Mark Zuckerberg was just spotted shopping at Costco. Look inside the lives of surprisingly frugal millionaires and billionaires, from businessmen like Warren Buffett to A-list celebs like Jennifer Lawrence.
Mark Zuckerberg doesn't need to hunt for wholesale bargains at Costco, but that doesn't stop him from doing it anyway.
The billionaire Facebook CEO was spotted in the electronics section of a Costco store in Mountain View, California, alongside wife Priscilla Chan on December 13, TMZ reported. But he's not the only billionaire that goes out of his way to pinch pennies. Many millionaires and billionaires have something in common, aside from having high net worths: They're frugal.
To identify characteristics that are the most predictive of net worth, Stanley Fallaw conducted two studies that included a group of individuals with net worths ranging from $100,000 to $1 million and a group of high- and ultra-high-net-worth individuals.
She found that six behaviors, which she called "wealth factors," are related to net-worth potential, regardless of age or income. One of those is frugality — a commitment to saving, spending less, and sticking to a budget.
That's not surprising when you consider the habits of some of the richest people: Warren Buffett is notoriously frugal, and Richard Branson has previously said that displays of wealth embarrass him. The same extends to some A-list celebrities who rake in millions for their movies and TV appearances.
Here's a look inside the lives of some famously frugal millionaires and billionaires.
Sarah Stanley Fallaw, director of research for the Affluent Market Institute, studied more than 600 millionaires for her book, "The Next Millionaire Next Door: Enduring Strategies for Building Wealth."
One of those factors, frugality, came up several times during Stanley Fallaw's research — many of the millionaires she interviewed stressed the freedom that comes with spending below their means.
"Spending above your means, spending instead of saving for retirement, spending in anticipation of becoming wealthy, makes you a slave to the paycheck, even with a stellar level of income," she wrote.
Several of the most well-known millionaires and billionaires built wealth by living frugally — a habit they continue to practice even after becoming rich.
Consider the billionaire Warren Buffett, who's worth $89.9 billion and is currently the fourth-richest person in the world. Not one for lavish purchases, he spends relatively little money.
He previously told CNBC and Yahoo Finance's "Off the Cuff" that he's "never had any great desire to have multiple houses and all kinds of things and multiple cars."
Warren Buffet at the premiere of 'The Post' in Washington DC.
Dennis Van Tine/AP
Buffett also famously pays only $18 for a haircut.
Berkshire Hathaway CEO Warren Buffett waits to play table tennis during the Berkshire Hathaway annual meeting weekend in Omaha, Nebraska
Rick Wilking/Reuters
And he doesn't pay much for food — he spends no more than $3.17 on his daily McDonald's breakfast and gets dinner at the modest Gorat's steak house, where the menu items range from $3 to $41.
Then there's "Canada's Warren Buffett," the billionaire Jim Pattison, who earned his nickname from his own relatively frugal lifestyle. Pattison is worth $6.17 billion ...
... but, like Buffett, he keeps his wheels modest, driving a Dodge Ram 1500 Laramie truck around his hometown. The pricing for the 2019 model ranges from $31,695 to $56,495.
His frugality partly stems from his upbringing: Pattison was born during the Great Depression and grew up poor, wearing hand-me-downs and living in "Vancouver's gritty east side."
The billionaire Richard Branson — who's now worth $5.75 billion — also has modest roots. He's frugal when it comes to luxury items, largely because he grew up in a middle-class family.
Sir Richard Branson, founder of Virgin Group, waits to speak on a panel at the annual Skybridge Alternatives Conference (SALT) in Las Vegas May 7, 2015.
Rick Wilking/Reuters
"The idea of having a possession that is there just as pure luxury, and is not actually paying its bills is something which I'd be embarrassed about," he previously told The Guardian.
Richard Branson, chairman of Virgin Airlines, in 2016.
Getty
To Branson, the biggest luxury isn't money: "If we're talking about personal luxuries — and the luxury of being your own boss — the biggest reward is the amount of time one can find for family and friends."
Like Pattison and Branson, Charlie Ergen's frugal habits at work and home also take root in the way he was brought up. Ergen stepped down as CEO of Dish Network in December 2017 and has a net worth of $12.6 billion.
Despite her $4 billion net worth, Judy Faulkner, the founder of Epic Systems, also resists the lavish life: "I never had any personal desire to be a wealthy billionaire living lavishly," she wrote.
He's also been spotted driving relatively inexpensive cars, including an Acura TSX, a Volkswagen hatchback, and a Honda Fit, all of which are valued at or under $30,000.
With a net worth of $118 billion, Bezos is the richest person alive, but he used to drive a 1987 Chevy Blazer. As of 2013, he was driving a Honda Accord.
But billionaires, CEOs, investors, and businesspeople aren't the only ones who live frugally. Some celebrities don't act like they have millions to their names.
jacoblund / Getty Images
Consider Tyra Banks, who has always been more of a saver than a spender. One estimate puts the businesswoman, model, and producer's net worth at $90 million.
"While a lot of models were partying it up and going shopping and buying a closet of designer clothes or staying at the top hotels during fashion week, I was at the DoubleTree or Embassy Suites, saving my money, and bought a house at 20 years old," she once said.
"I was always more interested in experiences over things," she told Money magazine. "Things didn't make me happy. I saved, saved, saved. But I saved to a fault."
Her accountants told her she needed to spend money and had her set up a frivolous account, in which she had to budget to spend money on "stupid stuff."
When he hosted the "Tonight Show," he saved all of his "Tonight Show" money — reportedly as much as $30 million per year, according to CNBC — and spent only the money he made from stand-up-comedy touring.
Even after her rise to fame and consequently hefty payouts — she received $15 million for the 2018 film "Red Sparrow" and was one of the highest-paid actresses that same year — she lived for several years in the same three-bedroom apartment she got when she moved to Los Angeles.
She's particularly a fan of Bed Bath & Beyond's 20% off coupons. "I may or may not have stolen them out of my neighbors' mailboxes sometimes," she told Conan O'Brien.
That's pretty frugal for someone who reportedly earns $125,000 per episode of the TV show "The Good Place" — and that's not counting her undisclosed earnings from the movie "Frozen," which grossed more than $1.2 billion at the box office.
