Why does my rich neighbour keep pretending she has no money?

QMy son started college in another city in September. To cut a long story short he found out that a local’s daughter is a landlady of a house in that city. I was surprised to hear this as her mother is forever going on about how they haven’t got a penny. Curiosity got the better of me and over the following weeks my husband and I discovered through planning permissions and land registry that the family owns half a dozen other properties and land in various parts of the country.

There was a rumour going around 20 years ago that a local had won the Lotto. I remember seeing it in the paper but didn’t take much notice of it. Anyway, my son said he had access to newspaper archives through his college so we found the article about the Lotto win. While the name of the couple was not given, their description matches them perfectly. The win was over €2m. About 10 years ago my daughter was seriously ill, and the fact she had to go on a public waiting list rather than being treated privately meant she suffered a lot more over the course of 18 months. Thankfully she is in full health now. It sickens me that this family, who we see virtually every second day, and who I regarded as friends did nothing to help us and my daughter despite their massive wealth.

I could probably even forgive that but the reason I am writing this is that she has just been around moaning about how they are really struggling to survive. It is like they are mocking us and having a good laugh at our stupidity. They made other purchases at the time like a massive new premises for his business that cost nearly €100,000, and exotic holidays.

They said they had cashed in shares but I don’t believe that now. I don’t want to see this woman or her family for the next 12 months. But what do I say to her?

ABUT you don’t know they won the Lotto — you are surmising that they did, and with fairly strong evidence, but it may not be the case and it may have been somebody else in the vicinity who actually did win the money.

On the other hand you know for sure that they own a number of properties and this is a fact that they haven’t shared with you. There was no reason for them to tell you because it is their own business. It seems to me that it is an intrinsically Irish trait not to boast, particularly about money, whereas other people — Americans spring to mind — are quite the opposite and delight in telling others about their successes. While we do schadenfreude quite well, we don’t seem to rejoice when the news is good. As a result people are fairly reticent to share the news when good luck comes their way.

I’m not for a moment suggesting that you would not have rejoiced at your neighbour’s good fortune, but rather I’m looking for reasons why they might not want people to know about it. Consideration must also be given to the unsolicited begging letters that apparently arrive as soon as the names of big money winners become public.

I agree that your daughter would certainly have benefited from some financial assistance from these people when she was ill. If the situations were reversed then you would have helped their child. However, you have to keep this to yourself as you have no concrete proof that they won the Lotto, and anyway some people are far more generous than others.

Perhaps your neighbour is just keeping up appearances by moaning about money.

You can easily stop this by letting her know that your son accidentally found out that they have a property, and say that you understand it isn’t the only one that they own. Then rather firmly, but with a smile on your face tell her that you won’t put up with any more complaints from her about lack of funds, and tell her that you know now where to go for a loan when you are in need!

You don’t want to see her for a while and my guess is that she will get the message and won’t be calling to your house any time soon. But please keep a sense of balance — she hasn’t done anything wrong and so she should not be overly punished — just keep her at arm’s length for a while if that is how you feel.