1. Warren Buffet, the famous businessman and investor, was born on Saturday, August 30, 1930 in Omaha, Nebraska. Some other famous faces also share the same birth date, like American actress Cameron Diaz, the no. 1 American tennis player Andy Roddick and TV star Lisa Ling.
2. Family plays an important role inspiring children. The same was true for Warren Buffet. His father Howard Buffet was unable to continue with his family business and hence started a stock brokerage business on a small scale. As a kid, Warren often visited his father’s small office, observed the happenings and tried to participate by chalking the stock prices on a blackboard. His father was also a Republican member of Congress and his family shifted to Fredericksburg, Virginia once he was elected to the House of Representatives.
3. Nothing feels better than serving the community that you live in. For this very reason, Warren Buffet, pledged that he would donate all his wealth to charity. In USA history, this has been the greatest act of charitable donation so far. Warren has decided to give 85% of his wealth to his dear friend Bill Gates’ foundation, The Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation.
4. Patience is essential when it comes to investing. This is the lesson that Warren Buffet learnt when he bought his first ever shares of Cities Service Preferred at a mere age of 11. At age 11, he owned three shares of Cities Service Preferred, which he bought by paying $38/share. However, the stock price dropped to $27/share very soon. Warren did not lose hope and waited for the stock price to rise, which eventually did. He sold his shares at a profit of $2/share. He later regretted not waiting long enough as the share price reached $200/share.
5. Warren was eager to start up his own business following the example of his father. Therefore, at a mere age of 13, he started working as a paperboy. He also started selling horse racing tip sheets. Warren, even at that age, had a well-developed awareness regarding taxes and hence paid his first ever tax of $35 on his bicycle. The profit he made by delivering newspaper enabled him to buy a small farm at the age of 14.
6. For some people, money does not change their lifestyle. This holds true for Warren Buffet. Warren has been living in the same 5-bedroom house that he bought 50 years ago in 1956 in Omaha, Nebraska. In 1956, he bought the house for $31, 500. His house has no wall or fence. He loves to drive himself and has no driver. Although he is the owner of world’s largest private jet company, he has never travelled by private jet in his life.
7. Warren’s company Berkshire Hathaway has 63 companies under its belt. It is quite a surprise how Warren manages them with his unique style. Every year he simply writes a letter to each company’s CEO stating what they have to achieve in the coming year. The letter does the trick. There are no meetings and no phone calls are made to check on them. Warren has made his CEOs learn his two basic rules; do not lose any of your shareholder’s money and number two, do not forget rule number one.
8. Warren Buffet is not an extrovert and avoids socializing with people of his class. His favorite past time is to sit down and watch TV, while having popcorns made by himself.
9. Co-founder of Microsoft, Bill Gates, is a good friend of Warren Buffet. Their first meeting lasted for about ten hours though Bill only intended to meet him for 30 minutes, thinking that he and Buffet do not have anything in common. Bill Gates is also a board member of Berkshire Hathaway.
10. Warren Buffet has maintained a simple lifestyle all his life. He never used a calculator to make calculations of millions or billions, does not own a cell phone, lacks a computer on his office desk and plays bridge almost 12 hours a week, with Bill Gates often as his partner.
11. When Warren was studying at Woodrow Wilson High School, along with his friend, he started a small business in which they purchased a second hand pinball machine for just $25 and placed it in a salon in Washington D.C. In just a few months, profit started coming in, which enabled the two friends to buy yet another machine. Eventually they both owned three machines and placed them in three different locations. The business was later sold for $1200.
12. Surprisingly, Warren Buffet is still sporting the same hairstyle that he used to have as a kid. Not many people have the guts to do that.
13. As a teenager, Buffet was often caught lying, shoplifting and stealing golf balls.
14. Buffet’s children must have no interest in how much money their father makes each year. After all, they will not be inheriting anything from Buffet. According to Warren, just because his children were born in the Buffet family, does not justify them getting a portion of his wealth. His children are perfectly fine with their father’s decision.
15. Buffett was married to his first wife Susie in 1952. They remained married for 52 years until she died in 2004 due to cancer. However, long before that, in 1974, she had moved to San Francisco. Both Warren and Susie lived separately but never got a divorce.
16. Ted Weschler, a partner at hedge fund Peninsula Capital Advisors, paid $5.25 million twice to have lunch with Warren Buffet, with the money going to a charitable cause. What he did not know was that his donations could land him a job at Berkshire Hathaway. Buffet, in 2011, hired Weschler to manage a part of his investment.
17. According to Nicole, the adopted daughter of Warren’s son Peter, money is everything for Warren Buffet. He does not accept Nicole as his granddaughter and has disowned her after her appearance in the documentary “One Percent”, based on wealth disparity in the USA.
18. Warren Buffet is suffering from a non-life threatening prostate cancer that is quite common among men.
19. According to Warren Buffet, the worst ever investment he ever made was buying a Sinclair Gas Station back in 1951. Sinclair’s competitor right across the street clearly overtook and eventually destroyed the business for Sinclair. Warren suffered a loss of $2000 at a time when his personal savings were only $9600. However, the incident taught him to adopt a management style that is more passive. This is exactly what he did with his future ventures.
20. Famous personalities like Bill Gates (owner of Microsoft) and Mark Zuckerberg (owner of Facebook) are Harvard dropouts. Today both are immensely successful. In case of Warren Buffet, however, he was rejected by Harvard. He still went on to become one of the most successful executives in the world.