Being a very high net worth individual is an astounding 99.99%. You live in a huge mansion. You own many luxury holiday properties. You arrive at these holiday properties via private jets. Your garage is overflowing with supercars. Every whim is answered. Every need is immediately met. Your children also live a good life. They go to the best schools and are given every possible advantage the world can offer.
This last point actually presents one of the very few downsides to being an extremely high net worth individual. Every single high net worth individual with children always has the following question in the back of their mind:
How do you prevent your kids from growing up to be spoiled, do nothing, lazy shy calculating the days when their trust funds will start so they can squander the wealth you worked so hard to create for them???
This question has plagued wealthy parents for centuries. It is not an easy problem to solve. One foolproof way to make sure your kids don’t grow up to be spoiled, do nothing, shy lazy people is to hide the full extent of your enormous wealth. You can easily live in a mansion and fly periodically on private planes without your children knowing the full run of hundreds of millions of dollars. Let them think one day that they will have to work hard if they want to continue living lavishly.
Unfortunately, hiding your wealth is not an option if you are one of the most famous people in the world.
Take Shaquille O’Neal, for example. Not sure if you know this, but there is a disturbing website that literally lists the net worths of big celebrities like Shaq in an easy-to-search database. Just type a celebrity’s name and boom, and in one click you can read that person’s entire wealth history. I can’t remember the name of this site…but if any of Shaquille’s six children were too embittered to type their father’s name into the search bar, they’d find big, bold green letters announcing that Shaquille O’Neal has a net worth of $400 million.
Six kids… $400 million. That’s $67 million per child right now if Shaq doesn’t earn another dollar for the rest of his life. It’s almost certain that their inheritance will be much higher in a few decades considering Shaq is already making more money each year today in “retirement” than he ever did during his NBA days. Today, Shaq earns about $60 million each year thanks to a sprawling empire that includes many endorsements and a lucrative sports broadcasting career. There is a very real scenario where each of Shaq’s six children could one day inherit $100 million or more.
Knowing he can’t completely hide his fortune, Shaq recently revealed a simple rule his kids must follow if they want to inherit any of his fortune…
Shaq and family (Photo by Jimmy McCarthy/Getty Images)
Two degrees before cheese
Speaking to 7News Australia morning show, Shaq recently revealed a simple rule that each of his eight children must follow before they inherit a cent of his fortune:
“In order to get my cheese, you have to give me two grades.“
As in, before they can inherit any of his money, Shaq’s kids need to earn two college degrees.
Follow Shack:
“I teach them about the wealth of generations at the moment. I tell them all the time, we don’t need another NBA player at home. If you want to play, I can help you get there. But I’d rather see a doctor, dentist, vet, world traveler, hedge fund guy…“
Simple but effective. Not only does this create a built-in need for hard work, this system also forces children to be very knowledgeable and intelligent. Well-informed and intelligent people are unlikely to squander their fortunes.
This isn’t the first time Shaq has talked about the wall he keeps between his kids and his money. Speaking on the Earn Your Favorite Time podcast last November, Shaq shared a mantra that he periodically tells his children when they cross the fortune line:
“You are not rich. I’m rich.“
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