17 People Share Exactly How The "Rich Friend" In Their Group Got Their Wealth

We all have that one friend who is doing well for themselves. But then there's that one person in your extended circle who somehow bypassed "comfortable" and went straight to "casually buys a boat on a Tuesday" rich.

Whenever you see them, you can't help but wonder: How on earth did they pull that off?

Recently, people online started sharing the exact ways their wealthiest friends made their fortunes, and let me tell you, the secret is rarely a corporate 9-to-5 job. Grab a notepad, because these stories are wild.

"He owns a company that manufactures the tiny rubber feet that go on the bottom of commercial microwaves. That's it. He has a total monopoly on microwave feet. He drives a Lamborghini."

"She wrote highly specific, incredibly smutty dinosaur romance novels and self-published them on Amazon. Nobody in our friend group believed she was making money until she showed us her dashboard. She was pulling in $40,000 a month at her peak and paid cash for a mansion in Texas."

"In 2011, he bought $500 worth of Bitcoin because he wanted to buy a fake ID on a shady website. The site got taken down before he could buy it, so he just left the Bitcoin in his digital wallet and forgot about it. He remembered it in 2018. He retired at 26."

"My buddy is a COBOL programmer. It’s an ancient coding language that nobody learns anymore, but major banks still run their entire backend systems on it. He works maybe 10 hours a week as an independent consultant and charges them $400 an hour to fix their glitches."

"Portable toilets. He started with three incredibly gross porta-potties he bought on Craigslist and rented them out to construction sites. Now he has a massive fleet of luxury restroom trailers for high-end weddings. People will pay ridiculous amounts of money to poop in peace."

"He bought a bunch of random domain names in 1998 just because he thought the internet was a neat fad. Two decades later, a massive tech conglomerate wanted one of those names for a new global product launch. He sold it for $2.5 million."

"She owns two laundromats. It sounds exhausting, but she automated almost everything, hired a part-time manager to handle the machines, and just collects the profits. She works two hours a week and makes more than our entire friend group combined."

"He married the heiress to a regional mattress store empire. Not the most inspiring or replicable hustle, but hey, he seems very happy on their jet."

"She started a business power-washing driveways while we were in high school. Instead of going to college, she bought more trucks, hired our classmates, and scaled up. Now she owns the biggest exterior commercial cleaning company in our state."

"He was employee number 12 at a tech startup you have definitely heard of. He had no tech skills—he basically stocked the fridge, ordered lunches, and answered customer service emails. When the company went public, his early stock options made him an instant multi-millionaire."

"My friend does 'estate cleanouts.' When someone passes away and the family lives out of state and just wants the house emptied, he charges them a fee to haul everything to the dump. But the contract says he keeps anything of value. The amount of vintage jewelry, cash stuffed in walls, and rare antiques he has found is sickening."

"He bought a totally barren, useless plot of land in the middle of nowhere for dirt cheap. Five years later, the city announced they were building a new highway straight through it. The government had to buy him out for millions using eminent domain."

"She makes ASMR videos of herself crushing floral foam and cutting blocks of soap. She doesn't even show her face or speak. She has 8 million subscribers and makes mid-six figures a year from ad revenue."

"He created a super boring scheduling software specifically for veterinary offices. It doesn’t do anything crazy, it’s just really easy for receptionists to use. He sold the software to a private equity firm last year for an amount of money that makes me want to cry."

"He hoarded sealed Lego sets in his parents' basement for a decade. During the pandemic, when everyone was stuck inside, nostalgic, and spending stimulus checks, he started selling them off to collectors. He made enough to buy a house in cash."

"She got mildly bumped by a delivery truck for a massive global corporation. She wasn’t seriously hurt, just a broken arm and some whiplash, but their legal team settled out of court instantly just to make it go away quietly. She hasn't worked a day since."

"He makes custom, high-end staircases for mega-mansions. Rich people will literally pay $150,000 just for a really aesthetic, floating glass staircase. He does maybe five projects a year, completely outsources the installation, and spends the rest of his time skiing."