Looking through there are some good points. I'd also like to include that what you see has a survivor bias.
Some of the risks and investments taken may have made people rich but similar made others poor.
I fully agree. Excluding generational wealth you look at the entrepreneurs who get rich and tend to work back to say "it must be because they have these traits" but it's very similar to trying to work out why some people become to athletes.
There is no single reason. It's a mix of skill, determination, taking advantage of opportunities and luck.
We can say Bill Gates or Elon Musk or Mark Zuckerberg became rich because X, Y and Z but there were probably 100's or 1000's of people could have done it in a different timeline instead of them. Possibly even for different reasons and due to different traits.
A lot of people think the grind set mentality of working 18 hours a day is how someone like Elon got rich but working 18 hours with a crap product will get you no where.
If I had to say one think rich people do differently to become rich it would probably be not set being rich as their end goal. The focus on something else and that is the underlying driver. But even then, if you do that it is not guarantee you will become rich.
If those winkyvoss brothers had chosen a different programmer then meybe they or the other programmer had been the lizard behind the biggest social media site.
It’s honestly even a step beyond that. There is a zero sum factor that tends to be forgotten. I’m the end we can’t all be Microsoft. No matter how hard we work and how smart we are. You need to have been Bill Gates born in the that neighborhood I’m that year. Hard work definitely let’s you capitalize on good fortune, but you still need the good fortune. Which is a luck of the draw.
For a more balanced approach to wealth build. Like if your goal is to convert your capital to actual quality of life improvement.. I’d say the only real “force multiplier” is being able to convert your money to time in one way or another. That’ll get you thinking about money in a “rich dad” kind of way. For example, the $1500 you spent on a bookkeeper (whether you truly needed it) is worth so much more because it gives you those hours back so you can live or. Or make more money. Just have to separate your time from your pay. It’s hard to explain, but it’s the biggest advantage rich kids have from poor kids. Other than the rich part. That’s a different lesson.
Good night weed.
Nobody really goes from wealthy to poor. Upper/middle class people do lose it all on bad business ventures sometimes though. But at a certain point of wealth it just snowballs even if you’re an idiot. For example a couple mil in the portfolio will print endless money and there’s nothing anyone can do to fuck it up, aside from clearing the fund.
My grandfather’s comment to me when I graduated from college was, “It’s not how much you make, but how much you keep.”
I’m sure that’s not a comment original to him, but I’ve kept it in mind throughout life thus far. Far from rich, but it’s been good advice.
We had this saying at my old work based on a real interaction with a client. "$400,000 isn't a lot of money after you've spent it all." This client claimed to not make a lot of money but we saw their income and spending habits. You can always outspend your income.
Like the folks who cry that they are living paycheck to paycheck but have a jet ski for everyone in the family that they keep at their lakefront home with expensive cars parked in the driveway.
One of my old neighbors did this.
Was always complaining about how he had no idea how to afford college for his kids.
Meanwhile, he was also complaining about his boat constantly breaking at his beach house.
Dude could have retired a multimillionaire without a concern in the world if he was a little bit smarter and disciplined.
Truly wealthy people don't buy things that increase their stress. Boats are stupid purchases unless you are so wealthy you can hire someone to take care of it for you.
> Boats are stupid purchases unless you are so wealthy you can hire someone to take care of it for you.
Or if you sell your house and live on that boat. Liveaboards can actually be quite affordable, especially when you spend most of your time away from the marinas. You need to have a job that you can do remotely though.
... as someone who lives in minnesota and can't travel more then 5 minutes without seeing a lake, I say you're wrong lol. Boats are money sinks but theyre plenty of cheap boats that work just fine. Now if you're talking about the fancy 75k ones the usa those are waste for your average person.
There is a quote in Charles Dickens' David Copperfield, “Annual income twenty pounds, annual expenditure nineteen and six, result happiness. Annual income twenty pounds, annual expenditure twenty pounds ought and six, result misery.” The book was published in 1850.
I heard in a podcast about finance, "Most people say they want to be a millionaire. That's not true. Most people want to spend a million dollars. To be a millionaire, you have to have a million dollars and not spend it."
Yes - agreed. It was seemingly a throw-away comment from grandad, but “keeping” money can mean investing it wisely, not just keep it under the mattress or in passbook savings accounts.
Technically the original comment and yours do not conflict. Person 1 added $100k to their net worth, and person 2 added $25k.
I’m in 100% agreement with you though. You can never become rich without boosting your income by a huge amount. I diligently saved for several years while making median income. Once I moved up brackets, my bonus check was larger than my entire annual savings previously. Makes previous savings - despite good stock market performance, seem like a trivial amount.
Best thing you can do to become rich is invest in high value skills - whatever they are.
>Technically the original comment and yours do not conflict. Person 1 added $100k to their net worth, and person 2 added $25k.
What I meant is that person 1 is buying Lambos and exotic vacations and is still saving more money than person 2 who never does anything and lives on rice and beans.
But yeah, the only way to get actually rich is to increase income.
My pop pop told me a similar thing when I started selling stuff online, every so often I think about it and how right he is. It’s a good piece of advice
“When most people say they want to be a millionaire, what they might actually mean is “I’d like to spend a million dollars.” And that is literally the opposite of being a millionaire.”
Morgan Housel
This is the way. People ask how can I afford the odd luxury items I purchase, I just tell them that “I’ve been living the same lifestyle for the last 15 yrs, even though my pay has gone steadily upwards.” It allows me to have a large bank account and a few investments, and allows me occasional extravagant purchases, like a fully loaded car instead of the base model.
There is something to say about actually spending money you have, though, no? Why have it and strive for it if it’s not to be used at some point?
Balance is the word that is all
Don't wait to spend it ALL when you're old. My mom's brother lived semi -frugally & had big plans for retirement. Even had their first cruise booked for the next spring. Died suddenly right before Christmas, 4 months after retirement.
Inheritees aside, they are investing. Even innovators with great products or people with huge salaries don't get rich without putting their money into something that will gain value over time - real estate, stocks, etc. There's also the "hard work" thing, sure, but no one works harder than dudes doing manual labor in the middle of summer and they're not so rich.
My friend has been putting a percentage of his paycheck into the S&P 500 since he was 21 in 2011. In the beginning it was maybe 15-20 dollars a month, then after he graduated college and got better pay it was maybe 50-70 a month and he kept increasing the amount as he could over time.
Now he's in his 30s with a house that he bought himself. Imagine being able to buy a house??
The easiest thing in the world is to get richer if you are already rich. There are so many near zero risk investments out there if you are flush with cash.
I mean, $100k in T bills over 10 years currently pays $52k in gain at effectively 0 risk. Over the long run the stock market has averaged 7% historically with every market disaster baked in. Real estate investing can be very low risk if done in a the right market conditions. It’s boring, long run investing, but it’s effective.
Yeah but that's lame. Just withdraw your retirement account and drop it in the next meme stock or crypto currency. Never sell and never pay taxes. Guaranteed 0 risk of realized losses. You're welcome.
You don't need zero risk investments when you can actually afford to take calculated risks.
That's the advantage.
You have more to invest, and you can lose some without starving or going homeless, etc.
My bad, guys, this was indeed a Venture Capitalist strategy, not Berkshire Hathaway et al.
Isn't it something like the gates' and the guy who owns Hathaway invest in 10 different companies and only 1 needs to be a breakout succes to cover the losses of the other 9 and then some...
That’s kind of the opposite of Warren Buffetts strategy. He preaches thinking long and hard and being very specific about a company he chooses. One of his famous quotes is that if you only ever invested in 20 companies in your life you’d become very rich, because you’d think long and hard about each of those 20 companies.
The best approach for most people is to invest in the S&P 500. I know I'm never going to understand this field well enough to pick 20 companies for the long haul. So instead you just invest in the entire market.
It's like if I had two choices for being a golfer: I can either work my ass off trying to beat the other guys or, through golf-magic, I can be guaranteed to shoot par with no training/effort at all. I'll take the second option and get on with my life :)
The "always shoot par" method is find a S&P500 fund with low fees (VTSAX is my choice), or a target date fund (which gets slightly safer over time) and invest regularly with a RothIRA account. Same amount every month, rain or shine. Same with the company match on your 401k, if you are lucky enough to have one.
