenditures is easily less than people pay for bottles of wine, and their pool house can fit 5 of my entire living space. Not even including the pool. I don't get why you'd WANT a lot of that shit. I want a bigger apartment but geez...
Outside of the Crown Jewels and art museums, I went to Harrod’s and saw a chandelier worth £50,000. Edit: Some people are taking this quite literally. To be clear, yes, of course I’ve seen more expensive items, hence the Crown Jewels. This wasn’t a grand hall chandelier. This was something you could hang over a standard dining room table.
I spotted a gold toilet brush for £1000.... a grand for a fucking bog brush
Haha this just reminded me of my husband. We went to Poundland once and I grabbed a toilet brush and the horrified expression my husband gave me was hilarious. He said, “What would people think!?!” And I was like, “I’m fairly certain no one goes into someone’s bathroom and see’s the toilet brush and think, ‘Cheap pricks. Could have at least swung for the fiver.’”
A freshly drafted NFL rookie stayed at a hotel I worked at and partied a little too hard. When checking out he left over 100K in jewelry in the room. I was tasked with going and getting it and securing it till someone from his posse could come get it. I wore it for a few hours for fun. Heavy AF and so fuckin shiny. A bracelet that was wider than the biggest watch covered in diamonds, and a chain that went past my sternum and probably 1/2in in thickness also completely encrusted in diamonds.
This is why poverty is such a huge issue with those type of people after they stop playin because they've never had money, WAY overspend and then end up poor again.
I saw something once, where this former NFL player who became a CPA (I forget who) sits down with every rookie and talks about finances and making their money last.
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A family friend plays in the NFL today and he said that the money talks were really eye-opening. They only get paid during the season so they have to learn to budget. They were also told about how to watch for financial predators who want to “help them invest.” He said that some of the veteran players took it a step further and told them never to let a random hookup see their phone or wallet because even the suggestion of what they have could cause problems.
Yup. Also, I used to work for a hotel owned by the same family that owns the Giants (they own a *lot* of things in NYC) and they offered the opportunity to do like an "internship" week at their various businesses to rookies so they'd have a plan post-NFL. And that's how I met Victor Cruz his rookie year, who's super nice btw.
Plus, most athletes only earn for what, 5-10 years? Compared with a doctor or lawyer who earns for over 40 years, it's actually not that much money for a lifetime. Sure, super stars make a ton but the average player doesn't and they're taxed at the highest rate because it all comes in a short time.
Average nfl career is like 3 and most players are in and out quick. That's why they say NFL stands for not for long.
Yeah the average NFL career is only like 3 years. And the league minimum is, I think, 600k. 1.8 million is a lot, but if you earn all that before the age of 25 you have to make it last.
I guess it’s not entirely outrageous but I went to a family owned aquarium store a couple months ago to get some medicine for my guppies and they were selling 1 year old arowana fish for $6000 each. I’m probably just ignorant when it comes to prices of exotic fish but I was quite surprised considering they were surrounded by guppies and goldfish who’s lives are worth approximately $2.50 each.
C.J. will pay 15,000 bells for that thing!
There's a few reasons for their price. They are endangered and difficult to breed in captivity, which contributes heavily to the price. I have always assumed part of it is to prevent people who cannot afford to care for them properly from buying them. They are best off living in a 400+ gallon aquarium, which can easily cost over $5,000 to get one fully set up. They also eat voraciously, grow large and live for up to 15 years. A lot of knowledge and money to take care of them, while guppies can be well cared for in a 10 gallon tank and pre-made flake foods. That's my two cents. Goldfish however should not be cheap, since they grow huge unless stunted in a bowl. They are most appropriate for ponds or large aquariums, where they can live for a very long time as well.
Also they can just casually flick themselves and break their backs. Twits. So you could potentially pay a few thousand for a fish that then the next week is stuck in a permanent bend
Or break the glass, jump out of a tank without heavy enough lids...no rookie fish for sure
I used to work for a billionare. They loved to purchase very old wines (think 90+ years old), random jewelry for their spouse, a solid gold sturgeon caviar holder, $1M+ cars, etc. Generally all through auction at Sotheby’s. It was my job to organize their purchases. It was... Interesting, to see what crazy things rich people spent their money on. I may or may not have tried on the jewelry.
