How Does One Become A Criminal Mastermind?

I'm only half kidding.

Like.

I've been watching a bunch of "summer movies" lately and there seems to be this guy in a suit who spends his time in a nice apartment, centrally located in the most photogenic urban region of whatever country offers the best financial incentives to the makers of action movies, accompanied by the finest women and scotch and furniture. In fact, he seems to already have more money than he could ever spend given that he has already spent millions of dollars on a plan to threaten some nation or government or community with certain destruction unless they give him more millions. 

Because, well, as for me, instead of spending millions on the high-tech gadgetry and mercenaries necessary to enact my evil plot, necessarily foiled, of course, by the nonconformist government agent who doesn't play by the rules but gets things done, regardless, wearing a leather jacket and a two-day stubble instead of a navy suit, well, I would just keep the apartment and the scotch and the women and the designer outfits and then hold on to my untold millions in order to keep my exact same lifestyle going into perpetuity.

If I pretend I'm going to release poison into Chicago's water supply, um, could you give me a nice pad in Hong Kong and a few perfectly-tailored suits to go with? I promise I won't kill anyone. Just send me the lease, the plane tickets, the aspiring actresses who should stick to modeling, etc.

Thanks.