From Rags to Riches Challenge

SimishGamer ChallengesMod The Sims ChallengesSurvival

Jul 17

CREDIT: SimishGamer @ Mod The Sims on March 18, 2015

What Is The From Rags to Riches Challenge?

The point of this challenge is for each simmer to get the sim of their choice from living in rags all the way up to riches. In order to complete this challenge your Sims must meet all of the main game challenge goals listed below. There are mandatory challenge goals that you must meet before you can complete some of the main challenges. There is also a list of optional goals for you to pick and choose from to go along with the main challenge.

Challenge Information and Rules

There are certain main goals you are not allowed to complete until you finish the Mandatory Steps that go with them, these side challenges can be found in the Mandatory Steps section. You must complete mandatory steps before you can get a job, build your home and start your family.
Do not use any cheats unless it is to reset your sim, take away your money, or allow you to move objects. In the beginning of the game move into the most expensive empty lot and then get rid of all of your money. If you need to know how to do this, refer to the Helpful Hints section.
To make money before you are allowed to get a job take advantage of the things listed in the Making Money section. Your spouse is not allowed to work until they have met the mandatory work requirement. If you have more than one working sim in your home they must each meet the requirement.
You may not place anything on your Sims lot until you have unlocked the mandatory steps for building a home. Items your sim can carry are allowed to be set down or used on your own lot excluding seeds.
You are not allowed to place items outside the walls of your home or use seeds until you finish the Mandatory Steps for Building a Garden.
Before you own a bed you must use public places to sleep, you may not place a bed on a public lot. Outdoor retreat users may use a tent if you want but you must earn the money to buy it and it can not be placed on your home lot. Once your friendly level is full with a sim you may stay at their home one night a week if you so wish. You must count the days and on the seventh day you can stay with them again. While at their home for that one night you are allowed to make and eat as many meals as you want to but you cannot take them with you. You can make one plate of food before you leave their home to take when you go. Do not sleep at any Sims home at any other time until you have a bed of your own.
You can rummage for food, garden public plants or cook on the outdoor barbecues until you have built your home. I survived off of selling collectables and making food like this for a while before I got my home.
If you decide to add any other sims besides the spouse and kids, they may not work in any way or earn money with hobbies like painting.
If you are part of a club that can earn money by painting, writing, etc. You can not keep any of the money made by selling these items until you have finished every main goal. You may however hang the paintings in your home or delete them all.
If you have city living you can move your sim into an apartment, but you must follow all of the challenge requirements. You have to delete everything from the apartment and get rid of all of your money. You must eventually work your way up to owning the penthouse so you can complete the garden challenge.
Your life span can be set to anything you wish for this challenge, you can even turn aging off to be able to finish the whole challenge.

Main Game Challenge Goals (Non optional)

A fully furnished home with:

At least 3 Bedrooms.
A Kitchen.
A dining room.
At least 2 Bathrooms.
A family or living room.
A study with at least one computer.
An outdoor garden. (If you are using city living you must have a penthouse to achieve this goal)
A pool.

Have a Family:

Get married to a sim (you can create a sim or marry one already in game but you must get rid of all of their possessions and money before you marry.)
Become a grandparent.

Have a career:

Pick any career of your choosing, you can use Get to Work, or any regular job. You may also run a restaurant, or store.
Earn the Entrepreneurial lifetime reward.
Reach level 10 of the career branch of your choosing/Or if you are running your own business earn $100,000 with your business and have your employees be fully trained.

Aspirations:

Complete at least one aspiration goal for both your original sim and their husband or wife.
Complete one aspiration for each child you have. (You can do this in their childhood years or make it harder on yourself and accomplish this when they become adults.)

Money Goal:

Have a home worth at least $100,000.
Have at least $200,000 in the bank. (If you want a harder challenge raise this goal up to $500,000 or even $1,000,000.)

Mandatory Steps

Before you can complete the main goals for this challenge you must meet the qualifications listed below. Once you have completed one of these goals you can move on to the main goal it is paired with.