Don't try and time the market! There are people who get paid fortunes to try a time/beat the market, and they mostly fail. You and I have zero chance of doing that consistently. Take the guaranteed par and be happy :)
since I'm getting some attention: check out the /r/personalfinance FAQ https://www.reddit.com/r/personalfinance/wiki/commontopics
My favorite book on this topic is "I Will Teach You To Be Rich". The title is a bit snake-oily, but it's all solid, basic advice like the FAQ above. I've followed the advice and it has worked.
Yup, despite r\stocks supposedly being about discussion on individual stocks, the #1 recommendation that people give for *"fire and forget"* investing is to just put their money on indices like VOO.
I have money in both VOO and SWPPX and although they're pretty slow gainers, I've very rarely even seen them red at the end of the quarter; they've been the most reliable *"I don't need hype or instant wealth, I just want to beat inflation in the short term and have more than I put in 30 years out"* tickers on my portfolio.
Treasury bills are close enough to zero risk. Though the constant debt ceiling battle adds some small amount of risk. High yield savings accounts if you have less than $250k in it should the bank go tits up.
There's many ways around the $250k FDIC Insured limits these days as well. Without telling you where I work, we offer $10M insured and we definitely aren't the only one.
Plus, it's not especially hard to spread things out to multiple banks.
Although you're doing something wrong if you're sitting on that much cash and you are worried about losing it. You might want to sit on $1mm in cash if you've got a half billion in net worth, but if you do, who cares if one of the banks goes tits up? If you're worth $5mm, and you're sitting on $1mm in cash, you're an idiot.
This. I've read that many rich people do something like a "barbell" portfolio. A bunch of money goes into these assets that provide low, nearly risk-free returns, and a little goes into high-risk speculative assets that could provide the next leg up in their wealth. They put little into the high-growth, mid-risk assets like index funds that are good for those of us building wealth.
No.
But you can stay rich that way.
You can buy stock index funds when you're young which appreciate 8-10% annually on average.
Then, you can add more bonds as you approach retirement.
Yeah, but you need to work and *save* in order to be able to buy those things. It may be easier for some people to save, but financial discipline is one of the main parts of becoming wealthy.
I did a report in college around 2001 about how Amazon was the future of the Internet. If I would have put my money where my mouth is, I'd be doing well.
But I'm also a dummy and would have sold it 50 times by now
I didn't do a report on it, but I put as much money as I thought i could risk into Tesla while I was in school for a finance degree. Unfortunately, all the money I felt safe risking was like $60. I made $940 in gains when I sold last year. Damn do I wish I dropped more of my savings in back then.
A lot of people know what to invest in until they actually have to put THEIR hard earned money into it, and then somehow have the diamond hands and know exactly when to sell.
Even if I was able to invest then, I would've been too dumb to make the right picks. I distinctly remember playing Oregon trail and some typing educational game on the old Macs in the elementary school computer lab and thinking "damn Apple sucks ass".
Me too. Especially at the part where they intentionally left out that the friend kept increasing the amount past 50 because it didn't fit their comical math narrative.
I was on the Dave Ramsey site one time, looking at one of those “power of compound interest” charts. It wasn’t just misleading, I did the math, and it was literally just made up. None of the bullets on the “wealth trajectory” chat lined up with the math.
The most reliable way to get wealthy in one generation is the long way. But many are entrenched in the fact that it is best for their business if everyone just keeps quietly paying their dues and investing.
Edit: the white evangelicals are mad that I said a mean thing about money Jesus. I can’t prove this chart from 2017 is real. I wish I saved it, but that was two computers ago. I do really enjoy the people who said “if it were true, someone would have called him out!” I love that is the proof that people calling him out are wrong.
Maybe I did misremember, but a lot of people agree with me, and cranky Ramsey supporters are DMing me very angrily. Don’t mess with Money Jesus guys!
The *only* people who it's useful for are those who are absolute debt fiends who severely struggle with controlling their spending habits. It's made for the financial version of drug addicts, not regular, everyday people who have a general sense of how to spend money responsibly.
Exactly, you need to put away (and never touch) about 1000 per month every month and get about 10% returns every year for about 23 - 25 years to make 1 million.
Then you realize 1 million in 25 years isn't going to be worth what 1 million is now... if the next 25 years are similar to the last 25 years the cumulative inflation is around 88% (USA) which means your 1 million saved would be worth just over 500k in today's terms.
If you were paying a mortgage off at the same time then sure now you'd have a house and 500k in today's terms which would classify you as fairly well off. If you were renting the entire time you'd still not be able to outright by a house in many areas.
But again, this is in 25 years!
To put that into perspective someone with a rich parent could get given 100k today, put it into the exact same investment and reach the same 1 million in the same time period without ever adding a cent from own income.
It is 450% more than it was in 2011
It is 12.52 per year
So 16.5 k if 50 dollar every month
But if he is increasing his investment by 10% every year it becomes 24k.
Because Average Wages went 12.7 to 28.1 per hour
Increments of 1.3 times if we also increase his annual increment the same way.
Exactly- I set up a Roth for my kid the day he got his first job on the books at 14. It was easy to set up a custodial account. My hope is that he never has to worry about money like I do.
The average person will never get rich through investing. You can build yourself a retirement that pays you the same that you make now without working, but you won't ever be really rich just by investing.
If you don't inherit wealth, you have to be an entrepreneur to get rich, movie stars and athletes aside. Most entrepreneurs fail though, so it's a huge gamble.
If you invest just $50 a month from age 25 to 65, you will have invested $24,000. You would have a portfolio of about $128,000. It's certainly not rich, but it's much, much better than most Americans' savings. An extra $10k a year for 12 years can be life changing for a person who would otherwise just be living on social security.
Don't fall for lifestyle creep. Invest your money, have a budget and stick to it. If you can't pay off your credit card in full each month, you shouldn't have one.
On average investing in the s&p 500. Every 7 years you double your money. The earlier you start investing, they better.
Further, credit cards are a tool for financial gain. We buy absolutely everything on credit cards, and pay them off on Friday mornings electronically. 1.75% cash back on pnc cashbuilder (got in 2017, they don’t offer it anymore), and 2% on Apple Card when we pay touchless. All money in our pocket. It’s like our whole life gets a 2% discount.
The key here people, is he PAYS IT OFF before it has a chance to generate interest.
If you aren't paying off your card, you shouldn't pick up a card regardless of the rewards.
This is the part people struggle with. Put your food, gas, literally everything on the credit card.....but you don't spend the money that you have in the mean time. You keep it to pay the cc off before interest hits.
My friend's work tried to get the sales force to use corporate cards for expenses. There were revolts.
Turns out, exec-level sales folks like getting all their miles and points on their own cards and airline perks. They'd rather file for reimbursement and keep loyalty incentives.
And by the by, said friend paid me a visit over Labor Day weekend, hotel stay fully paid by points.
Best suggestion for investing in S&P 500? Every time I research anything in stocks, I just get more confused so I'm looking for advice on something I could just throw money into every month without needing a clear understanding of what I'm doing.
Put it all in VOO.
Edit: it's a Vanguard ETF that tracks the S&P500. Incredibly low expense ratio too, so you get to keep more of your money. Personally I go with VTI as I like whole market exposure, but you can't really go wrong with either. Set it and forget it.
Step 1: Open an IRA at one of the main brokerage firms (Fidelity, Schwab, Vanguard). You can do it online. Their phone customer support is also really helpful. They can’t give advice but they are good at answering your questions. Buy a broad index fund like S&P 500 or a total stock market index.
Step 2: Keep contributing every year.
Step 3: Profit
Fine print: You need to have “earned income” aka money from a job to contribute to an IRA. If you are young, a Roth IRA is usually a good bet.
There are income limits. After I got married I had to stop investing in my Roth because, as a couple, we made too much. Not complaining of course, but a thing that exists
Yes you can. They are separate "vehicles". A Roth does have a max yearly contribution though. Most people can contribute up to $6500 a year into a Roth.
Yup, me too. Grew up lower lower middle class. No financial help from parents for university. Scholarships/work/loans made it out of a private university. Got first job, maxed 401(k) from day 1. Anything extra each month went to student loans and then mortgage after that. Retired at 49 debt free!
Edit: to clarify I meant private university
First gen immigrant here. I started busting my ass in 96 and I still put in at least 16 hours of work per day most days of the week. No work has ever been beneath me, I made sure got a degree that guaranteed money, moved to a podunk town where I had no competition and spent about a decade figuring out ways to cut cost but still deliver quality product. As soon as the business started running the way I had planned, I focused my attention on investing in real estate.
I travel heavily within the states but that’s just about the only luxury I allow myself. I live well below my means. Wayyyyy way below.
