How do you afford list

Conman personally. I defraud the elderly.

I robbed a major banking company using nothing but a ballpoint pen...

Nah, I'm still just a student. But one thing I've learnt, is that with enough determination and saving power, you can get ANYTHING.

I'm a student too. I bought my m50 and um-1 using savings alone.

Architecture student with several grants and scholarship for supplies (wood is expensive) and I try to recycle materials as much as I can. Whenever there's leftover after a semester, usually about one to three hundred, they go to cans. Mind you, one project can easily cost several hundred to make.

Application developer.

Sent from my Samsung Epic 4G

I lease poppy fields in Pakistan.

One piece at a time. Save, save, save.

I get a large tax refund every year, due to writing off a lot of travel expenses.  Then the spending drought resumes...

I don't think this is a valid question because you should already know the answer. How does anyone afford anything? You have to save up for it first!

 

Once you're done saving, then it's up to you to decide how much or what proportion of that money you want to spend on a hobby. Many people with tens of thousands of dollars in equipment might not be as rich or as well-paid as you think; on the other hand, I personally know an extremely wealthy entrepreneur who decided to get a nice pair of headphones and after lurking around this website (no joke) decided on a Grado SR80. A wealthy person might purchase a Bugatti Veyron, whereas another equally wealthy person might opt for my dream car instead, a Porsche 911 GT3 RS (sorry about the car analogies--that's another hobby of mine).

 

Granted, it's impossible to tell the exact net worth of an individual, not to mention that it is a constantly fluctuating measure, but my point is that the amount of money one spends on a hobby is a highly individual decision. It's all about what YOU want and what is important to YOU--nobody else. I'll be surprised if you get many truthful answers to your question. But I will not be surprised if you find people from different backgrounds with widely varying degrees of successes and financial positions having all sorts of unexpected equipment relative to what they do and how much they make.

 

TL;DR: People can afford expensive equipment because they save up for it and because they think it's worth it, relative to the amount of money they have.

Exactly, everyone has varying degrees of income, and once the bills are paid the decision of how to spend the disposable income is up to each one.

I could make 3 times what the next guy does, but not have enough for good audio equipment due to other expenses, lack of interest/priority etc.

 

I *could* afford a much more elaborate set up than I have now, but there are other things I like to do and don't want to or can't sacrifice them, so I get what best suits me for the budget I can allow.

 

3.1 B&W 600 series for home stereo / theater use.

Ultrasone pro 900s / hfi 780s / Sennheiser IE7s + dap etc for mobile / work / gym use / quiet home listening.

 

Nothing fancy compared to what some people have, for others "I'm crazy" for having spent what I have,... for me and my budget it's perfect (for now). If I want more or better stuff, I just have to manage my money and make sacrifices in other areas accordingly.

 

How much you ultimately make only makes the prioritization harder or easier, how you make the money is much less relevant.

Haha I wonder this myself too at times. Me personally, I did an internship where they paid me well and after I had paid my tuition and everything else, I had money leftover so thats where I spent it. I don't have an expensive setup compared to alot of people here though, but I tried alot of IEM's in a very short period of time. 

One thing that has to be taken into consideration is the age of the member. Us silverbacks have been in the hobby for a long time. We have been on the journey of finding that elusive "perfection" for decades and have accumulated (non gear rollers) some gear. Fortunately amps and speaker technology haven't changed much so when someone did it right, you hang on to it.

The answer is easy, but difficult to accommodate for those in a hurry. It is "education", "job" and "age". The former secures income an the latter secures the incremental increase. That simple.