Mandatory Steps for Building a Home:

You must have a level 5 in the handiness skill and 3 levels in logic.
You must pay a fine of $500 to the city for noise disturbances before you begin building.

Mandatory Steps for Building a Garden:

You must complete the Mandatory Steps for Building a Home.
You must have your handiness skill up to level 7 and your gardening skill to level 5 before you can begin building or placing items outside.
You must have at least one bedroom with a bed, a bathroom with a toilet and shower, a living room/kitchen (this can be one room but you must have these basic items) fridge, counter, sink, stove, table, chair, fire alarm and a couch.
Blueprints cost $500.

Mandatory Steps for Getting a Job:

You must have a home address before applying for a job. Complete the Mandatory Steps for Building a Home.
Have one of each in your home: a bed, a toilet, a shower, a sink, a stove, a counter, a chair and a fridge.
Pay $1000 for a college degree to begin your career.

Mandatory Steps for Having a Family:

Before you can marry a sim you must have a starter home for them to live in.
Every kid you have must max out all of their skills as a toddler before they can age up.
To age up to a teen each child must complete one of these options: have 5 levels in any 1 skill and perfect grades, or 10 levels in one skill.
To level up to a young adult your sim must complete one of these options: Have 5 levels in any 2 skills and a part time job, or 10 levels in 2 skills.
You must pay for and host a wedding every time a pair of sims get married.

Optional Challenges

Get your starter sim and their husband or wife both to level 10 in their career.
Have three or more children and at least three grandchildren.
Have at least one child and their children live with your starter sim and their spouse.
Expand your home; make it a mansion with the most expensive items in the game.
Divorce your spouse and remarry after you have kids. (The same process must be met with your new spouse as your first.)
Keep the kids if you divorce.
Have an amazing relationship with your children.
Have a part time hobby while working a career. (Example: painting or writing)
Complete every type of party available with the highest success possible.
Write one of every style book.
Have at least 5 of your own paintings on the walls of your home.
Woohoo in every place available.
Complete one of your children’s aspirations as an adult.
Complete one of your grandchildren’s aspirations as a child.
Complete one of your grandchildren’s aspirations as an adult.
Purchase one of each lifetime reward for one sim, excluding the potions.
Have your family be worth one million dollars.
Pool Parties Galore: Throw 10 house parties and have at least 3 guests swim at each one.
Visit every public lot at least 3 times each in your game.
Host 5 or more weddings.
Read every book available in the Sims.
Reach level five of every skill available in game.
Have twins or triplets.
Complete every optional goal available.

Helpful Hints

Taking Away Money
Press Ctrl + Shift + C to gain access to the cheat bar, type in testingcheats on and then hit enter. Open the cheat bar again and enter money 0 and hit enter again, this will take away all of your money. When you are completing a mandatory step and you have to pay money before you can complete it use this step. For example: you have $1075 and you need to pay $500 for blueprints use the cheat and set your money to $575 and you have no bought your blue print.

Making Money
The options listed below seem to be what people think are the best ways to make money without having a career.

Gardening (You can’t use seeds on your own lot but there are plenty of places around town that you can harvest plans from.)
Painting (Find a lot with an easel and begin painting. If you can’t find an easel around town anywhere I suggest placing one in the park or on another public lot.)
Writing (The library has full access to computers.)
Programing (I’m not sure if you can do this on a public lot but if you are not allowed to, this would be a good way to make money once you have a home but no job yet.)
Comedy (People say that this isn’t the fastest way to make money but it might help with this challenge. The nightclub has a mic stand that you can use.)
Musical Instruments (You can make tips by playing the instruments provided for you in town or buy your own once you have built your starter home.)
Collecting (When I started this challenge myself collecting was a major factor for me in the beginning. I sold the items I found and made some pretty good money off of it.)
Video Gaming (Isn’t the most profitable earning system but you can still make some money off of playing games.)

Updated Challenge

Credit: SimishGamer @ EA Forums on August 15, 2021

Are you prepared to do whatever it takes to completely change your sims lifestyle to get them from living in rags, all the way to riches? In this challenge you will find a creative twist on raising to the top. You will also be able to customize most aspects of it to fit your gameplay style in hopes that you don’t feel too stifled by the bulk that sometimes can be overwhelming in challenges like this. Below you will find that some aspects of this challenge are similar to the original but I have since edited it to hopefully be a little less daunting.