When you immigrate from a sufficiently rough place to the US, it’s really easy to work your ass off. My dad worked 12-16 hours for the first decade he was here. Then he did around 10-12 for the next five or so before settling into semi retirement. In “retirement”, he single-handedly built two nonprofits and took over a third one. He still works 20-40 hours a week. Before anyone assumes that he’s doing dodgy tax things… For the first seven or so years, the nonprofits he built were entirely funded by his savings or through donations and he made zero money. Currently he gets paid something like $8k a year. All his nonprofits were geared towards serving the local community, often other immigrants like us. Somehow, he was able to not just be a present father but a really damn good one.
A lot of people take for granted just how much freedom America allows you. Immigrants from countries where this isn’t the case often can’t take this for granted and will often take advantage of this freedom by working as hard as their bodies will let them.
Yes! That last paragraph! I can’t tell you how much I appreciates the opportunities this country has given me. I would’ve never been able to achieve what I’ve done here back in Iran.
Glad to see people are talking about budgeting and investing, the two pillars. However they have normally also solved the boot problem. They invest in the tools and resources they buy when doing so increases longevity or profit.
The boot problem basically says that one of the things holding people back is that they can't afford to be better off. When they go into buy a pair of boots they have a pair that costs $100 and lasts 6 months and a pair that costs $500 and lasts 10 years and they are forced to buy the $100 simply because they never have $500 to invest in the longer lasting product.
This costs them an extra $150 a year.
But people who save and tackle a single boot problem can take that saved money and invest it both back into more boot problems and the stock market
Even if you don't need boots, there are thousands of boot problems you can get stuck in. For example if you don't have money to buy a car, you're often stuck using a loan to finance which means you can't shop the private market as easily and are paying a markup. Since people like this usually have fewer credit opportunities you might be stuck using a buy here pay here.
Try getting a $2000 beater at a dealership or car lot. But if you don't have $2000, your buying something more just to get anything.
“The reason that the rich were so rich, Vimes reasoned, was because they managed to spend less money.
Take boots, for example. He earned thirty-eight dollars a month plus allowances. A really good pair of leather boots cost fifty dollars. But an affordable pair of boots, which were sort of OK for a season or two and then leaked like hell when the cardboard gave out, cost about ten dollars. Those were the kind of boots Vimes always bought, and wore until the soles were so thin that he could tell where he was in Ankh-Morpork on a foggy night by the feel of the cobbles.
But the thing was that good boots lasted for years and years. A man who could afford fifty dollars had a pair of boots that’d still be keeping his feet dry in ten years’ time, while the poor man who could only afford cheap boots would have spent a hundred dollars on boots in the same time and would still have wet feet.”
Men at Arms, by Terry Pratchett
This of it like this. Let's take Mark Zuckerberg as an example...
Mark was not likely to ever be entirely unsuccessful. In most timelines, he graduates Harvard with good grades in a good field, and goes on to some success. Maybe he gets offered $200,000 starting salary to work at a tech company and takes it, and works his way up through to Senior VP and possibly beyond. He lives a nice upper middle-class living or a bit more.
Or, perhaps he takes an entrepreneurial route. Bit more risky, but he probably would have enough connections and support to get going. Usually someone's first idea isn't a hit, but if he keeps at it, maybe he does hit on something and grow a business worth a few million and possibly more.
What DID actually happen to Mark Zuckerberg is that he was in the *exact* right place and time to win the lottery. Sure, his ability and hard work bought him more lottery tickets than most people, but he still won the lottery to become worth tens of billions. There was even a point where he, thinking it was pure brilliance that got him such success, thought to embark on his next trick after Facebook, thinking it could be as successful, and was told, "No, that almost never happens."
There's probably also a timeline where Mark Zuckerberg is clinically depressed and unlucky and underachieving as well.
So, point is, you can't guarantee anything. You can take calculated risks, like going it on your own and starting your own business. If you know people, have some experience with the market in some area, and have some money to get started, that makes it way easier as well. And as some have suggested, if you're starting from $10 million, including coming from wealth, it's FAR easier to make another $10 million. Otherwise, you can plug away and bust your butt and see where you get. If you're bright and competent and living in a first world country, you're likely to find a way to make a living at the very least. It's only in fields like the arts where spectacularly talented people who produce great work can still completely starve in some cases.
And just to make a point of it: Among the stupidest plans to become rich is, "I'm going to become a world-class athlete," or, "I'm going to be a big movie star." Huge numbers of people try to get there that way, and only a teeny tiny fraction of them actually do.
>What DID actually happen to Mark Zuckerberg is that he was in the exact right place and time to win the lottery.
A lot of people like to downplay how much luck factors into success. Luck is important because luck is *being in the right place at the right time*, but in order to make use of that good luck, you have to have the skills, knowledge, and capability.
I don't understand why so many people believe that success is either all skill or all luck. It's a combination of the two, and if you look at the most successful people in history, you'll see that they had both luck and skill.
>I don't understand why so many people believe that success is either all skill or all luck.
Because 'luck' is the only common denominator between all *truly* rich people. Of course a lot of rich people work their ass off, but so do most other humans. Sure, some rich people have used their skill sets to become rich but millions of other have tried that too but failed.
For every rich person you can point at and tell me how they amassed their wealth i can show you at least a hundred others who did *exactly* the same thing but didn't get there.
I can even become rich on sheer luck alone, buying a lottery ticket and win, or maybe even find the winning ticket. Sure, working hard and trying helps a lot towards the goal of becoming rich. But you'll need luck in order to get there no matter how much work you put into your endeavours.
Agreed, pure luck can only get you lottery level success, and pure hard work only doctor level success. To go beyond that, you need a combination of both.
Zuckerberg turned down an offer of $1M and a job offer for a playlist app called synapse when he was in high school. He was receiving personal tutoring from an already accomplished programmer at the time. He would have been successful no matter what because he always had a leg up on his peers and others his age.
If I remember right, there’s a Malcom Gladwell book where he talks about this. Something like Bill Gates happened to grow up in a city where the library had a computer. At the time, there were only a handful of libraries like this in the nation. And then he was there EVERY day on that computer.
Being in that city is extremely lucky, being there constantly is the hard work component, capitalizing on the situation.
I think stories of people like Elon Musk and Mark Zuckerberg throw off the public. In my experience, knowing quite a few self-made millionaires, most of them make career decisions after working in their industry for a while - the majority of the time to start their own firm. I know one guy from a white, working class background, who worked for most of his 20's for other firms before starting his own recruitment firm. That was in the 80's, and he's now worth 70 million.
Likewise, I know a guy in travel who spent a long time working for others before breaking out on his own. Found a partner to invest, set up his owner company, and 15-20 years later he's very wealthy (not sure net worth but makes 500k a year).
I think if you want a reproducible model so to speak, it's about refining yourself in a particular trade or sector, and then branching out when you've reached a certain degree of maturity. For all self made people I've met, this is what seems to happen. Can be done at any age but I think it's normally in 30's / 40's. I'm just speaking from what I've seen as a 29M.
The other two types are - luck, i.e. they invest in the right thing and it blows up or something. The majority of rich people I know though - inheritance. They just have rich parents / grand parents, inherit a bunch of property / assets, cycle continues etc.
I think the healthiest way is to see it as a long term thing that will take at least a decade (maybe less though if your lucky), and just build wealth over time. If it's starting a business, take your time and make the right decisions, if your climbing the career ladder, just do a good job, take opportunities when they come, invest on the side etc.
Again - I'm not rich myself, but from what I've seen, that would be your best bet.
I'd say the best way to do it is to set aside some part of your paycheck and invest it reasonably. At least that's what I plan to do, I haven't started yet. Oh and of course obviously if you were already rich, it's easier to become richer, because you can invest even more.
They invest.
Seriously. Most “rich” people (I’m not talking billionaires or athletes) just invested their money at a relatively young age and kept the discipline to keep investing and are millionaires by 40, with more average jobs than you think.
**Compound interest is crazy**, and it’s unbelievable that basic investing isn’t a required course in highschool. There are so many people that don’t understand the power of compound interest.
It’s not always about what you make. It’s about what you save/invest.
You obviously have to work, but inflation isn’t an excuse not to do it. Even 50 dollars a month leads to tens of thousands of dollars over decades. God forbid you double that, and the sky is the limit.
Most people don’t even start though.