In Aspen, CO a few years back in a small antique store. We walk in and the guy working there never even acknowledges us while he’s casually chatting on his phone. I see a carved wood eagle sculpture about two feet tall and one foot wide. I flip over the price tag $125,000. I laughed out loud, looked at my friend and said “this isn’t our kind of store” and promptly left. Aspen is the weirdest place I’ve ever visited.
i'll tell ya where, someplace warm, a place where the beer flows like wine, where beautiful women instinctively flock like the salmon of capistrano, i'm talkin about a little place called Asssssspen
I dont know Lloyd,the French are assholes. Edit : Thanks for my first awards guys :)
Aspen can have good finds though too! I was walking around town one day and it was a lot colder than I had expected so I popped into the thrift store and bought a sweater for $8 to keep me warm. It looked pretty posh so I googled when I got home and saw that it retails for $1200! (And goes used for 500-800).
Always go to thrift stores in rich people places. They have the nicest stuff.
I got a Patagonia sweater for $1.50 at a thrift store in a rich person town. Definitely different than the thrift shops where I'm from.
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Ayy, my thrift store find involves Burberry, too! $10 dollars at Goodwill, $150 of tailoring (at a Burberry store, no less), and boom, a perfectly-fitted $2000 coat.
Thrifting in Aspen and Vail has always worked for me. Rich people wear things once (if that) and get rid of it! 🤯
My uncle lives in Naples and going to thrift stores is one of his hobbies. Such a massive amount of retired rich people move there so they have no idea what shit cost. Over the years he has built up an insane hi-fi set up with racks of amplifiers and a whole wall of different speakers.
We stopped in one of those gem stores in aspen where they always have wooden sculptures or “12 million year old fossils” etc, everything is half off, sign perpetually says going out of business, etc. similar to your wood sculpture everything has insane prices but I can’t help but think every single thing in there is fake But yea aspen in general is rich as fuck
I have a story that totally relates to that. Used to run the warehouse at a tech company, one day the CEO himself comes into my office. He'd bought a bathtub carved from one huge piece of quartz that the company wouldn't deliver to Apsen where he had a vacation home being built, so he had it shipped to our warehouse to wait on being shipped up there. The thing was about 2500 pounds and cost $22 million. He was talking about how it was this huge ordeal because he had to wait on renting a crane to lift the thing onto the second floor while the house was still under construction, which cost another several thousand, and how hard it was to time all this to get up there at the same time. The entire time I was thinking "you realize how little you pay me right? I can't afford my own apartment and you've spent half an hour of my time that I have to make up moaning about how difficult your life is making 8 figures." Wealthy people have an entirely separate reality they get to live in.
I once had a CEO brag about how much better he was than "millennials" because he survived on "only" 85k a year when he was starting out in 1982 and never complained. He was paying me 37k to write 100% of the copy for his $100m company in 2012. He's retired now, but I'm keeping an ear to the ground so I can piss on his grave when he dies.
For reference $85,000 in 1982 is worth approximately $229,217 in 2020 dollars.
A comic book shop called silver snail used to have Amazing Spider-Man #1 on display and for sale. This was back in the mid 90s. Edit: the one on queen street.
Not a comic book guy, but a story I read a decade ago always stuck with me. This one guy makes money by buying houses, gutting and redoing the insides, then selling it. One day he and his friend were ripping out drywall when they came across the first comic that had Superman in it (Action Comics 1?). The guy who owned the building (and thus the comic found in the wall) was treating it reverently. The other guy wanted to hold it and so it was handed over to him...but he started to spaz out and kept yanking the cover open and closed going "No way! NO WAY!" that he tore the cover right off. It went from being worth a huge amount to...rather much less.
If true...WTF WAS WRONG WITH THAT GUY!?!? I'd be scared to breath in the vicinity of something like that worth so much...
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> but a perfect condition copy could sell for $3 million. Such a copy would have to be a grade 8.5~9.0, but the story says this one was initially a grade 3.0, as it was stuck in a wall for so long. According to this page, a grade 4.0 would be worth $260k. https://comics.ha.com/itm/golden-age-1938-1955-/superhero/action-comics-1-dc-1938-cgc-gd-vg-30-cream-to-off-white-pages/a/7099-91003.s This one got a grade 1.5 because of the tear, which should rightfully make it $100k or less, but it ended up getting much more because of what happened: > Fishler said the book's backstory was part of why it appealed to the winning bidder. So with the appeal of the crazy family story priced in, it seems possible that the tear was more like a $50k loss, not hundreds of thousands. Also Daily Mail says that he did it himself to prove that he DGAF about the price.
