Despite having a internet price of $400 million, Kevin O’Leary nonetheless retailers at Walmart for $29 denims

“I’m always looking for a great deal, that’s why I’m in Walmart,” he said in a recent Instagram video. “You know those fantastic black jeans I’m always wearing? That’s right—Walmart special, 29 smackaroos. That’s how you save dough.”

The 72-year-old added that his spouse despatched him to the shop to purchase some necessities, together with batteries, butter, paper towels, and OxiClean laundry spray. But O’Leary wasn’t about to waste the chance to hunt for a saved buck.

“I want to save dough when it comes to paper towels. Check it out. Bounty—12+ rolls is like 18 small rolls—I’m going plus,” he stated with a smirk.

O’Leary, who owns multimillion-dollar properties in Florida, Massachusetts, and Toronto, has made the purpose to buy at Walmart on quite a few events—lengthy arguing that there’s no cause to pay extra for on a regular basis necessities when a less expensive possibility will do. 

Plus, as O’Leary sees it, there’s no assure the cash you spend immediately will nonetheless be there whenever you want it.

“I hate wasting money,” O’Leary advised CNBC in 2021 after a Walmart run went viral. “I just don’t get why you would do that. It’s so hard to make it in the first place.”

From Warren Buffett to Scale AI’s Lucy Guo—even billionaires nonetheless search for methods to avoid wasting

O’Leary will not be alone among the many ultrawealthy in maintaining a frugal streak. Some of the world’s richest individuals have continued to hunt for bargains and keep away from spending greater than they should, at the same time as their fortunes have grown.

Warren Buffett, whose internet price presently sits at about $144 billion, has lengthy embraced a famously frugal life-style. The 95-year-old nonetheless lives in the identical five-bed, two-and-a-half-bath residence in Omaha, Nebraska, that he bought in 1958 for $31,500. Today, the home is price over $1.3 million.

He additionally famously used to cease at McDonald’s on his strategy to the Berkshire Hathaway workplace—and let the inventory market dictate his order. When markets had been down, he’d spend $2.61 on two sausage patties. On higher days, he’d splurge $3.17 on a bacon, egg, and cheese biscuit, based on a 2017 HBO documentary.

Ikea’s late billionaire founder Ingvar Kamprad had an identical love for financial savings. Despite at one time having an estimated $58.7 billion fortune, Kamprad purchased second-hand garments and drove an outdated Volvo.

“I don’t think I’m wearing anything that wasn’t bought at a flea market,” Kamprad stated in a 2016 documentary on Sweden’s TV4. “I want to set a good example.”

Kamprad additionally continued working at Ikea till he was 87, greater than three many years after he grew to become a billionaire. He died in 2018 at 91.

One of the latest members of the billionaire membership, Scale AI cofounder Lucy Guo, is a more moderen instance of somebody whose spending habits have remained comparatively modest as her fortune has soared. The 31-year-old has lengthy embraced the FIRE (financially impartial, retire early) motion by going to extremes to economize, together with shopping for discounted clothes, skateboarding to work, and reserving flights she would later cancel so she might eat free of charge in American Express airport lounges.

“Everything I wear is free or from Shein…Some of them aren’t going to be that great quality, but there’s always like two pieces or so that really work out, and I just wear them every day,” the billionaire founder beforehand advised Fortune. “I still literally buy buy-one, get-one-free on Uber Eats.”