Posted on 09/08/2021 5:32:38 AM PDT by blam
New Zealand is becoming the ideal spot for high-net-worth people to ride out a societal collapse.
Billionaire Google co-founder Larry Page has been hiding out in private islands in Fiji to avoid COVID-19 and was recently granted New Zealand residency under a category for wealthy investors.
Long before Page, Peter Thiel, the tech billionaire who co-founded PayPal and Palantir, retained residency on the island country in the southwestern Pacific Ocean and bought a $13.5 million estate in 2015.
According to CNBC, Thiel has filed plans to build a mansion buried into the hillside on the shores of Lake Wanaka.
Architecture drawings of the hillside mansion, designed by Tokyo Olympic Stadium architect Kengo Kuma and Associates, show what almost looks like a classy doomsday shelter, with enough liveable area for 24 people.
Kengo Kuma and Associates said the mansion was "designed as an organic architecture that fuses into the landscape."
"The careful design and placement of buildings into the landscape is thoughtful and recognizes the landscape setting. The sympathetic design will use a green roof that will employ the same naturally rustic planting palette of the hillocks that they will be located within," Jo Fyfe, senior planner at John Edmonds and Associates, who assessed the environmental impact of the future structural, said.
The idea that the southwestern Pacific Ocean island country is laden with luxury survival bunkers flourished during the early days of the pandemic when we noted, "New Zealand has become the 'doomsday resort' and #1 pandemic escape destination for America's rich."
It's hard to say Thiel's and Page's motivation to avoid the largest population centers of the world and acquire citizenship in a country of just 5 million people, but it appears to be the ideal spot to ride out a future societal collapse.
Billionaires are making long bets that New Zealand will be the safest place in the world to hunker down during a global crisis, such as the current COVID crisis that forced central banks and governments to go on a borrowing binge like nothing the world has ever seen before, creating what some refer to as the welfare state. When that collapses, the new Hamptons will be New Zealand.
... and it's not just billionaires who are seeking shelter outside the US. Wealthy Americans with assets over $2 million who renounced their citizenship have surged amid socioeconomic despair, political firestorms, and an unrelenting virus pandemic sparking increasingly freedom-destroying mandates.
Wealthy folks are beginning to understand: they don't want to be the last ones sticking around when the party ends in the US.
So he is going full hobbit from the looks of the place.
So, instead of rioters, arsonists, murderers, etc., the earthquakes, volcanoes and tsunamis will get them.
Hmmmm.... I think New Zealand is an island, no? And besides, Jacinda is basically running things as a totalitarian dictator, no?
Revelation 16:19 And the great city was divided into three parts, and the cities of the nations fell: and great Babylon came in remembrance before God, to give unto her the cup of the wine of the fierceness of his wrath.
20 And every island fled away, and the mountains were not found.
And besides, Jacinda is basically facilitating totalitarianism, no?
Not to worry, he’ll be safely locked down with no guns or knives.
Mr. Thiel helped to build a new global business model and now gets the idea he may need a lavish underground bunker with a rather large moat to separate him from his customers.
Who spends billions of dollars for real estate on global, ‘Earthquake Central’ turf??
Somehow I don’t think these billionaires have thought this doomsday mansion thing through. These things are very technically complex and big. He is going to need skilled maintenance staff in residence. And maybe their families too. Once the collapse and the billions are gone, what leverage does the billionaire have to keep the support people in their place. A guy that can fix an air conditioner is more valuable to the mini-society that has been created than a billionaire who has nothing to offer. Think French revolution.
These uber-wealthy "let's hide in luxury" types don't have much common sense. If things ever do go south, the locals won't exactly be tickled pink having some elitist Gringo in the area, thinking he's God's gift to Earth (& therefore running things). Somebody would likely 'pop him a new @sshole right in the middle of his forehead' (paraphrasing Mr. Eastwood ;^) the first time he stepped outside...
What happens when the country locks-down and they don’t allow his private jet to land?
My Congress Critter has a couple of investment homes in NZ. He says it reminds him of America in the ‘50s. You know... before his kind screwed it up.
A gigantic mansion, all by himself?
I’m generally not a “People Person” except when I have to be, but I would wish to occupy an emmense palatial home completely alone. I would at very least plan on renting a few floors out to approved tenants. Just to have others to say Good Morning to.
“So, instead of rioters, arsonists, murderers, etc., the earthquakes, volcanoes and tsunamis will get them.”
Not to mention the pucker factor when he sees the chinese (or russian?) fleet sail into the bay. Who’s going to stop them?
They haven't learned yet that they can't hide from God and they're not going to live forever, even if they can ride out the destruction and chaos they plan on unleashing on the world.
Prep ping.
Exactly - who will protect them? No one.
Isolated with limited points of egress - might as well live like a rat in a hole, since that’s the basic theory behind this sort of thing.
This isn’t the image of a leader of anything.
And it’s NZ where they filmed it.
I guess he plans on having his one hundred and eleventieth birthday party there…
A dozen 18 y/o bikini models, preferably mutes.
That was going to be my take.
Maybe during the cold war, NZ looked like a nice option. Remote island (but huge if you even want to call it an island) in the southern hemisphere likely to have less nuclear fallout, and difficult to reach except by boat or plane but definitely not puddle-jump close to any significant population or power.
But now, if you get a global SHTF scenario, you will see a lot of geopolitical anarchy, and it’s very conceivable that a power like China will want control of the entire south Pacific.
“He is going to need skilled maintenance staff in residence.”
And, when there is a true SHTF/EOTWAWKI scenario, who is going to end up owning this; the wimpy silicon valley people, or the staff they hired to cater to them? The rich people will have absolutely no leverage. You only own what you can defend. If I were in a position to prepare like this, the main people I would worry about would be my security people. You would need security to watch the security.
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.