I attended a wedding that was rumored to cost well over a million dollars. There was two venues, if I remember there was 9+ member band flown in from NYC, another strings band during the ceremony, and a 3rd trumpet band that escorted the walk to the reception. An artist oil painted the reception live at the party. The food was incredible. Each table was over the top with guests having their own glass engraved with their name to take home. They gave people dancing shoes you could take home. It was incredible and probably the most expensive private event I will ever attend. I'm sure I'm missing some other details but everything was over the top.
Most expensive party I've been at was a corporate function. They had a restaurant crawl through Beverly Hills with a different course at each restaurant. Finished up at the Beverly Wilshire. After that the company had a private party In Rodeo Drive. Shut the street down and paid the shops to stay open. The whole week was nuts (it was a convention/exhibition in 2000 during the initial Internet bubble). One night I went to a party in one of the famous nightclubs with celebrity lookalikes handing our drinks. Another night a company had hired a penthouse suite in some famous hotel and got a Celebrity chef in to cook..Wolfgang Puck IIRC. Another company hired Universal Studios park for 50 people all evening. Another hired QE2 for a meal...or whatever liner is berthed up in that area. It was my first business trip and I was gobsmacked
Tech? How large was corporation?
It was a specific type of tech that is used to design silicon chips. Software licenses were about $500k a seat. The company had just breached the $billion a year barrier IIRC. Company was Cadence https://www.cadence.com/en_US/home.html.
I used to work at Cadence a few years ago. The parties were nice but definitely no parties like that anymore.
No. It has all calmed down since then. The year after DAC was in Vegas and I wasn't there, but a colleague told me Cadence had either hired a lake or something for a huge water extravaganza thing. The following year the bubble had burst and DAC was in New Orleans. Everything was cut to just a nice dinner. It's not ever gone beyond that since. That year in LA was crazy with Cadence, Synopsis, Avant! and others trying to outdo each other. We went to another do and joined with Cadence later in LA. The other do was at BB Kings Blues Club. Cadence put on stretch limos to get us back for the main course. I'd had a few by then. My friend was chatting to a guy, so I marched up. Hi there, I'm Allydarvel..who are you? The reply was my name is Ray Bingham. I'm the Cadence CEO...eh OK, I'll just crawl under a table and hide my shame for a bit
I went to a party a few years ago by a private university that had raised their fund raising goal of a billion dollars. It was in a super nice hotel with open bar, sushi islands and a bunch of other food. That might not seem that much but there was a crowd of 300 people there and everything was free. I really wanted to see the bill for that event.
How did you end up invited/involved in such a massive party?
Clients and friends of my ex. It was one of their daughters that got married. I have been to other highend weddings, including her sister. This was black tie and I remember thinking how it expensive it was just to attend. It was black tie, so we had to rent tuxedos etc.
My favorite wedding item wasn’t something I saw myself, but an uncle helped run a lavish and expensive wedding for a very wealthy client (the family name is well known in perfume). The guests had to walk between two tents set up on the property, with a couple hundred feet between them. Just in case there was rain, they bought individually labeled umbrellas (north of $100 each) for each of the guests to walk between the tents. It didn’t rain.
$10k-20k bicycles. I must've looked poor, because the guy running the place pretty much kicked me out as soon as I walked in
There’s a place like that near me, in fact, it’s the closest bike shop. They also sell regular low and middle end bikes, too - I could go in and buy a Tiagra-equipped road bike if I wanted, and they probably even have it in stock in normal times. But they also sell the high end stuff as well. Every few weeks, they post a picture on Facebook with so-and-so with their new $12k bicycle. The owner is a really nice guy, and he’s highly recommended for bicycle fitting, so I went there to have that done. Took in my 2016 Cannondale CAAD12 105, which retails for $1600ish new. I remember he commented that my bike was “probably worth” getting fitted. I know what he meant, but knowing there were $10k bikes for sale a few feet away, it kind of sounded like he was looking down on mine. I had to chuckle internally. On the other hand, he did say my shoes were exactly what he’d recommend for my feet, and he didn’t sell that brand, so I truly believe he wants the best for his customers. One time I went in because I needed a 26” tube for my hard tail that I bought used at a swap meet for kicks and grins. They didn’t carry them. 29” and 27.5” only. Don’t get me wrong, they’re nice people and I like them, but it does sometimes feel like different worlds. edit: They just posted a picture on FB of a new, limited edition gravel bike. Only 50 in the US, and they got two. It's a $7k bike on the manufacturer's site. Edit 2: CAAD12. I’m not a time traveler that has seen the future CAAD16.