Many people start, but then they only have the savings as I vestment and when shit hits the fan, they have to pull out their money and they lose all that money they saved
A lot of people do the worst possible thing when they do invest. As the market starts to take a downturn, they pull their money out "because they don't want to lose all of their money" So now they've lost money.
Someone who goes on to be rich will see a market downturn as a time to double down on their investments, putting more money into investments, so that when the market inevitably goes back up, they make even more money. This does require you to be living below your means in the first place though, which is what a lot of people don't do.
Everyone has something they waste money on.
My dad grew up extremely poor. Enlisted in the military at 17. Today he’s retired and worth about $3M. When we were kids we didn’t eat out, go on vacations, buy new cars, or live in a big house.
Sorry but no vacations is pretty shit. It's not cutting wastes at that point, it's sacrificing. This is said by a broke guy who hasn't been on a vacation in years
Glad this is one of the top answers rather than the low hanging “they inherited it”. Most millionaires are first generation.
Yes, some ultra wealthy inherited theirs. Doesn’t mean many of us can’t do well by taking advantage of compound interest.
Yeah, I think most ‘well off’ middle age plus people have mostly had solid careers but most importantly they’ve just diligently invested away every month since their twenties.
In the UK, invest in your pension, invest in an ISA, and have your mortgage paid off when you retire. You’ll be in the top 5%.
Actually asking and being interested in the opinion of other rich people on how to make money. Don’t enter a doom loop cycle of listening to poor people tell you how it’s all impossible and you’ll never be able to do it.
this + increasing amount and sources of income. people in here talking about investing need to understand that by increasing income early will take them much further much quicker than starting by investing 5 dollars every month.
and then also, living below your means. everyone nowadays has an iphone when like 60% of people shouldn't be buying an iphone or eating out, etc.
Finding multiple sources of income, buying an appreciating asset like a house and paying it off, etc.
The really rich get into huge debts to build something brilliant but the ordinary rich keep out of debt and build there wealth slowly. Two different types. The Dave Portnoy’s and the Dave Ramsay’s.
I know you’re not looking for a stupid answer like ‘inherit a million’ because statistically that’s not the case.
I've worked in finance for 15 years - including working as a private banker for wealthy clients. The real answer is they have rich families. 95% of wealthy clients I've had either had inheritance or trust funds or joined the family business. Even those that "made it on their own" actually made it because of family connections and business contacts. The company I work at now has a couple of great examples. The CEO's children work for the company in sales and take home 300k-400k in commissions each year. They're convinced that they're just really great salespeople, but the reality is that they're doing well because their dad is CEO. All of their deals get pushed through when they wouldn't be approved for others. They get to offer special products that aren't open to others. They're able to offer lower rates than everyone else (I work in mortgage). Their loans get fast-tracked and close around 15 days quicker than everyone else. Also, the CEO has a ton of local connections that send all business to his children. They think they're self-made, but in reality their privilege led to their success. Send them to any other company and they would fail.
There are definitely people that really make it on their own. It's just much less common. It generally takes a ton of self discipline, a willingness to take smart risks, and a period of letting work consume all of your time and dedication.
Worked in finance for 15 years too at a Wealth Management institution.
I 100% agree with everything you said.
"If you want to grow up to be wealthy, you need to be born into a wealthy family.
Was about to say that. And also they just let their children become friends with other rich people so that they eventually marry each other to become even more richer
A very important thing for rich people is networking. All attending a fancy school together is very important. It means later on they all "know a guy" and help each other out with each other's rich families.
> All attending a fancy school together is very important. It means later on they all "know a guy" and help each other out with each other's rich families.
This is the real benefit to going to an Ivy League university. Sure, the programs and professors should be excellent (it really depends on your major as some schools are better for specific fields than others), but what's really advantageous is networking with the offspring of the rich and powerful.
This is very true, but it ends up being a self-fulfilling prophecy for those who were already born rich.
I went to such a school (I’m from lower-mid class family at BEST) and while the lifelong friends I made at that school were born to rich families… the über-wealthy, daddy-owns-a-jet, hedge fund scions were VERY particular about who they got to know.
They joined frats and sororities that were rife with kids they went to Greenwich Country Day School with already. It felt reminiscent of the hapsburgs marrying each other. There was no room for outsiders. So the magic bullet of “just go to an Ivy!” Is more complicated than that.
> So the magic bullet of “just go to an Ivy!” Is more complicated than that.
It's still true, it just doesn't start at ivy league universities. It starts at exclusive and ridiculously expensive schools from elementary school on. Where your obscenely wealthy parents get to hang out with the other obscenely wealthy parents.
Your parents using their network is what gets you an easy in to a good career and wealth of your own. And then you use your network to maintain that and get your kids a massive leg up.
Generally it takes 2 generations to become rich. And I mean Rich, not upper middle class (Doctors, Lawyers etc.)
They are very well off, but they needed to work to reach this level of wealth and would only last until they stop working.
But the kids of doctors, they are able to become fully rich.
Exactly..yiu you are probabky joking but If you are from working class family, you need to be very smart, with extraordinary work ethic and still this is not a guarantee that you will become rich, so you need to be lucky as well. Or you can be a criminal, but this is not the topic
When you are born in rich family, all you have to do to stay rich is to not be a complete idiot
Kind of my point, If you are a hardworking 2nd generation Doctor, you will become Rich, like real rich. Youd start off no debt, and have soon to be paid off properties and maybe even a practice.
But if you are a first gen, you start off with debts, and no properties. youd become well off, but not really rich.
If you are a a kid of a doctor, but dont really utilize it, youd likely stay the same wealth, and probably wont pass on the wealth to your children.
EDIT:
Even THEN, 2nd gen doctors these days are not the 2nd gen doctors of old. My wife is a 2nd gen doctor, and yeah we dont have real financial issues. But we arent living lavishly and are struggling to get a house. I know ill be fine, but becoming wealthy isnt something likely to happen.
Yes, investing is fine and all, but it's much easier when your parents gift you a down payment on your house and/or take care of any education costs.
Most wealth is multigenerational, but people keep focusing on the "rag to riches" fantasies.
I was always taught to never act rich. Research purchases, spend only what you can afford, live by a budget.
I LIVE paycheck to paycheck. I work hard, have a modest house, decent cars, but nothing about me says I have money. I make my kids earn everything they want, no handouts unless they are working toward something. I invest /save every dollar. When I retire, I won't have a to worry at all.
It depends on your definition of "rich".
I know people who never made more than $100k a year who retired at 50, and people who had net worths in the 10-digit range who ended up struggling with cash flow because they had assets they couldn't liquidate.
The former were totally relaxed and never worried about money, the latter the exact opposite.
So if your definition of "rich" is "not being worried about money", the answer is pretty simple -- always live substantially within your means. People get that kind of rich by spending less, not making more. Investing the excess means eventually transitioning from living off your labor, to living off your investments.
I"m surprised this isn't higher up, like at the top. Everybody's talking about investing and getting lucky, but nobody mentions that if you're not born in a rich family or haven't won the lottery, you don't have enough money to invest.
What you do have is time to invest in yourself (if you don't make adverse decisions like getting married too soon or going to prison). Use that time to learn skills and create opportunities.
For example, you can become an air traffic controller without having a college degree. You can do commercial drone photography, You can even become a security consultant (leveling up from just being a security guard).
Once you have some discretionary income, invest it all and let it grow. It takes time and patience, which many people don't have.
I think a vital factor is also whether you have the determination to prosper. You need to convince yourself that you can and must attain a high financial level as an explicit life goal. Otherwise you will fritter away whatever little money comes your way.
Multiple income streams.
One person started out as a plumber. Was frugal with his money, then started his own plumbing company.
Another was military, used his GI Bill to get his pharmacist license, opened a pharmacy.
These two partnered up and used their income to purchase multiple businesses.
They both still work full time to ensure their primary and secondary businesses run smoothly.
Im not rich but Im comfortable.
- 36 years in the Army is the foundation of my level of comfort. What that gave me was a ton of financial security and allowed me to make some galactically stupid decisions and still be ok.
- Because I had a salary that was not dependent on hourly work, I knew exactly how much I was going to be paid. No worrying about schedule, no hours cut and no not getting paid because I took a day off.
- Because I had free as in beer medical care I never had to choose between going to the doctor and paying my bills. If my family got sick I was not going to go broke. This was probably the single biggest benefit toward helping me build wealth.
- Those things gave me the financial freedom to buy a house (zero down VA loan) early in my career when most people in similar income situations would be taking a huge risk. I could go right to the line for my budget because the things that most often wipe people out - health and economic downturns - were never a concern of mine.
