Quote Originally Posted by somebodyshotmypaw View Post
One example that my daughter had to learn on her own, even though I've been telling her. Sometimes they have to see it. My daughter has a very nice Nissan Altima that I bought used. Her friend got a brand new Mercedes SUV. Obviously anyone would be a little jealous. Recently my daughter found out that the Mercedes was a lease. She also found out that the girl is attending Ole Miss utilizing student loans. So not everything was as it seemed.

A 529 plan was one of the best things I ever did. Now that they are in college, it's been so nice.
You really can't tell much about people by their lifestyle. I've got older relatives on both sides of my family that always had nicer cars than my immediate family, took nicer vacations, ate out more, and just generally had much more consumption that are more or less broke at this point and too old to do anything about it. They probably did make a good 15-20% more in earned income over most of their careers, but spent that and then some and now are asking the family members that didn't take all the vacations and lease the nice cars to help keep them out of a medicaid nursing home.