Still shaking my head... Unbelievably dumb..

[1 Wild R/T]

So today I went to look at some equipment at a repair facility, got taking to the man that owns the shop & as it turns out the 130 acres of land behind the shop.... He owns the impressive old farm house too....

Turns out he bought all this about fifteen years ago from the people who live in the travel trailer across the road......  They inherited 3200 acres about twenty years prior & lost virtually everything because they like to gamble..... Are you kidding me? At what point do you look & realize you've gambled away 2500 acres & you only have 700 left... And think this next bets gonna turn it all around? Idiots!!!! 

They have about three acres left, a travel trailer, a double wide & two mid eighties suburbans......

Around here An acre of agricultural land is worth about 75K  x 3200 acres thats 240,000,000.....  I'm just dumbfounded, I know it's happened before & it'll happen again but jesus...  The Grand Parents worked & saved & got to the point where everyone should be more than taken care of for many generations & in less than 20 years it's gone...

[jimynick]

It's a sickness, like alcoholism or drugs. You called it right on the head though- "the next bet will make up for all the previous losing ones" and so it goes. I've had friends comment on casinos and their lavishness and I turned to him and said "you don't think they built this joint with THEIR money, do you?" Imagine blowing the equivalent of nearly a quarter BILLION dollars! Jesus, it takes your breath away at the sheer stupidity of it. 

[Cuda Cody]

That sucks.  Someone had to work their behind off so they could pass down a better life to their children and most of it is gone just like that.   

[Spikedog08]

No good words . . .   

[1 Wild R/T]

I understand it's a sickness but still ar some point you'd think a small bit of sense would force you to seek help.... I don't know, maybe 20-30 million into the spiral?    I know enough guys with liquid cooled wallet that live pretty high but a quarter billion & they pissed it away.....

[RUNCHARGER]

Unreal: That's why it's good to like Mopars. So busy working to buy the next part or project car you don't have time for anything else.

[Cudakiller70]

Can't wrap my two brain cells around this, for some money seems to be a curse. Hopefully no one else got sucked in and hurt. Wow just wow sad story. 

[71GranCoupe]

With all that much spent, if they don't have a couple Hemi cars by now, they will soon be on the street and homeless. No hope.   

[Topcat]

Been there seen that before myself.

So this guy I knew for many years lived in Los Gatos where I grew up.
His house was right next door to the Calvary Baptist Church there in town.

Now this Church is no Little League Church. It freakin Ginormous.

Both his parents gone and his Grandparents who started his place back in the early 20's.
Being the only son, he inherits the house.

Church gives him $2.1 Million Dollars.
He's set for life.

We  tried to steer him in the right direction on some very good investors to meet with.
He didn't want none of that!

Within 4 years he is now broke and Penny-less working for the Salvation Army up in the Santa Cruz Mtns.
Living in a moldy wet damp rental with just a space heater in a small room.

[GoodysGotaCuda]

Living in Vegas will either teach to that you like to gamble, or you will never gamble. We watched several lose all they had hoping for the next hand, pull, roll, etc. It's hard to watch and is pretty much just as bad as any drug out there.

[YellowThumper]

Countless stories such as that.
Biggest one was a company my brother worked for. 2 guys owned it they were hard driving asses but built it up and then sold at the pique of market.
52 million split between the 2.
One i don't know how he ended up but the other was "addicted" to speed. Had his assortment of fast cars when owning it. then with the big payday he got into jet boat racing. Flipped it and was dead within about a year.

Knew an owner of a very large mold tool supply house. Liked to live large. Found the perfect hooker that loved him. Divorced his wife (she took him to the cleaners which forced the sale of the company...) and married his love. Yes, again divorced soon after. But not after she had extracted large sums from him also...
Then he invested the bulk of his remaining $$$ into a pay phone company right when the cell phones were coming into mas market. LOL 

[Chryco Psycho]

People who earn their fortunes usually value the $$ , they understand the hardwork it took to to get there & often are not flashy about having $$ at all.
One friend who is doing just fine was showing me the glue he uses to keep the soles on his cowboy boots !
Conversely people who inherit usually have no clue & believe it will never run out unless their family force them to build their own wealth with some backing .
Even this is not always true , a good friend did very well for himself owned a nice home & a successful business , I lost track of him for over a decade ,when we reconnected I assumed he would be well set for life but no , still working his ass off but renting , owned nothing got hooked gambling , virtually nothing left . Could not see the forest for the darn trees .
As Goody said you either get caught or turned off by gambling , I could live in Vegas no problem , I hate gambling .
I have won the lottery 3 times in my life so far though    ............... but $10 doesn't last very long !!
There would have to be some positive reinforcement to continue & I cannot win a coin toss ever, funny how some people are consistantly lucky& others are the opposite , I was at a carshow one time with 400+ people they did a 50/50 draw twice , the same person won both times close to $1000 in each draw , why bet against them ?

[Timbbuc2]

It is sad to hear about these people that have no clue about money. Like the shows you see on tv about Lottery winners being broke within 2 years, (Not all of them) I can gamble, I go to the Casino I have $20 in my pocket win! loose! or draw. That is all I am going to spend on gambling. I knew this one guy that would leave at lunch spend the entire hour on a one arm bandit, then he would call his wife telling her to come quick, the machine was getting ready to pay off. Which it never did. This  guy pulled in a good salary and now he has nothing.

[Rev-It-Up]

Similar situation (albeit not as significant amounts of money) with the previous/original owner of our current house. I don't know what "addiction" it was, but the story goes like this.  This house was built and given to her along with the 300 acres surrounding this house as a wedding present from her father in the late 70's. After the first 10 years she sold off 100 acres (a subdivision was built a few miles down the road). Then in the late 90's she sold off the rest and a subdivision was built all around this house. When we bought the house 4 years ago, her take away check at closing was less than $20k. They owned a successful HVAC/plumbing company for more than 30 years...I just don't understand it.

[Spikedog08]

For myself and the casino, I might as well just give them my money as I walk in the door . . . I am not lucky with things like this.  Never have been so just don't do it.  Just went to Vegas a couple weeks ago and didn't gamble at all, just looked at the sights!  My wife is the same with gambling, her downfall is shopping . . . poor credit card abuse.