One of the must frustrating fallicies that I face with people all the time is the assumptions and statements around “Well everyone else does”.
The topic can very from, “Well my coworker at work drives a BMW, so I should be able to also” or “Everyone else has a car loan”. Even “Everyone has second mortgages”.
Do you know what the correct statement to these types of phrases is?
it is:
No. No they don’t.
Lots of people buy cars without car loans. Most people with your income don’t drive BMWs (and thats true no matter how high your income is!), and not everyone has a second mortgage to buy stuff they don’t need. Its time to put those stupid life-destroying statements to bed.
To help with that, I wanted to share a few examples that I think are pretty cool.
Geovanni Bernard-
I’ve personally been a huge fan of Gio his entire career. Evidently he drives a borrowed Honda Odyssey minivan. If that isn’t inspiration, I don’t know what is. Have you thought about how your wallet would do if you drove a borrowed car instead of paying for one?
Kirk Cousins-
Kirk Cousins is a Redskins Quarterback who brings in around 20 million dollars per year. What does he drive? He drives a GMC Savana with over 100k on it. He purchased it in 2014 for the paltry sum of $5,000. (Thats less than .03% of his salary…)
How about you try spending less than .03% of your salary on a car? Think that would put more in your retirement?
Alfred Morris-
Alfred Morris is another athlete we should all look up to. While he makes a couple of million dollars a year, he’s sporting a 27 year old Mazda 626! Thats right, from good ‘ol 2001. He was quoted by CNBC stating that this keeps him grounded, which it does.
I share this feeling. While I might not make the kind of money a pro athlete does, I make sure I always have at least 1 “beater car” to help keep me grounded!
Mitchell Trubisky-
Mitchell may not be the wealthiest of athletes, but he sports the most average car in the world- a 1997 Toyota Camry… in Beige. This was a gift from his grandmother, and show’s a certain aire of responsibility!
LeBron James-
If Football isn’t your thing, how about the quarter-of-a-billionaire LeBron James? I love his story. He received some criticism for endorsing Kia… but the part that most people seemed to miss is that he was driving a Kia well before an endorsement deal! And why not? Kias offer a great car with a great warranty at a great price! So why is this one last? well his Kia does happen to be a K900, and he happens to have a few high end exotics back home as well…
This isn’t a complete list either. James Harrison and Antonio Garay both sport $4,000 Smart cars. Jake Rudock rocks a 2003 Manual Transmission Ford Explorer. Nnamdi Asomugha enjoys a 1997 Nissan Maxima and John Urshel bought a Nissan Versa for $9,000 AFTER he was drafted by the Ravens with a $144,560 signing bonus. I’m also sure there’s a few others.
So whats the moral of the story here? If Millionaires and Billionaires (because there’s a few of them too- Jeff Bezos for example) thing a several thousand dollar car is good enough for them, then why isn’t a several thousand dollar car good enough for you? How many people do you know that insist you have to spend $30,000 for a “decent car” and insist that they deserve to drive a BMW?
They don’t. You don’t have to either!
Sources:
https://www.cnbc.com/2017/11/03/millionaire-athletes-who-drive-super-cheap-cars.html
https://gearheads.org/professional-athletes-that-drive-beater-cars