Lim Goon is done with maple.

I would like to point out that Lim Goon, like many others, were in charge of bossing squads of their respective servers back when such were organized.
He controlled zakum, horntail, pink bean and their chaos versions when they came out. same goes for empress.

the stats on his current items comes from hours upon hours of dedication and merchanting, not thousands upon thousands of dollars.

I'm not saying he didn't spend a single cent, but that he has been self sustaining for many years, without the help of real life currency.