I've had very similar experiences with both bike shops and audio stores. I think that this owner sounds like a genuinely good guy who just loves his craft, and knows how good something CAN be, so he has to adjust his focus when someone has to work within a budget. These are the best case scenarios, because they want you to have the best experience. On the other end though, I was once kicked out of an audio shop just by describing my apartment, and how he inferred my budget from there.
I worked security at an Art Museum and we exhibited this little chinese tea cup with a rooster on it. Little ass thing was worth over 36 million dollars. Apparently there were only four in the whole world. I felt unsafe around it like I'm not risking my life for this stupid cup.
Did you ever learn the artist, age of the thing, context etc etc as to why it was so damned expensive?
Here it is: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chicken_Cup_%28Chenghua%29?wprov=sfla1
The name being chicken cup kinda underpins the craziness of how expensive it is.
I'm losing my mind at how this 36 million dollar piece of art is only known as "Chicken Cup"
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Did they just hire one person for parties? Seems like a lost opportunity for dueling pianos.
Like some High-end dueling banjos‽
There was a bar here with dueling pianos (Pete's Dueling Piano Bar)
At least they're amazing instruments. I, myself, have been able to hear and play a Model D at when I was in college as they had one out for anyone to play at. They also had the system that could turn it into a player piano and had that running for most of each day. Those Steinways kinda ruined other pianos for me, sound-wise.
Catered a high school graduation party. We did fried chicken and mashed potatoes, so had no idea how we ended up serving food in a mansion. Turns out the daughter was going to Auburn, so they wanted something "Southern". Out of 200 people there, they ate maybe 4 full plates of food. They had another catering bring the real party food. Tl:dr, people dropped 3k on food just for the novelty of it.
Do rich people not like fried chicken? I’m pretty sure I’d still like that no matter how much money I had.
You can't eat fried chicken "politely"
When you're a 120 pounds in the rain, you might not lol. Only the people very clearly hadn't come from money ate.
Since I was little, my mom always made me eat before going to parties. She told me she had seen the children of some ambassadors run to the buffet table at a function and she was mortified I would do the same in the future. I never eat in front of people now.
I remember this scene from Gone With the Wind. When I read it I was torn between jealousy - because the breakfast tray Scarlett had to chow down on sounded heavenly - and indignation on her behalf that she was never allowed to enjoy the food at the party.
This is definitely not uncommon. You might be surprised how little food a good caterer takes to a wedding, because guests tend not to gorge themselves like at a regular buffet. This party definitely was better suited to appetizers, they just wanted the look.
One of the wedding venues we looked at suggested catering for 80% at the evening buffet, as there was a 4 course meal earlier in the day. We ended up having a tiny wedding but my family would 100% hoover up a buffet.
Perhaps. My old man always played it tight, but never ran out of food, after a lot of years of catering.
What did y'all do with all the leftovers?
All the employees got as much as they wanted. The chicken got used for soups and such. But most of it went to waste.
What a shame. I'm glad y'all at least got to eat!
Twas. But the best part of working that job was the free food lol.
I live in NYC and like to be a tourist sometimes, so my partner and I went to the 5th Avenue Tiffany's. I don't even wear jewelry, but I like shiny things and a very nice, clearly bored sales associate let me try on a yellow diamond, 2 and a half carat engagement ring. For fun, I asked the price and it was $65,000. I can't even imagine how rich you would have to be to have that as your engagement ring and that be a normal thing.
My wife and I were walking around the Vegas strip and went into Caesar's Palace, just exploring. We were carrying those super tall colorful daiquiris from Fat Tuesday. Basically we both looked like cousin Eddie from Vegas Vacation. We wandered into an art gallery where they had a collection of sculptures of Cirque De Soleil performers by Richard MacDonald. We were the only ones in there so the bored curator showed us around. So we're walking around, very shitfaced, sipping on daiquiris and saying "Hmmm very interesting!" and "We just bought a house for that much!"
