Warren Buffett is one of those rare billionaires everyone feels like they know. He still lives in the same modest Omaha home he bought in 1958. He eats McDonald’s and drinks Cherry Coke like lunch is a personal investment strategy. In a world full of private jets and vast estates, his choices are weirdly relatable — almost comforting. But even familiar figures can have unsuspected personal chapters, and Buffett’s love life is one that defies tidy labels.
In 1952, Buffett married Susan Thompson, known to friends and family as Susie. Together they raised three children — Susan Alice, who shares her mother’s name, Howard and Peter — and built what looked like a classic Midwestern family.
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But by the late 1970s, with Berkshire Hathaway taking off and Buffett turning into a household name in finance, Susie made a surprising decision: she moved to San Francisco to pursue her dreams as a singer and activist while maintaining her marriage to Warren.
It wasn’t distance or bitterness that defined the split — it was understanding. In a 2004 interview with journalist Charlie Rose, just months before her death, Susan Buffett explained that she knew her husband wasn’t equipped to live alone. He couldn’t cook, do laundry, or handle the day-to-day. So she turned to a friend she’d met while singing at The French Café in Omaha: Astrid Menks, a Latvian-born hostess. “Astrid, will you take Warren, make him some soup, go over there and look after him?” she recalled asking. Astrid did — and never really left.
Astrid moved in with Buffett in 1978, and the three stayed close for decades. As recounted in “The Snowball: Warren Buffett and the Business of Life” by Alice Schroeder, Christmas cards from the Buffett household didn’t feature just one signature, or even two. They were signed: “Warren, Susie and Astrid.” That tiny detail became one of the most talked‑about quirks of Buffett’s life, a window into a genuinely unconventional alliance.
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The arrangement might look strange on paper, but the people in it seemed to understand it deeply. In a 2006 interview with The New York Times, Buffett’s daughter put it plainly: “Unconventional is not a bad thing. More people should have unconventional marriages.” In the 2017 HBO documentary “Becoming Warren Buffett,” she added that Astrid had “been part of the family for a long time, so it just evolved into something that for us was kind of normal. Nobody was being hurt and everybody was happy.”
Even as this unique domestic rhythm played out, the emotional bond between Warren and Susie stayed strong. When Susie was diagnosed with oral cancer in 2003, Buffett flew to San Francisco on weekends to be with her. He was at her side when she died in 2004, closing a chapter in his life that had lasted more than half a century.
Two years later, on his 76th birthday, Buffett married Astrid in a quiet ceremony at his daughter’s home. It was simple, understated and, in its own way, perfectly Buffett: no flash, no pretense, just family.
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Buffett has long insisted that wealth isn’t just built on spreadsheets or stock picks — it’s shaped by who you choose to spend your life with. In a 2017 talk with Microsoft co-founder Bill Gates at Columbia University, he said, “You want to associate with people who are the kind of person you’d like to be. You’ll move in that direction. And the most important person by far in that respect is your spouse. I can’t overemphasize how important that is.” For Buffett, partnership wasn’t about perfection. It was about alignment — emotional, intellectual, and, yes, even financial.
His name is synonymous with financial wisdom, but this glimpse into his life is a reminder that the richest returns aren’t always found in stocks or bonds. Sometimes they come from the messy, beautiful ways people figure out how to love and take care of each other — even when it doesn’t match anyone’s expectations.
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This article Billionaire Warren Buffett Had An ‘Unconventional’ Marriage That Lasted 52 Years. The Trio Even Sent Out Signed Christmas Cards—’Everybody Was Happy’ originally appeared on Benzinga.com
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