In the Rags to Riches Mega Challenge you will have main goals to complete and inside of those goals are steps you must finish before you can start it. In the edited version of this challenge I made optional goals. You no longer are forced to have a family, or get married, or work a traditional job. You can customize the optional challenges based on if you have the packs for them or if that type of gameplay even fits your style. This challenge may look a bit daunting but when you take into consideration that most of the information here are optional goals you can choose to add, it becomes much simpler.

Below you will find that this challenge is broken up into multiple posts to make it a bit easier for you to pinpoint exactly what you are looking for.

This is a bit of the backstory on why this challenge was created. Completely optional to read, feel free to ignore it.

“Hello there, I am SimishGamer also known as LadyAlitear on some platforms. I created The Sims 4 Rags to Riches Mega Challenge back in 2017. At the time I had been doing the basic Rags to Riches challenges and hadn’t completed it a single time because I kept losing interest in the middle of it. I had decided one day to go through the forums and look for a new challenge. I scrolled for hours and liked some aspects of other challenges but to be honest none fit how I wanted to play. So I sat down with a pen and paper and decided that I was going to write out a challenge I wanted to play. When I made the original version of R2RMC it was back before Get to Work came out. I edited it to include some of that a while later but then I completely forgot about my challenge.

Years later in 2021 I was part of a streaming community and one of the girls was doing a Rags to Riches challenge on her stream. It seemed familiar to me and I had her post the link. Funny enough that link led me right back to my own page. I quickly read through it since I had forgotten most of the information in it and realized that it was massively outdated and was shaped to fit how I play The Sims. Now, at the time I had not expected that in those few years that I forgot about R2RMC, that it would get as popular as it did. I came back to people asking lots of questions and wanting more out of the challenge since it was so outdated.

It is now 2023 and I have realized even more that with the changes I made in the challenge with the updated post, that it is still structured to fit my gameplay style. I am currently working on restructuring both the main goals and the optional ones. I am also trying to add more onto the optional section as packs continue to be released for the game. I am attempting to rectify some of the questions or things that don’t quite make so much sense to some people. So please if you have any questions or suggestions throw them my way. I am more than happy to answer them.”

In this challenge there will be mandatory steps to complete for almost every goal. You must complete these steps before you can take on the bigger goal. Some of the goals will require you finishing others before you may begin them. There is also a list of optional goals for you to pick and choose from to go along with the main challenge but there are some mandatory steps to those as well.

Cheats and Mods
Cheating is not allowed unless it is to reset your sim, take away your money, or allow you to move objects
You may use mods that do not make the game easier for you. If you have a mod that does change gameplay, just make sure to not take advantage of it to get further in the challenge.

Getting Started

Make one sim of your choosing they can be as young as a teen or up to an elder. Your life span can be set to anything you wish: you can even turn aging off to be able to finish the whole challenge.
Move into the most expensive and empty lot in any town. Then set your money to 0. If you don’t know how to do that, look at the helpful hints.
You may not place anything on your Sims lot until you have unlocked the mandatory steps for building a home.
You are not allowed to place items outside the walls of your home or use seeds until you finish the Outdoor Building task.
To make money before you are allowed to get a job, take advantage of the things listed in the Making Money section. There is also a list of limitations below as well since some things are too easy to take advantage of.
If you add any sims into your house after your start, before they can work, they must meet the work requirements.
Before you own a bed, you must use public places to sleep, you may not place a bed on a public lot.
- When your friend level is full with a sim you may stay at their home one night every seven days. While at their home for that one night you are allowed to make and eat as many meals as you want to, but you cannot take them with you.
You can rummage for food, garden public plants or cook on the outdoor barbecues until you have built your home.
You may purchase a tent if you have Outdoor Retreat, but you must travel to Granite Falls and buy it from the shop there, you may only use it on public lots.
You may only have 10 stacks of items in your sims inventory at a time.