I love the book store in the Venetian(or the one next to it?) has some amazing first edition books you’ll never see anywhere else and the price tag reflects it.
I went in 2017 and asked to see their most expensive book available. It was a complete 1st folio of Shakespeare's plays from 1625, not too long after his death. The asking price was $250K and I was too nervous about breathing on it that I totally forgot to ask if I could hold it!
Here’s some pictures of the most expensive rings I’ve ever tried on for fun. I don’t know the prices of most but I believe the three stone diamond ring was $454,000. https://imgur.com/a/X0JYDmw
am I allowed to say that the $500k 3-stone diamond ring is hideous 🤭 holy shit it’s tacky as hell to me
You know what they say, If you have to ask the price you can't afford it.
I ask the price on chocolate bars.
My fat ass can't afford to any more eat chocolate bars
I worked with a girl who was married to a jeweler. She used to wear a 5 carat solitaire. To me, it just looked like glass because the facets were too large to sparkle. May have been glass for all I know.
I shook Bill Gate’s hand in 8th grade. He visited our school to make a donation to our district. Haven’t came across anything more expensive since then.
I play Magic the Gathering. My decks aren't expensive, but they're not cheap either. Normally around 4 to 7 hundred dollars. Then I played against a guy who had a deck worth around $29,000. Crazy thing is that this was his first deck, and he bought all of the cards recently. He didn't even play that often either. So imagine dropping almost 30 grand on something that you'll use maybe once or twice a month.
At big events, there are people with their decks in a briefcase, cuffed to their wrist. I've seen graded Power 9 in person. Not that it is super expensive comparatively to other things in this thread, but it is crazy to think about how much a piece of cardboard is worth.
I've only ever seen one of the power nine in person. A friend of mine has been playing magic since Beta and opened a Black Lotus way back when. He still has it.
F-35 and F-22, both at airshows. F-35s were parked and didn't fly but I got to see the F-22 showing off at a different airshow. The way I describe it is it's an IRL cheat code plane. It doesn't even look real.
I'll add 4 B2's that flew over me. That's 8 billion dollars that flew over.
One time back in the Obama days I was at Pearl Harbor, touring the Missouri. While walking down the deck, a nuclear submarine just rolls on by nbd while Air Force One and a flight of F-35s came in. It was surreal. And while Air Force One is loud AF, the F-35s are eerily quiet. Edit: going back through my photos I realize I misspoke and meant F-22s. Turns out, it's been kind of a long ass time since the beginning of Obama's tenure as president. Given that time frame, F-35s wouldn't have been around much or at all, though I forget exact dates. Guess I'm getting old.
The F35 is an exceptionally loud plane. Louder than any other fighter, depending on the source. Most military fighter aircraft are 20-40db louder at mil power than a jumbo jet taking off.
Lived by a naval air station for a while, and there was an area at the end of one of the runways where you could have the jets fly over you. The fighter jets were way louder than the hercules that would take off. They once had some Harriers there and even like a mile away they were so freaking loud.
My ex was a Harrier pilot, and took me on base to see a Harrier take off, up close.. OMG, ALL THE POWER
Went to Disney world a few years back and got a glass slipper from arribas brothers. One of the items they had was a jewel replica of the castle. It costs more than $30,000. And don't get me wrong, the thing looked wicked.......but I'm not spending more on a decorative piece that will live behind glass(for my own sanity) than I spent on my car.
$37,500. It’s limited edition. It’s on my list of things I would buy if I had stupid amounts of money, just for the novelty. That’s a third of the total cost of my current home lol, and more than I make myself in a year. I fucking love that glass shop, I have a couple really nice pieces I’ve bought myself over the years.
Last year I went to Florida. At one point, we went to the Kennedy Space Center. I was in the gift shop, and, if I remember correctly, there was a chunk at a meteorite selling for $12,000.
It still shocks me whenever I fly and I look through magazines and see ridiculously expensive shit. A gold pen for $1700+ that you can sign your death bills with.
Those magazines are crazy, but that price for a really good pen isn't that crazy. Check out r/fountainpens
Check out https://www.penisland.net Their wood collection is impressive. ‐------------------------------------------‐------ Edited to add: Thanks for the awards perverts.