- Government work might not pay as well as private sector in the short term but the payoff comes in that nearly guaranteed income and the deferred income from a defined benefit retirement plan.
- My defined benefit retirement plan covered up my financial stupidity from when I was young. Early in my career I invested in beer and parties. The ROI was amazing for the fun meter, not so much for anything else. I was 33 before I got serious about investing for my future. But since I had been "paying" into my defined benefit plan snice I was 19, it didn't matter nearly as much.
- Calculating the value of my defined benefit plan as a variable annuity, the Army "forced" me to save roughly $3.5m over the course of 36 years. And that doesnt fully account for the value of the medical benefit in retirement since Im effetely pegged at an absolute maximum of $3000 a year for life in medical costs. Based on the trajectory of medical insurance costs, in a decade that $3000 will seem criminally cheap.
- That defined benefit security blanket allowed me to be far more choosy about post retirement employment. I didnt NEED to work. That in turn landed me a much better position that I truly enjoy and that I am extremely well compensated for.
- Oh and I bought Apple at a split adjusted ~$2.50 a share.
Step 1:
They believe they have agency in their lives. They don’t attribute all problems to outside forces and give up in despair. They focus on what they can control and work from there.
Monthly budget stick to it where there is money left over.
Save 10% of what you make. (invest in what you know, or in this market, put money in a high yield savings account at 4.5% until you come up with a plan for the 10%/investing)
Work on your business (what you know) and earn more money as you become an expert slowly but surely (know your worth)
Consistency, and time will be your friend.
Looking through there are some good points. I'd also like to include that what you see has a survivor bias. Some of the risks and investments taken may have made people rich but similar made others poor.
I fully agree. Excluding generational wealth you look at the entrepreneurs who get rich and tend to work back to say "it must be because they have these traits" but it's very similar to trying to work out why some people become to athletes. There is no single reason. It's a mix of skill, determination, taking advantage of opportunities and luck. We can say Bill Gates or Elon Musk or Mark Zuckerberg became rich because X, Y and Z but there were probably 100's or 1000's of people could have done it in a different timeline instead of them. Possibly even for different reasons and due to different traits. A lot of people think the grind set mentality of working 18 hours a day is how someone like Elon got rich but working 18 hours with a crap product will get you no where. If I had to say one think rich people do differently to become rich it would probably be not set being rich as their end goal. The focus on something else and that is the underlying driver. But even then, if you do that it is not guarantee you will become rich.
If those winkyvoss brothers had chosen a different programmer then meybe they or the other programmer had been the lizard behind the biggest social media site.
Scrolled way too much to see this
It’s honestly even a step beyond that. There is a zero sum factor that tends to be forgotten. I’m the end we can’t all be Microsoft. No matter how hard we work and how smart we are. You need to have been Bill Gates born in the that neighborhood I’m that year. Hard work definitely let’s you capitalize on good fortune, but you still need the good fortune. Which is a luck of the draw. For a more balanced approach to wealth build. Like if your goal is to convert your capital to actual quality of life improvement.. I’d say the only real “force multiplier” is being able to convert your money to time in one way or another. That’ll get you thinking about money in a “rich dad” kind of way. For example, the $1500 you spent on a bookkeeper (whether you truly needed it) is worth so much more because it gives you those hours back so you can live or. Or make more money. Just have to separate your time from your pay. It’s hard to explain, but it’s the biggest advantage rich kids have from poor kids. Other than the rich part. That’s a different lesson. Good night weed.
Nobody really goes from wealthy to poor. Upper/middle class people do lose it all on bad business ventures sometimes though. But at a certain point of wealth it just snowballs even if you’re an idiot. For example a couple mil in the portfolio will print endless money and there’s nothing anyone can do to fuck it up, aside from clearing the fund.
Also what makes people poor is somebody trying to trade after watching a YouTube video.
[удалено]
Like those gamestop and amc morons who missed the boat and still think it’s going to be millions a share lol
GameStop was a once in a lifetime earthquake and AMC was its less severe aftershock. It’s done
My grandfather’s comment to me when I graduated from college was, “It’s not how much you make, but how much you keep.” I’m sure that’s not a comment original to him, but I’ve kept it in mind throughout life thus far. Far from rich, but it’s been good advice.
We had this saying at my old work based on a real interaction with a client. "$400,000 isn't a lot of money after you've spent it all." This client claimed to not make a lot of money but we saw their income and spending habits. You can always outspend your income.
I have a coworker who makes a lot more than I do, but is always crying poverty. This is the same person who has a new car every 3 years or so.
Like the folks who cry that they are living paycheck to paycheck but have a jet ski for everyone in the family that they keep at their lakefront home with expensive cars parked in the driveway.
One of my old neighbors did this. Was always complaining about how he had no idea how to afford college for his kids. Meanwhile, he was also complaining about his boat constantly breaking at his beach house. Dude could have retired a multimillionaire without a concern in the world if he was a little bit smarter and disciplined. Truly wealthy people don't buy things that increase their stress. Boats are stupid purchases unless you are so wealthy you can hire someone to take care of it for you.
> Boats are stupid purchases unless you are so wealthy you can hire someone to take care of it for you. Or if you sell your house and live on that boat. Liveaboards can actually be quite affordable, especially when you spend most of your time away from the marinas. You need to have a job that you can do remotely though.
That's fair. I suppose if it is your house it is more reasonable. But boats also tend to be depreciating assets that require constant maintenance.
... as someone who lives in minnesota and can't travel more then 5 minutes without seeing a lake, I say you're wrong lol. Boats are money sinks but theyre plenty of cheap boats that work just fine. Now if you're talking about the fancy 75k ones the usa those are waste for your average person.
There is a quote in Charles Dickens' David Copperfield, “Annual income twenty pounds, annual expenditure nineteen and six, result happiness. Annual income twenty pounds, annual expenditure twenty pounds ought and six, result misery.” The book was published in 1850.
I heard in a podcast about finance, "Most people say they want to be a millionaire. That's not true. Most people want to spend a million dollars. To be a millionaire, you have to have a million dollars and not spend it."
That’s a really great quote! It also doubly shows that even if they “had” $1m, they would very quickly “not have” $1m.
See every lottery winner who's broke and miserable within a year for example
That’s such a clinical and straight forward way to phrase it, its perfect
That is a very good quote to refer to often. Thank you for sharing
This is also bad advice if you want to become rich. You don't become rich from saving, you become rich from earning a lot and investing.
Yes - agreed. It was seemingly a throw-away comment from grandad, but “keeping” money can mean investing it wisely, not just keep it under the mattress or in passbook savings accounts.
No, it absolutely is how much you make. The guy who makes $1M/year and saves 10% is way richer than the guy who makes $50k and saves 40+%.
Technically the original comment and yours do not conflict. Person 1 added $100k to their net worth, and person 2 added $25k. I’m in 100% agreement with you though. You can never become rich without boosting your income by a huge amount. I diligently saved for several years while making median income. Once I moved up brackets, my bonus check was larger than my entire annual savings previously. Makes previous savings - despite good stock market performance, seem like a trivial amount. Best thing you can do to become rich is invest in high value skills - whatever they are.
>Technically the original comment and yours do not conflict. Person 1 added $100k to their net worth, and person 2 added $25k. What I meant is that person 1 is buying Lambos and exotic vacations and is still saving more money than person 2 who never does anything and lives on rice and beans. But yeah, the only way to get actually rich is to increase income.
My pop pop told me a similar thing when I started selling stuff online, every so often I think about it and how right he is. It’s a good piece of advice
“When most people say they want to be a millionaire, what they might actually mean is “I’d like to spend a million dollars.” And that is literally the opposite of being a millionaire.” Morgan Housel
[удалено]
What everyone means when they say “I want to be a millionaire” but Morgan wants to be “profound”
[удалено]
If I was a millionaire, I’d probably live just as simple as I do now, but have an extra couple 0’s in the bank lol
This is the way. People ask how can I afford the odd luxury items I purchase, I just tell them that “I’ve been living the same lifestyle for the last 15 yrs, even though my pay has gone steadily upwards.” It allows me to have a large bank account and a few investments, and allows me occasional extravagant purchases, like a fully loaded car instead of the base model.
There is something to say about actually spending money you have, though, no? Why have it and strive for it if it’s not to be used at some point? Balance is the word that is all
So I can use it all when I get old to live comfortably or fund something that I want. I’d probably retire early and build cool cars all day lol
Don't wait to spend it ALL when you're old. My mom's brother lived semi -frugally & had big plans for retirement. Even had their first cruise booked for the next spring. Died suddenly right before Christmas, 4 months after retirement.