Making Money Limitations

Odd jobs are not allowed until you have completed the Get a Job Challenge, once completed you may take an odd job once a week.
If you are part of a club that can earn money by painting, writing, etc. You can not keep any of the money made by selling these items until you have finished every main goal. You may however hang the paintings in your home or delete them all.
Dust bunnies are not allowed to search for items.
Money trees may not be planted until you complete the Reach Riches challenge.
Before you can do things to make money with hobbies such as painting, writing and programming you must be working in that career path.
You may not use the wishing well for money or skills at any time.
You may not sell any items you have changed with the SimRay.
You may dumpster dive for items once a week and cannot sell the items unless you own a business to sell them at. You may salvage them for bits and pieces to use.
You may use the money-making trash can but do not take advantage of it and make over $200 each week intentionally.
Do not ask people for loans or swindle credits.
Do not sell your date and party rewards.

Main Goals
Main challenge goals and the mandatory steps to complete them

Have a fully furnished home

At least 3 Bedrooms.
A Kitchen.
A dining room.
At least 2 Bathrooms.
A family or living room.
A study with at least one computer.
An outdoor garden. (If you are using city living you must have a penthouse to achieve this goal)
A pool.

Mandatory Steps to complete before Building a Home
- You must have a level 5 in the handiness skill and 3 levels in logic.
- You must pay a fine of $1,000 to the city for noise disturbances before you begin building.
Outdoor Building
- Have at least one small area outside for your sims to spend their down time.
Mandatory steps to complete before outdoor building.
- You must have your handiness skill up to level 7 and your gardening skill to level 5 before you can begin building or placing items outside.
- You must have at least one bedroom with a bed, a bathroom with a toilet and shower, a living room/kitchen (this can be one room, but you must have these basic items) fridge, counter, sink, stove, table and chair.
- Blueprints cost $500.
Get a Job
Congratulations you can get your first job!
- Choose any part time job you would like.
Mandatory Steps to complete before getting a job
- You must have a starter home and have one of each in your house: bed, toilet, shower, sink, stove, counter, chair and fridge.
Go to College
If you don’t own the university expansion pack don’t worry. In that case just spend $2,000 dollars for the degree and you are done. This amount was chosen by how much each class is in university and a little bit of money off .

If you have university, please don’t skip these steps.
- You may apply for one student loan and get accepted. If you don’t get the first one you can apply again for a different type of loan.
- Apply for the school of your choosing and any degree you want.
- You may take only 3 classes each semester that can be 2 regular and one elective or all 3 normal classes.
- Graduate from college and earn your degree to complete this challenge.
Mandatory steps to complete before going to university
- You must have a basic home to be able to get your acceptance letter. You must have at least four closed walls with a bed, toilet, shower, sink, stove, counter, chair and fridge.
Have a lifetime career
- Pick any career of your choosing, this may include stay at home jobs, jobs you go to the site to complete and any of the businesses you can own.
- Earn the Entrepreneurial lifetime reward.
- Reach level 10 of the career branch of your choosing/Or if you are running your own business earn $500,000 with your business and have your employees be fully trained.
Mandatory steps to complete before getting a career
- You must have a degree before taking on a career.
- You must have completed the fully furnished home challenge to begin this one.
Aspirations Goal
- Complete at least one aspiration goal for both your original sim and any other sims living in their home. This can be the same goal or different it doesn't matter.
- If you have children, complete one aspiration for each child you have. (You can do this in their childhood years or make it harder on yourself and accomplish this when they become adults.)
Reach Riches
- Have a home worth at least $100,000.
- Have at least $1,000,000 in the bank.

Helpful Hints

Taking Away Money
Press Ctrl + Shift + C to gain access to the cheat bar, type in testingcheats on and then hit enter. Open the cheat bar again and enter money 0 and hit enter again, this will take away all of your money. When you are completing a mandatory step and you have to pay money before you can complete it use this step. For example: you have $1075 and you need to pay $500 for blueprints use the cheat and set your money to $575 and you have no bought your blue print.