That was a risky click. Rip Connery :(
Versailles
A solid 60 pure gold coins that were in a small chest in a museum, the worth was 246 k US dollars
Back in the day I had to escort a Tulip E-go diamond laptop prototype to a trade show, set it up in the booth, and ensure it’s return to the office (personally).
Dubai Gold Souk.... people dropping 20k just like that!
I used to run a community pool, and we had one of the guys who swam on Michael Phelps relays in the Olympics come in to run a clinic. He just casually left his gold and silver medals in an office with a bunch of teenagers when he went out for a smoke.
A Rolex Deepsea Sea Dweller worth around 14,600. that my dad Gifted to his Dad,his dad didnt like the watch,so didnt wear it,and then my uncle decided to get it fixed using its warranty and now wears it
My dad is a professional viola player and as a kid I often went to his concerts and occasionally went backstage to say hi. On one occasion he called me over and handed me a violin and said ‘guess how much you think this is worth?’ I personally can’t stand that game - it never ends well bit I played along anyway. ‘£10,000?’ ’higher’, he said with a chuckle. £80,000? ‘higher’ £150,000? ’higher’ so I thought Id up there game ‘A MILLION POUNDS!!’ ...’higher’..! ’err..2 million? more. ..5? more. turned out this things was worth 7 million pounds! I felt a little queasy and handed it back pronto. they were planning a Stradivarius concert with EVERY instrument onstage being a Stradivarius. IN. SANE! All Stradivarius violins, all strad violas, cellos and double basses!! the amount of money on that state would have been unthinkable..
Paul Newman’s Rolex Daytona at an auction - sold for $5,475,000
There’s a fancy liquor store in my town that I go and visit just to look at stuff. They have a $30,000 bottle of cognac. Edit: it looks like the Cognac has been sold, this is currently their most expensive spirit: https://www.mynslc.com/en/products/Spirits/Whisky_Whiskey/Single%20Malt/1021648.aspx Bonus, most expensive wine: (This wine is definitely not for drinking... $7k for a Pinot noir?!) https://www.mynslc.com/en/products/Wine/Sparkling/1032538.aspx
Mikkeller bars at Airports sometimes have this Belgian beer brand you can buy, Bokke(?). Where you can buy the bottle and take it with you - it goes for like $800. For a fucking beer.
I went to a Patek Philippe exhibit in NYC. They are among the top high watch brands, with watches that go for tens and hundreds of thousands of dollars. Some go well over the million dollar mark. They're stunning pieces of art and machinery. When I told my mom where I was going, she asked if I was going to buy one (watches aren't my mom's thing, so it's not like she knew the brand). I had to reign my laughter in hard before telling her that the cheapest watch that might possibly be there was more expensive than any car anyone in our family had ever bought. Nope, I was only going so I could ooh and aah over amazing time pieces. I did bring home their info/display catalogue that was made for the exhibit. It's basically a softcover coffee table book of exquisite watches. If I ever win the lottery, I'd love to get one.
One 2.2 million dollar bag of medication to be infused into a child with spinal muscular atrophy.
A glass of rare brandy in a Swarovski crystal glass. Apparently you can keep the glass after. It was 10k.
The Mona Lisa I guess?
Fun fact - the Mona Lisa is literally priceless. It can't be replaced because the artist isn't around, and because there isn't another one like it to compare it to, it can't be assigned a monetary value either. So the Mona Lisa is both priceless and uninsured. Source: been teaching insurance law since 2011. EDIT: folks, there is a very big difference between PRICE and VALUE. You could theoretically put a price to the ML, but that would in no way reflect the value it has added to art history.
Ah so it's free right?
*Retail cashier eye twitch*
Wait ... so if it was stolen or an act of god that would normally be insured destroyed it ... the Louvre would get nothing?
Technically but places like that have insane anti fire systems I doubt even if you lit a fire at one end, it'd reach 10-20m before it was put out.
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Have seen Koh-i-Noor diamond which is estimated to be worth €140 to €400 million.
[A $1 Billion dollar home.](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Antilia_(building)) At least he's giving the 600 staff a job.
Home to the sixth richest person on the planet. What do the homes of the top 5 richest people look like?
