When linebacker Devon Kennard was drafted by the New York Giants in 2014, friends asked him what kind of car he was going to buy. His answer shocked them: He had decided to keep the 2005 Kia Sorento he'd been driving since he was 16 years old.
"Just because you have money doesn't mean you have to spend money," he tells CNBC Make It. "Any purchase that's over, let's say, $300 or $400, I take a long time to consider." He asks himself questions like, "Do I really need this?" and "Do I really want it?" With more serious purchases, he'll wonder, "Can I afford it if I never play another down of football?"
"In my family, I'm known as the stingy, frugal person," he says.
That's why he was disappointed when he realized during his rookie season that his faithful Kia, accustomed to sunnier days in Phoenix where Kennard grew up and Los Angeles where he attended the University of Southern California, wasn't suited to East Coast winters. "I hydroplaned, like, three times," he says.
So he bit the bullet and leased a newer model, a Kia Cadenza, which he drove for three years before recently deciding, after six or seven months of deliberation, to purchase a Range Rover.