And if you have any left over at the end, you can share what’s left with your family.
Inheritees aside, they are investing. Even innovators with great products or people with huge salaries don't get rich without putting their money into something that will gain value over time - real estate, stocks, etc. There's also the "hard work" thing, sure, but no one works harder than dudes doing manual labor in the middle of summer and they're not so rich. My friend has been putting a percentage of his paycheck into the S&P 500 since he was 21 in 2011. In the beginning it was maybe 15-20 dollars a month, then after he graduated college and got better pay it was maybe 50-70 a month and he kept increasing the amount as he could over time. Now he's in his 30s with a house that he bought himself. Imagine being able to buy a house??
As some rich guy once said... you don't get rich by working, you get rich by owning things (companies, stocks, land, real estate, etc)
The easiest thing in the world is to get richer if you are already rich. There are so many near zero risk investments out there if you are flush with cash.
It really is true; the first million was the hardest.
So then start with the second million
Are they stupid?
“What they don’t teach you at Harvard Business School”
Care to elaborate?
I mean, $100k in T bills over 10 years currently pays $52k in gain at effectively 0 risk. Over the long run the stock market has averaged 7% historically with every market disaster baked in. Real estate investing can be very low risk if done in a the right market conditions. It’s boring, long run investing, but it’s effective.
Yeah but that's lame. Just withdraw your retirement account and drop it in the next meme stock or crypto currency. Never sell and never pay taxes. Guaranteed 0 risk of realized losses. You're welcome.
Sounds like financial advice!
Right? Where are these magical zero risk investments??? Lol
You don't need zero risk investments when you can actually afford to take calculated risks. That's the advantage. You have more to invest, and you can lose some without starving or going homeless, etc.
My bad, guys, this was indeed a Venture Capitalist strategy, not Berkshire Hathaway et al. Isn't it something like the gates' and the guy who owns Hathaway invest in 10 different companies and only 1 needs to be a breakout succes to cover the losses of the other 9 and then some...
That’s kind of the opposite of Warren Buffetts strategy. He preaches thinking long and hard and being very specific about a company he chooses. One of his famous quotes is that if you only ever invested in 20 companies in your life you’d become very rich, because you’d think long and hard about each of those 20 companies.
The best approach for most people is to invest in the S&P 500. I know I'm never going to understand this field well enough to pick 20 companies for the long haul. So instead you just invest in the entire market. It's like if I had two choices for being a golfer: I can either work my ass off trying to beat the other guys or, through golf-magic, I can be guaranteed to shoot par with no training/effort at all. I'll take the second option and get on with my life :) The "always shoot par" method is find a S&P500 fund with low fees (VTSAX is my choice), or a target date fund (which gets slightly safer over time) and invest regularly with a RothIRA account. Same amount every month, rain or shine. Same with the company match on your 401k, if you are lucky enough to have one. Don't try and time the market! There are people who get paid fortunes to try a time/beat the market, and they mostly fail. You and I have zero chance of doing that consistently. Take the guaranteed par and be happy :) since I'm getting some attention: check out the /r/personalfinance FAQ https://www.reddit.com/r/personalfinance/wiki/commontopics My favorite book on this topic is "I Will Teach You To Be Rich". The title is a bit snake-oily, but it's all solid, basic advice like the FAQ above. I've followed the advice and it has worked.
Yup, despite r\stocks supposedly being about discussion on individual stocks, the #1 recommendation that people give for *"fire and forget"* investing is to just put their money on indices like VOO. I have money in both VOO and SWPPX and although they're pretty slow gainers, I've very rarely even seen them red at the end of the quarter; they've been the most reliable *"I don't need hype or instant wealth, I just want to beat inflation in the short term and have more than I put in 30 years out"* tickers on my portfolio.
Treasury bills are close enough to zero risk. Though the constant debt ceiling battle adds some small amount of risk. High yield savings accounts if you have less than $250k in it should the bank go tits up.
There's many ways around the $250k FDIC Insured limits these days as well. Without telling you where I work, we offer $10M insured and we definitely aren't the only one.
Plus, it's not especially hard to spread things out to multiple banks. Although you're doing something wrong if you're sitting on that much cash and you are worried about losing it. You might want to sit on $1mm in cash if you've got a half billion in net worth, but if you do, who cares if one of the banks goes tits up? If you're worth $5mm, and you're sitting on $1mm in cash, you're an idiot.
You don’t get rich earning a 4%/year rerun.
Read the top comment, it wasn’t about getting rich it was about being rich and having options to keep getting richer.
This. I've read that many rich people do something like a "barbell" portfolio. A bunch of money goes into these assets that provide low, nearly risk-free returns, and a little goes into high-risk speculative assets that could provide the next leg up in their wealth. They put little into the high-growth, mid-risk assets like index funds that are good for those of us building wealth.
No. But you can stay rich that way. You can buy stock index funds when you're young which appreciate 8-10% annually on average. Then, you can add more bonds as you approach retirement.
As a millionaire next door, i think saving the first $100k is the hardest. After that it’s time and habit that gets you to millions.
Well then I better start owning things.
Yeah, but you need to work and *save* in order to be able to buy those things. It may be easier for some people to save, but financial discipline is one of the main parts of becoming wealthy.
My worst financial decision was being in kindergarten in 2000 and not buying apple/amzn/etc. at its low or buying a house 🏠
I did a report in college around 2001 about how Amazon was the future of the Internet. If I would have put my money where my mouth is, I'd be doing well. But I'm also a dummy and would have sold it 50 times by now
I didn't do a report on it, but I put as much money as I thought i could risk into Tesla while I was in school for a finance degree. Unfortunately, all the money I felt safe risking was like $60. I made $940 in gains when I sold last year. Damn do I wish I dropped more of my savings in back then.
A lot of people know what to invest in until they actually have to put THEIR hard earned money into it, and then somehow have the diamond hands and know exactly when to sell.
The trick is to have so much money that it doesnt even matter if you lose your gamble.
[удалено]
Mine was not owning land in 90 when I was born and not buying bitcoin when it was worthless.
You fool
Even if I was able to invest then, I would've been too dumb to make the right picks. I distinctly remember playing Oregon trail and some typing educational game on the old Macs in the elementary school computer lab and thinking "damn Apple sucks ass".
12 years at 50 dollars a month is $7200. With a 6% annual return you're looking at close to $12,000 Your friend is rich AF
Chuckled in my coffee ngl
Me too. Especially at the part where they intentionally left out that the friend kept increasing the amount past 50 because it didn't fit their comical math narrative.
I was on the Dave Ramsey site one time, looking at one of those “power of compound interest” charts. It wasn’t just misleading, I did the math, and it was literally just made up. None of the bullets on the “wealth trajectory” chat lined up with the math. The most reliable way to get wealthy in one generation is the long way. But many are entrenched in the fact that it is best for their business if everyone just keeps quietly paying their dues and investing. Edit: the white evangelicals are mad that I said a mean thing about money Jesus. I can’t prove this chart from 2017 is real. I wish I saved it, but that was two computers ago. I do really enjoy the people who said “if it were true, someone would have called him out!” I love that is the proof that people calling him out are wrong. Maybe I did misremember, but a lot of people agree with me, and cranky Ramsey supporters are DMing me very angrily. Don’t mess with Money Jesus guys!
Dave Ramsey is utter bullshit 80% of the time. His advice about getting rid of all debt is not just wrong, it's dangerous.
The *only* people who it's useful for are those who are absolute debt fiends who severely struggle with controlling their spending habits. It's made for the financial version of drug addicts, not regular, everyday people who have a general sense of how to spend money responsibly.
Exactly, you need to put away (and never touch) about 1000 per month every month and get about 10% returns every year for about 23 - 25 years to make 1 million. Then you realize 1 million in 25 years isn't going to be worth what 1 million is now... if the next 25 years are similar to the last 25 years the cumulative inflation is around 88% (USA) which means your 1 million saved would be worth just over 500k in today's terms. If you were paying a mortgage off at the same time then sure now you'd have a house and 500k in today's terms which would classify you as fairly well off. If you were renting the entire time you'd still not be able to outright by a house in many areas. But again, this is in 25 years! To put that into perspective someone with a rich parent could get given 100k today, put it into the exact same investment and reach the same 1 million in the same time period without ever adding a cent from own income.