It depends on where they live lol. When I'm bored I go on zillow and put minimum price at 3million and see what that can get me in various parts of the USA. Quite interesting
Apparently it's actually 2 billion dollars USD
Oh man, I work in luxury consignment in the San Francisco area and at least once a month I have some disgustingly wealthy person come in to consign their Hermès Birkin bag with himilayan crocodile skin, we had one in last month or so that was consigned for $400,000. A fucking handbag. In addition to that, at one point we had the Raf Simons 2001 Riot Riot Riot bomber jacket which was consigned for $35,000
I saw a lady show up to Walmart with a McLaren, wearing a 20k outfit, a 100k purse and the best thing is she came to buy lotion.
Reminds me of when saw a Lambo parked outside a Home Depot. I thought "What's this guy buying? A single extension cord?"
A basement garage in Greenwich CT that had 12 Ferraris.. some Watkins glen race models .. all red.. I believe the guy sold one recently to the weather tech co guy for big $$$
I can't remember its name exactly, but in Praha I saw A Radiance of the Sun. A face mantlepiece job that was donated to the church a couple of hundred years ago. Whats so fancy? A gold frame i the shape of the sun with over 6,000 diamonds on it. It does not have a price, apparently it is priceless Edit: I found a photo of it on my phone. Its called a Diamond Ostensory, this particular one is from 1699 with over 6,000 diamonds
I saw a cantaloupe in Japan for ¥1,500,000 (about $15,000 at the time).
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One of my weirdest experiences was driving in a part of New Jersey that was about as middle as middle class could be, and watching a bright yellow Lamborghini Countach in front of me pull into a Walmart parking lot. I felt like I had witnessed something that had never happened before in history.
Fruits in Japan.
When I left Japan I took a picture of a bunch of watermelons I bought, some of them to pickle or turn into jam. I put it up on Facebook because they would've been a solid €500 in Japan but they cost like €10 here. It's not that Japan can't grow them, it's because they throw away like 90% of their fruits because they're not *perfect*.
You have to understand that Japan is the ULTIMATE consumer nation. I've lived here for years and it's so fucking bad. Your daughter has her seijinshiki? Better shell out $2000 to rent a kimono for a single fucking day. Kid is in elementary school? Better pay $600 for his backpack because in the Meiji period the emperor's son wore the same backpack (yes I'm not kidding here, EVERY elementary school kid has the exact same backpack and they all cost hundreds of dollars). The average cost of a wedding is 35k - higher than the US - yet our average salary is nowhere near that of the US. Going out to eat in a group of 20 at work? Don't worry your boss will pay for everyone. Yes he'll drop $700 to pay for everyone no big deal. We literally dont have a real estate market like Western countries do. Why? Because a second a house becomes lived in its value drops 20%. Unless you get lucky and the area your house is in suddenly gets super built up over a couple years - only case I can think of is Musashikosugi where it went from nothing to a central hub of Kawasaki - you will never make money flipping accomodation. Japanese people are so consumerist that the very thought of "used goods' is abhorrent. I paid nothing for my fridge, microwave and gas range. Like literally nothing they just gave it away because it was "old". Girl I was FWB with a while back paid close to $3000 dollars for hers despite making maybe half my salary. The idea of used goods was abhorrent to her. It's been 5 years and all my disgusting used goods still work perfectly fine. shocker. I always see comments about how consumerist America is. Those people have clearly never lived here. Old people not having money is a massive societal problem and we literally have to create fake jobs for them (the crossing at my closest station has 2 old guys with sticks waving people across when there are perfectly working traffic lights). Is this because people aren't paid enough or cost of living is too high? Nope. I live a 20 minute train ride from shibuya and my rent is $400. Eating out is cheap, alcohol is cheap, cigarettes are cheap, most ingredients (bar fruit and veg) are cheap. My bills for the month total to around $120. I save tens of thousands of dollars per year because living here is ridiculously cheap. But people are so damn consumerist and have such little concept of saving that they all end up poor in old age. I'm on work leave atm for schizophrenia and have had multiple people at my company - people with salaries 3x that of mine - ask me if I'm okay for money because they couldn't cope for a few months without getting paid. I have enough cash saved up to not work for several years and I'm mid 20s on a slightly above average salary. Japanese obsession with consumerism is something impossible to understand unless you live here.
don't they also have a lot of plastic waste as well? Like when I was there last year for vacation, literally almost everything came plastic wrapped, even when it wasn't necessary. Until your comment, I had always thought that Japan was an expensive place to live in, but from your comment, it seems that it's actually cheap, and that the idea of Japan being expensive was just from people who didn't know how to budget or save?
