It wasn't a stock, a company, or a billion-dollar bet. According to Warren Buffett, the most important decision you'll ever make isn't even financial—at least not at first glance. It's who you marry.
Yes, the man who built Berkshire Hathaway into a multitrillion-dollar empire and reads financial statements for fun says your long-term returns in life—and even in business—hinge on the person you choose to build a life with. "I can't overemphasize how important that is," Buffett told a crowd at Columbia University during a 2017 conversation with Bill Gates. "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."
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Buffett, who has never been one to give flowery love advice, has repeated the same message for decades. At the 2009 Berkshire Hathaway annual meeting, he put it simply: "Marry the right person. I'm serious about that. It will make more difference in your life. It will change your aspirations, all kinds of things."
He's not talking about fairy tales. He's talking about personal alignment—the kind of stability and support system that quietly compounds in the background while you're chasing goals in the foreground.
In the 2017 HBO documentary "Becoming Warren Buffett," the Oracle of Omaha called marriage one of just two turning points in his life. "One when I came out of the womb and one when I met Susie," he said, referring to his first wife, Susan Buffett. "What happened with me would not have happened without her."
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But even Buffett didn't get it perfectly right the first time. In "The Snowball: Warren Buffett and the Business of Life," Alice Schroeder's authorized biography, he admitted that letting Susie leave their Omaha home in 1977 was the "biggest mistake I ever made." After she left, Buffett was reportedly adrift—barely managing daily life until she stepped in from afar.
According to "The Snowball," Susie asked Astrid Menks, a restaurant hostess she knew, to check in on him. Astrid moved in, and after Susie's death in 2004, Warren married her. As Buffett explained in the biography, "Susie put me together, and Astrid keeps me together."
And this wasn't some lonely man clinging to companionship. In 2004, Buffett's net worth was already over $40 billion—he had wealth, power, and the kind of independence most can only imagine. But when it came to love, he wasn't looking for leverage. He was looking for stability.
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For Buffett, the financial implications of marriage aren't about joint checking accounts or prenups—they're about long-term alignment, emotional clarity, and who's in your corner when the markets tank or the pressure spikes. And while he's known for reminding investors to avoid panic-selling during downturns, he's just as quick to warn that the wrong partner can quietly erode your personal balance sheet.
Coming from a man whose every word moves markets, it's worth noting that his most repeated guidance isn't about stocks—it's about spouses.
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