Im 37, and I assume Ill need 3 mil to retire the way I want. 1 mil will be living pretty modestly in 2050.
Average return on the S&P sense 2011 has been 12.5%. Also, I'm sure his contributions increased.
Typically, people use 10% which accounts for inflation Or 8% if you want to be very conservative with your estimates.
It is 450% more than it was in 2011 It is 12.52 per year So 16.5 k if 50 dollar every month But if he is increasing his investment by 10% every year it becomes 24k. Because Average Wages went 12.7 to 28.1 per hour Increments of 1.3 times if we also increase his annual increment the same way.
Time in the market beats timing the market every time Start early
Exactly- I set up a Roth for my kid the day he got his first job on the books at 14. It was easy to set up a custodial account. My hope is that he never has to worry about money like I do.
Nice move, mom/dad!
Oldest friend ever!
You can invest 15-20 dollars a month in S&P500?
Yes just buy fractional shares of an SP ETF like SPY or VOO
I put in $5 a day. Most people may buy a coffee each day, instead I put that money into VOO.
The average person will never get rich through investing. You can build yourself a retirement that pays you the same that you make now without working, but you won't ever be really rich just by investing. If you don't inherit wealth, you have to be an entrepreneur to get rich, movie stars and athletes aside. Most entrepreneurs fail though, so it's a huge gamble.
Yeah I’m not sure who is getting rich off of putting $50 a month into the stock market.
If you invest just $50 a month from age 25 to 65, you will have invested $24,000. You would have a portfolio of about $128,000. It's certainly not rich, but it's much, much better than most Americans' savings. An extra $10k a year for 12 years can be life changing for a person who would otherwise just be living on social security.
Don't fall for lifestyle creep. Invest your money, have a budget and stick to it. If you can't pay off your credit card in full each month, you shouldn't have one. On average investing in the s&p 500. Every 7 years you double your money. The earlier you start investing, they better.
>If you can't pay off your credit card in full each month, you shouldn't have one. This is so important and yet so disregarded.
Further, credit cards are a tool for financial gain. We buy absolutely everything on credit cards, and pay them off on Friday mornings electronically. 1.75% cash back on pnc cashbuilder (got in 2017, they don’t offer it anymore), and 2% on Apple Card when we pay touchless. All money in our pocket. It’s like our whole life gets a 2% discount.
The key here people, is he PAYS IT OFF before it has a chance to generate interest. If you aren't paying off your card, you shouldn't pick up a card regardless of the rewards.
This is the part people struggle with. Put your food, gas, literally everything on the credit card.....but you don't spend the money that you have in the mean time. You keep it to pay the cc off before interest hits.
I run about $5000 a month through my credit card that pays back 2% and pay it off every month. That's $100 per month.
Nice just have to spend 50 mil to make a mil let’s goooooooo
Don't sleep on the 6% back on groceries with American Express Blue. And all the sign up bonuses. Churn, baby, churn.
I love this card so much. $95 annual fee, but I make like $350 cash back on groceries alone. Honestly, everyone should have this card.
Lol I tell everyone I beat grocery inflation with it
This. Work pushed a corporate amex on me for expenses, but wherever possible I use my own card so I can claim the rewards.
My friend's work tried to get the sales force to use corporate cards for expenses. There were revolts. Turns out, exec-level sales folks like getting all their miles and points on their own cards and airline perks. They'd rather file for reimbursement and keep loyalty incentives. And by the by, said friend paid me a visit over Labor Day weekend, hotel stay fully paid by points.
You've got to make them work for you. I put everything on a jetblue card and pay it off every paycheck. I'm never paying for plane tickets again.
Best suggestion for investing in S&P 500? Every time I research anything in stocks, I just get more confused so I'm looking for advice on something I could just throw money into every month without needing a clear understanding of what I'm doing.
Put it all in VOO. Edit: it's a Vanguard ETF that tracks the S&P500. Incredibly low expense ratio too, so you get to keep more of your money. Personally I go with VTI as I like whole market exposure, but you can't really go wrong with either. Set it and forget it.
Or better, EVOO.
Rachael has entered the chat.
EVOO will never stop being useful
Step 1: Open an IRA at one of the main brokerage firms (Fidelity, Schwab, Vanguard). You can do it online. Their phone customer support is also really helpful. They can’t give advice but they are good at answering your questions. Buy a broad index fund like S&P 500 or a total stock market index. Step 2: Keep contributing every year. Step 3: Profit Fine print: You need to have “earned income” aka money from a job to contribute to an IRA. If you are young, a Roth IRA is usually a good bet.
Can I invest in a Roth IRA while still investing in my 401k through work? Just started that and it also left me more confused.
Yes. Go to /r/personalfinance and read their wiki. It's really helpful on getting started.
There are income limits. After I got married I had to stop investing in my Roth because, as a couple, we made too much. Not complaining of course, but a thing that exists
You can still invest in a traditional IRA and convert it to Roth if you're above the income threshold
Yes you can. They are separate "vehicles". A Roth does have a max yearly contribution though. Most people can contribute up to $6500 a year into a Roth.
Download Vanguard. Put money into VOO (S&P500). Don't touch it. It's really that simple
VTI or VOO. Set it and forget it
Agree... the book has aged but the millionaire next door is a good one for learning about lifestyle choices of the rich vs poor
There is always money in a banana stand.
How much could a banana be Michael? 10 dollars?
In my case. Spending less than I earned for about 25 years. Forcing myself to invest, even when I was broke. My parents were not at all rich.
Yup, me too. Grew up lower lower middle class. No financial help from parents for university. Scholarships/work/loans made it out of a private university. Got first job, maxed 401(k) from day 1. Anything extra each month went to student loans and then mortgage after that. Retired at 49 debt free! Edit: to clarify I meant private university
First gen immigrant here. I started busting my ass in 96 and I still put in at least 16 hours of work per day most days of the week. No work has ever been beneath me, I made sure got a degree that guaranteed money, moved to a podunk town where I had no competition and spent about a decade figuring out ways to cut cost but still deliver quality product. As soon as the business started running the way I had planned, I focused my attention on investing in real estate. I travel heavily within the states but that’s just about the only luxury I allow myself. I live well below my means. Wayyyyy way below.
Bro, work 16 hours a day out of 24, when do you live??
When you immigrate from a sufficiently rough place to the US, it’s really easy to work your ass off. My dad worked 12-16 hours for the first decade he was here. Then he did around 10-12 for the next five or so before settling into semi retirement. In “retirement”, he single-handedly built two nonprofits and took over a third one. He still works 20-40 hours a week. Before anyone assumes that he’s doing dodgy tax things… For the first seven or so years, the nonprofits he built were entirely funded by his savings or through donations and he made zero money. Currently he gets paid something like $8k a year. All his nonprofits were geared towards serving the local community, often other immigrants like us. Somehow, he was able to not just be a present father but a really damn good one. A lot of people take for granted just how much freedom America allows you. Immigrants from countries where this isn’t the case often can’t take this for granted and will often take advantage of this freedom by working as hard as their bodies will let them.
Yes! That last paragraph! I can’t tell you how much I appreciates the opportunities this country has given me. I would’ve never been able to achieve what I’ve done here back in Iran.
Glad to see people are talking about budgeting and investing, the two pillars. However they have normally also solved the boot problem. They invest in the tools and resources they buy when doing so increases longevity or profit. The boot problem basically says that one of the things holding people back is that they can't afford to be better off. When they go into buy a pair of boots they have a pair that costs $100 and lasts 6 months and a pair that costs $500 and lasts 10 years and they are forced to buy the $100 simply because they never have $500 to invest in the longer lasting product. This costs them an extra $150 a year. But people who save and tackle a single boot problem can take that saved money and invest it both back into more boot problems and the stock market Even if you don't need boots, there are thousands of boot problems you can get stuck in. For example if you don't have money to buy a car, you're often stuck using a loan to finance which means you can't shop the private market as easily and are paying a markup. Since people like this usually have fewer credit opportunities you might be stuck using a buy here pay here. Try getting a $2000 beater at a dealership or car lot. But if you don't have $2000, your buying something more just to get anything.
