Why Warren Buffett Once Told His Daughter, 'Go To The Bank Like Everyone Else'

In a 2021 Berkshire Hathaway press release, Warren Buffett heaped praise on philanthropists and charitable workers who partake in "retail" philanthropy, or who give of their time, energy, love, and monetary gifts that amount to a heavy personal sacrifice. "They do not have buildings named after them, but they silently make those establishments — schools, hospitals, churches, libraries, whatever — work smoothly to benefit those who have received the short straws in life," he said. As a point of contrast, Buffett owned up to doing very little direct philanthropy himself; his big contribution was giving away money he didn't need and would never be able to spend in a lifetime.

But that forthrightness on his wealth and his pledge to give 99% of it to philanthropy in life and at death have given Buffett's name considerable honor outside of his business acumen. It should be said that the Oracle of Omaha hasn't been entirely hands-off the allocation of his philanthropic donations; specifically, in June 2024, he told The Wall Street Journal that the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation would no longer receive funding from him after he died (said Buffett, "The Gates Foundation has no money coming after my death"), with the money instead going to a charitable trust managed by his three children Susan, Howard, and Peter.

The Buffett children all have philanthropic endeavors of their own, so they are no strangers to that side of their father's work. Nor are they strangers to his frank perspective on wealth. An example? When his oldest, Susan, once asked for money to remodel her kitchen, Warren Buffett flatly refused her request, telling her to go to the bank and take out a loan instead.

While Warren Buffett was open about enjoying the lifestyle wealth afforded him in a statement to The Giving Pledge, he also discussed the limits of his luxuries, as well as his good reasons for them. "Some material things make my life more enjoyable," he wrote. "Many, however, would not. I like having an expensive private plane, but owning a half-dozen homes would be a burden. Too often, a vast collection of possessions ends up possessing its owner."

It seems he tried to teach his children exactly this. For the HBO documentary "Becoming Warren Buffett" (2017), Susan Buffett recalled that despite her father's success, she and her brothers lived a largely ordinary childhood. They had fixed allowances without the option to earn more on top, and their allowance was just enough to cover typical kid fixations like candy. "We grew up in this very normal sort of situation," said Susan, "kind of the regular father-knows-best situation." (Read more about allowances and kids.)

The story of Susan Buffett's kitchen remodeling was featured in HBO's "Becoming Warren Buffett" as another example of her father's thriftiness and lessons in responsibility. The occasion was the birth of Susan's first child; she needed to make room in the kitchen for the baby's high chair and she asked for a $41,000 loan. Susan said that she wasn't playing the nepotism card. "I thought I was asking for a loan," she said. "I was not asking him to give me the money." Buffett, however, refused and insisted she "go to the bank like everyone else."

Not spending on his kids is a somewhat notorious trait of Buffett's. For example, speaking to NPR back in 2010, Peter Buffett said that he and his siblings each inherited $90,000 in stock when they were younger (in 1977, Peter was 19) after the sale of their grandfather's farm, and that the money gave them "a head start." However, it was understood that this $90K would be their only inheritance for personal use. (It should be mentioned that if the Buffett kids held their stock long term, it'd be worth $300 million in 2020.)

Buffett himself has said that his kids have been given plenty and will be given more, but he's also never planned to leave the whole or majority of his fortune to them as part of a great wealth transfer, and Susan agrees with her father on that. In an interview with Business Insider in 2017, she said she agreed with "not dumping a bunch of money on your kids" and defended Buffett against charges of being cheap with his family. "My dad gets a bad rap for that," she said. "He has been much more generous than people are aware."