How to Buy…
A bargain hunter’s guide to finding value in luxury
PHOTOGRAPHS BY JAMIE CHUNG
If you feel like ruining your day, walk through your house with a pocket calculator
and add up the cost of everything you own that you now wish you hadn’t bought.
You’ll be in a bad mood before you even get to your garage. I still brood about stuff
my wife and I asked for and received as wedding gifts more than 30 years ago—all
those $100 wineglasses, whose pattern was so elegantly simple that when a friend
broke our last one (the others having perished, one by one, in the dishwasher),
she said, “At least it wasn’t your good crystal.” How much smarter we would have
been to ask for something sensible, like cash. Then we could have gone to Pottery
Barn and bought elegantly simple wineglasses that were less expensive and not
so fragile, and invested the difference in something with a longer half-life than
Baccarat stemware…such as a more interesting honeymoon. Continued on page 84
REPORTED BY RICK COLLINS, CHRIS CONNELLY, JASON DALEY,
LINDSEY GETZ, ALISON KOTCH, JESSICA LOTHSTEIN, ANDREW
PARK, WILL RIZZO, MATT SCHNEIDERMAN, LES SHU, MICHAEL
SLENSKE, TREVOR THIEME, AND JOEL WEBER
How to Buy a Racehorse
You need not be royalty of Dogwood Stable,
to buy entry into the a top-ranked racing
“sport of kings.” That’s stable in South Carolina
because stables that is home to 73
have recently started stakes winners. “And
offering multiowner the head of Prudential
partnerships. An initial owned part of a horse
investment of $25,000 named Smok’n Frolic,
will generally get who earned about
you (or your group of $1.5 million in three
friends) a 25 percent years.”
interest in a quality A racehorse may
contender. “The seem like a luxury,
ex-chairman of Dow but like everything
Chemical owns a share else nowadays, one
in every horse at our can be found at a
stable…and has for steep discount. To
15 years,” says Cot pick a winner, deal
Campbell, president with a reputable,
professional stable
that buys yearlings;
to find a stable
near you, contact
the Thoroughbred
Owners and Breeders
Association ( toba.org)
or the American Horse
Council (horsecouncil
.org). Most stables will
mail you a brochure of
horses. Despite what
you might imagine,
buying a racehorse
is much like buying a
new car, and there’s
no reason to send a
vet to examine your
steed (quality stables
have streamlined the
vet-check process to
ease the burden of
purchase). As with any
big investment, you’ll
sign a legal agreement.
Then you’ll fill out a
license in the state
where you’re going
to race (the stable
also provides this at
no extra cost). Next:
Enjoy the ride. The
average horse runs
10 times a year. You
and your brood will
get free admission to
the stables’ box, meet
the jockey and trainer,
and hang out with your
horse in the paddock
before the race.
Stable owners
generally estimate
that only 33 percent
of horses make
money. The good
news is that you can
write off the expense
on your taxes, so
it’s a worthwhile
investment, even if
you don’t win. “Horse
racing isn’t for widows
and orphans,” says
Campbell, “but it’s the
most exciting venture
in the world.”
