Neither popular nor middle-class education: Bill Gates gave his daughter a $16 million horse farm in Westchester for college graduation
Is it possible to raise your kids in a middle-class household despite being billionaires? Melinda Gates explains how she and former husband Bill Gates did.
Raising children to grow up with their head on straight and hardworking is a challenging task, especially when it’s so tempting to spoil them at times. The job can be even more difficult if you are a billionaire, aflush with wealth beyond the imagination of most mortals.
That was the situation that Bill and Melinda Gates, who divorced in 2021 after 27 years on marriage, found themselves in with their three children Jennifer, Rory, and Phoebe. However, in an interview with The New York Times, Melinda French explained that her kids’ household growing up was “very middle-class.” That despite being able to give, and giving, multi-million-dollar gifts.
Gates kids weren’t bought everything they asked for
Melinda French Gates told the Times that from a very early age that the children were told not to flaunt the family wealth in front of others. Likewise, that she and Bill would not just buy them anything that they wanted. Their kids had an allowance that they could use, or they could put what they wanted on a wish list for their birthday or Christmas and then wait.
“So, I think it was much more of an upbringing like I grew up in,” Melinda said, adding, “a very middle-class household where money did dictate whether I got an extra pair of shoes that year or not.” She believes that “that was a good principle to have.”
However, that didn’t stop them from splurging on their kids though, like the nearly $16-million horse farm in North Salem, New York for Jennifer upon graduating from Stanford in 2018. The accomplished equestrian went on to attend the Icahn School of Medicine at Mount Sinai, in New York City, which she graduated from last year.
Gates kids will inherit “a minuscule portion” of family’s wealth
Bill Gates, once the richest person in the world has been clear for a long time that the Gates children will not inherit the whole of his still immense fortune telling the Daily Mail in 2011 “I don’t think that amount of money would be good for them.”
He assured the outlet that the kids would receive “an unbelievable education,” which would be fully paid for, but that they will have to “find their own way” in the real world. “In terms of their income, they will have to pick a job they like and go to work,” he said.
As far as how much they can expect to inherit: “It will be a minuscule portion of my wealth,” he explained. He recently gave a number, saying it would be less than 1%, with the rest going toward the Gates Foundation, formerly the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation.
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