Quarterback Kirk Cousins bought the van from his grandma for $5,000 in 2014.
Quarterback Kirk Cousins could soon become the highest-paid player in the NFL.
While no final decisions have been made, he will likely sign a three-year, fully guaranteed $84 million deal with the Minnesota Vikings, ESPN reports. The $28 million per year Cousins would earn is slightly more than Jimmy Garoppolo’s $27.5 million per year .
Cousins, who earned $23.9 million last season, is easily already a multimillionaire, but you wouldn’t guess it based on what he drives: a dented GMC Savana passenger van with more than 100,000 miles on it. He and his wife bought it from his grandma for $5,000 in 2014.
« It’s better to buy appreciating assets than depreciating, » Cousins told Kevin Clark of The Wall Street Journal in 2016 . « No yachts, no sports cars. »
The starting quarterback makes a good point. The moment you drive a new car off the lot, its value depreciates by about 20 percent.
Cousins’ frugal habits also include living in his parents’ basement during the summer.
« For a good portion of the off-season, the eminently practical Cousins holes up beneath the floorboards of his teenage home in Holland, Michigan…. He shares the space with his wife, Julie, » GQ reported in 2017.
The couple move to a warmer climate during the first few months of the year: the basement of Julie’s parents’ home in Georgia. « It works well, » Cousins told GQ. « We don’t pay rent. »
They do plan on eventually moving into their own place. After waiting to make sure they were in a good financial position to invest in real estate, Cousins and his wife bought a lakefront property on which they’re building a four-bedroom home.
At the end of the day, « you don’t know how long you’re going to play, » Cousins told the WSJ. « You’ve got to save every dollar even though you are making a good salary. You never know what’s going to happen so I try to put as much money away as I can. »
Other players in the league share Cousins’ philosophy .
« Even after you’ve made it to the NFL and you’re ‘living the dream,’ it can all be gone in a split second, » says wide receiver Ryan Broyles, who signed $3.6 million rookie contract when he was drafted by the Detroit Lions in 2012. « The game, the paycheck, the spotlight — just like that, you could lose everything. »
Broyles is planning for the worst and working to secure his future. He and his wife live on a modest $60,000 a year, preferring to stash the rest of his salary, which has been as high as $570,000 a year, in investments and retirement savings accounts.
« The goal was to play 10 years in the NFL, » Broyles writes on The Players’ Tribune . « But financially, I planned like I wouldn’t make it past the next 10 minutes. »
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This is an update of a previously published story .