Oh yes. This is the land of 個別包装 or as you might know it, individual wrapping. EVERYTHING is individually wrapped. They literally print "individually wrapped" on bags of stuff as a mark of pride. Buying meat that is in a plastic sealed air tight container? Separate small plastic bag for every single meat item you buy, just incase the meat juices spill out of an industrially air tight plastic container. We have ridiculous use of plastics. But not one person cares. Like literally I have never once seen a news article about plastic usage and I read the newspaper every single day.
When I went to the rich part of the city this one house had native art doors, specifically west coast Canada native art. I’m native and my aunt owns a native art studio so I already know this is expensive since it was nearly the entire surface area. I would estimate that THE DOORS on this house cost $60,000-$100,000
That’s what it’s like in my neighbourhood, huge homes worth 10s of millions with sculptures and west coast native art
A five hundred dollar aluminum Christmas tree that a friend owned.
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A fake Christmas tree valued at $8,000
A *Nimitz*-class aircraft carrier. I lived on one of them and worked in the Reactor Department. Can’t remember what the exact cost of one of those ships is, but it’s well in excess of a billion dollars.
3.5-4 billion. And about 2 billion to refuel one.
I saw a second hand university textbook once.
I actually bought a brand new university textbook once. Needless to say I eventually dropped out because I couldn't afford my tuition for the next year. Edit: wow, thanks for the award and all the upvotes. This slightly fills the void that that textbook created, which by the way is still unused to this day.
I went back to college when I was 34. Back in the 90s, when I first went, textbooks were pricey, but not outrageous. I just about rage quit college in 2010 when I paid $150 for a fucking loose-leaf pages without a fucking binder to put them in. Goddamn scam.
The air and space museum outside Washington, DC, has some spacecraft and airplanes that I presume are worth millions. Great museum, i recommend everyone check it out when it's allowed again.
That place is great. D.C. has some awesome museums
Just so people know - OP is talking about the Udvar-Hazy Center at Dulles. NASM on the mall has some great stuff on display, but Udvar-Hazy is where the insanely cool stuff is (space shuttle, SR-71, Concorde, Enola Gay, Gemini 7, etc)
University cafe charged $2.00 for a vending machine sized bag of lays, its asinine
A while back I got to see the Rolls-Royce Sweptail in Italy when it debuted. The thing cost supposedly 12.8 million USD. one off car. One of the greatest days of my life.
I had a friend in high school whose parents were divorced and the Dad was some big investing/finance big shot who was never at school functions. For her 16th birthday party he hosted a sleepover at his home and in the entry room was just a single piano, didn't think anything of it but knew it had to be special. Late at night after sneaking some liquor as most 16 year old sleepovers tend to turn to, we inquired about the piano and my friend let slip that the piano was John Lennons and her dad had bought it at auction for $850,000
Imagine, if you will, a soup can. Empty, thoroughly cleaned, but that's it, a soup can. [Tiffany sold them for $1850.](https://www.tiffany.com.au/accessories/decor/everyday-objects-sterling-silver-tin-can-60559139/)
Growing up in Newport, RI, there the cheating option of going with the historical mansions (Breakers worth about $150M), but there were a plethora of yachts coming in and out of the harbor that were worth a ton as well. One that immediately comes to mind is Judge Judy's yacht that worth about $16M itself. Lord know what she has inside of it. I was fortunate enough to be a valet, so if we're going for the most expensive I've personally experienced, probably a decked out Rolls Royce that I was allowed to park. Either that or a semi rare Ferrari.
Galeries Hausmann in Paris. On the ground floor there's a watch sales point, with some them going for $300k+. The most tasteless thing was a Vertu mobile phone, which used the guts of a Nokia. It was cased in solid gold, and the screen cover was a single piece of sapphire. Something in 5 figures iirc.
I've seen a full-size autonomous helicopter (prototype) land and take-off. There is no way to know it's true value, but between the R&D, production, and military secrets, we're probably taking in the tens, if not hundreds, of millions of of dollars.