re: What would you do with a billion dollars?

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Why would you leave that much? It's not like your kids are helpless invalid.

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Because, the history of my family heritage is time and time again of building small fiefdoms and watching them collapse. The idea of building a new family empire while putting in place mechanisms to help it last and self-perpetuate is an appealing concept.

The empire I would leave to my children is not one that they would be able to live off of until they are over 40 and have worked for the company for over 20 years (there will be some other instances that would entitle them to certain amounts of money, but all of them require certain careers outside the family empire).

Their college education would be free (and housing during college), but 6 months post graduation, they would be 100% on their own until they reach the required benchmark to tap portions of the family trust.

The idea would be to force them to grow the empire and to keep them from growing up with an entitled, selfish mindset.

We will assume it's after tax, cause, why not? =)

I would first pay off all the debts of close family and a few select friends who are struggling with student loan debt. This would be, at most, 1 million.

I would take 14 million and spend it pretty soon on things like new homes in multiple places, a couple of cars, and a really awesome trip somewhere.

I would take 30 million and set up trusts for each of my two kids and four nieces - 5 million each, with me as the trustee. Until the time they are 35 years old, all distributions would need my approval. I would distribute for things such as education, housing, a decent car, etc.

I would take another 55 million and put it into a trust for each of my two kids, 27.5 million each.

That gets me down to 900 million.

I would take 400 million and have it invested for the benefit of me and my wife. A 3 percent return each year would give us $12 million a year to live on.

The remaining $500 million would be initially used to fund the LSUFanHouston Family Foundation. We would immediately establish endowments of $5 million each at my high school, college, Boy Scouts of American, and two other organizations that I have been involved with in the past, with the purpose of the BSA endowment to help cover costs for inner city youth who want to join the Scouts, and the other four endowments to be used for scholarships that are based on leadership potential as well as academic achievement. My wife would do the same with her high school, college, and three organizations she cares about - with the purpose being up to her. The remaining 450 million in the foundation would be invested with half of the annual income being reinvested and half spent to further programs for children in the US such as education, athletics, fine arts, etc.

I would hire a team of advisers to help me with both investment and charitable giving, but I would make the final call on all decisions (with my wife's consent, of course!!)

$500 million in the bank

Other half

1. Got to Vegas put it on black and let it ride.

2a if I hit walk away happy af and do a bunch of philanthropy.

2b if I lose take half of my other half and do some hood rat shite with my friends and a lot less philanthropy.

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Nice, but not huge, unless you're talking about fairly small programs.

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I have several things I enjoy doing with my free time, what little I have, and I'd like my money to help those efforts. The big charities / big schools aren't struggling for money. I'm one of those LSU fans who didn't go to LSU... I went to UNO. Specifically... I'd probably give most of my 5 million for UNO to the accounting program... maybe a small bit to athletics.

I'd give my Boy Scouts money to the local council - where 200K a year would help. I don't want it going to build a camp somewhere - I would want it to fund some troops in areas of New Orleans where kids are desperate for male role models. 200K a year to support some inner city boy scout troops could do a lot of good, I think.

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I'm curious as to why you'd need a family foundation: they're not essential to a philanthropic plan, and most exist as tax dodges or because the philanthropist wants to control the funds from beyond the grave. I say give it away while you're still alive to see it working for good....far too many family foundations devolve into cushy jobs for family retainers & stipend/travel checks for family members to attend quarterly "grantmaking" meetings.

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I'm 35... I'm not ready to give away all that money at once. I plan on living a good long while. The types of organizations I want to support may change as I age and as our society evolves. Putting it into a family foundation simply allows me to take the charitable deduction in the same year in which I got the billion dollars. I would not at all hesitate to invade the principal of the foundation to give some really quality gifts if the opportunity presents itself.

10 acres is plenty. plus i would hire vandam to design it. put Florida bass in it. I would be the only person fishing it.

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So what would you do? How would you enrich your life?

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Slowly work towards other degrees.

Party.

I'd donate it to LSU so they wouldn't need trashy corporate advertisements on every wall court and field of their athletic facilities

it's never enough, huh?