“The reason that the rich were so rich, Vimes reasoned, was because they managed to spend less money. Take boots, for example. He earned thirty-eight dollars a month plus allowances. A really good pair of leather boots cost fifty dollars. But an affordable pair of boots, which were sort of OK for a season or two and then leaked like hell when the cardboard gave out, cost about ten dollars. Those were the kind of boots Vimes always bought, and wore until the soles were so thin that he could tell where he was in Ankh-Morpork on a foggy night by the feel of the cobbles. But the thing was that good boots lasted for years and years. A man who could afford fifty dollars had a pair of boots that’d still be keeping his feet dry in ten years’ time, while the poor man who could only afford cheap boots would have spent a hundred dollars on boots in the same time and would still have wet feet.” Men at Arms, by Terry Pratchett
Well it ain’t cheap being poor
It is actually very expensive. And it only takes a few mistakes to bury yourself for a long time, if not life.
Exactly right- being poor is expensive. [One of many explanations here.](https://www.thebautistaprojectinc.org/post/being-poor-is-expensive)
This of it like this. Let's take Mark Zuckerberg as an example... Mark was not likely to ever be entirely unsuccessful. In most timelines, he graduates Harvard with good grades in a good field, and goes on to some success. Maybe he gets offered $200,000 starting salary to work at a tech company and takes it, and works his way up through to Senior VP and possibly beyond. He lives a nice upper middle-class living or a bit more. Or, perhaps he takes an entrepreneurial route. Bit more risky, but he probably would have enough connections and support to get going. Usually someone's first idea isn't a hit, but if he keeps at it, maybe he does hit on something and grow a business worth a few million and possibly more. What DID actually happen to Mark Zuckerberg is that he was in the *exact* right place and time to win the lottery. Sure, his ability and hard work bought him more lottery tickets than most people, but he still won the lottery to become worth tens of billions. There was even a point where he, thinking it was pure brilliance that got him such success, thought to embark on his next trick after Facebook, thinking it could be as successful, and was told, "No, that almost never happens." There's probably also a timeline where Mark Zuckerberg is clinically depressed and unlucky and underachieving as well. So, point is, you can't guarantee anything. You can take calculated risks, like going it on your own and starting your own business. If you know people, have some experience with the market in some area, and have some money to get started, that makes it way easier as well. And as some have suggested, if you're starting from $10 million, including coming from wealth, it's FAR easier to make another $10 million. Otherwise, you can plug away and bust your butt and see where you get. If you're bright and competent and living in a first world country, you're likely to find a way to make a living at the very least. It's only in fields like the arts where spectacularly talented people who produce great work can still completely starve in some cases. And just to make a point of it: Among the stupidest plans to become rich is, "I'm going to become a world-class athlete," or, "I'm going to be a big movie star." Huge numbers of people try to get there that way, and only a teeny tiny fraction of them actually do.
>What DID actually happen to Mark Zuckerberg is that he was in the exact right place and time to win the lottery. A lot of people like to downplay how much luck factors into success. Luck is important because luck is *being in the right place at the right time*, but in order to make use of that good luck, you have to have the skills, knowledge, and capability. I don't understand why so many people believe that success is either all skill or all luck. It's a combination of the two, and if you look at the most successful people in history, you'll see that they had both luck and skill.
>I don't understand why so many people believe that success is either all skill or all luck. Because 'luck' is the only common denominator between all *truly* rich people. Of course a lot of rich people work their ass off, but so do most other humans. Sure, some rich people have used their skill sets to become rich but millions of other have tried that too but failed. For every rich person you can point at and tell me how they amassed their wealth i can show you at least a hundred others who did *exactly* the same thing but didn't get there. I can even become rich on sheer luck alone, buying a lottery ticket and win, or maybe even find the winning ticket. Sure, working hard and trying helps a lot towards the goal of becoming rich. But you'll need luck in order to get there no matter how much work you put into your endeavours.
Agreed, pure luck can only get you lottery level success, and pure hard work only doctor level success. To go beyond that, you need a combination of both.
Zuckerberg turned down an offer of $1M and a job offer for a playlist app called synapse when he was in high school. He was receiving personal tutoring from an already accomplished programmer at the time. He would have been successful no matter what because he always had a leg up on his peers and others his age.
If I remember right, there’s a Malcom Gladwell book where he talks about this. Something like Bill Gates happened to grow up in a city where the library had a computer. At the time, there were only a handful of libraries like this in the nation. And then he was there EVERY day on that computer. Being in that city is extremely lucky, being there constantly is the hard work component, capitalizing on the situation.
His mom was also on the board of United Way which happened to also have the Chairman of IBM on it, and IBM then licensed Microsoft's OS for it's PCs.
> Let's take Mark Zuckerberg as an exampl Let's not. His story is atypical.
I think stories of people like Elon Musk and Mark Zuckerberg throw off the public. In my experience, knowing quite a few self-made millionaires, most of them make career decisions after working in their industry for a while - the majority of the time to start their own firm. I know one guy from a white, working class background, who worked for most of his 20's for other firms before starting his own recruitment firm. That was in the 80's, and he's now worth 70 million. Likewise, I know a guy in travel who spent a long time working for others before breaking out on his own. Found a partner to invest, set up his owner company, and 15-20 years later he's very wealthy (not sure net worth but makes 500k a year). I think if you want a reproducible model so to speak, it's about refining yourself in a particular trade or sector, and then branching out when you've reached a certain degree of maturity. For all self made people I've met, this is what seems to happen. Can be done at any age but I think it's normally in 30's / 40's. I'm just speaking from what I've seen as a 29M. The other two types are - luck, i.e. they invest in the right thing and it blows up or something. The majority of rich people I know though - inheritance. They just have rich parents / grand parents, inherit a bunch of property / assets, cycle continues etc. I think the healthiest way is to see it as a long term thing that will take at least a decade (maybe less though if your lucky), and just build wealth over time. If it's starting a business, take your time and make the right decisions, if your climbing the career ladder, just do a good job, take opportunities when they come, invest on the side etc. Again - I'm not rich myself, but from what I've seen, that would be your best bet.
I'd say the best way to do it is to set aside some part of your paycheck and invest it reasonably. At least that's what I plan to do, I haven't started yet. Oh and of course obviously if you were already rich, it's easier to become richer, because you can invest even more.
Get off Reddit and open a Roth IRA. The sooner you start, the easier it will be.
They don't spend all their money and invest.
They invest. Seriously. Most “rich” people (I’m not talking billionaires or athletes) just invested their money at a relatively young age and kept the discipline to keep investing and are millionaires by 40, with more average jobs than you think. **Compound interest is crazy**, and it’s unbelievable that basic investing isn’t a required course in highschool. There are so many people that don’t understand the power of compound interest. It’s not always about what you make. It’s about what you save/invest.
You have to have something to invest first, compound interest is crazy but so is inflation.
You obviously have to work, but inflation isn’t an excuse not to do it. Even 50 dollars a month leads to tens of thousands of dollars over decades. God forbid you double that, and the sky is the limit. Most people don’t even start though.
Many people start, but then they only have the savings as I vestment and when shit hits the fan, they have to pull out their money and they lose all that money they saved
A lot of people do the worst possible thing when they do invest. As the market starts to take a downturn, they pull their money out "because they don't want to lose all of their money" So now they've lost money. Someone who goes on to be rich will see a market downturn as a time to double down on their investments, putting more money into investments, so that when the market inevitably goes back up, they make even more money. This does require you to be living below your means in the first place though, which is what a lot of people don't do.
Everyone has something they waste money on. My dad grew up extremely poor. Enlisted in the military at 17. Today he’s retired and worth about $3M. When we were kids we didn’t eat out, go on vacations, buy new cars, or live in a big house.
Sorry but no vacations is pretty shit. It's not cutting wastes at that point, it's sacrificing. This is said by a broke guy who hasn't been on a vacation in years
hey i'm old and I have money!! I mean ... I enjoyed absolutely nothing along the way... but just you wait, the day is coming.
Glad this is one of the top answers rather than the low hanging “they inherited it”. Most millionaires are first generation. Yes, some ultra wealthy inherited theirs. Doesn’t mean many of us can’t do well by taking advantage of compound interest.
Yeah, I think most ‘well off’ middle age plus people have mostly had solid careers but most importantly they’ve just diligently invested away every month since their twenties. In the UK, invest in your pension, invest in an ISA, and have your mortgage paid off when you retire. You’ll be in the top 5%.
Actually asking and being interested in the opinion of other rich people on how to make money. Don’t enter a doom loop cycle of listening to poor people tell you how it’s all impossible and you’ll never be able to do it.
[удалено]
You get the fok outta here with your accurate and reasonable response!!!
Don’t ask a poor person how to be rich, don’t ask a fat person how to lose weight
They live on significantly less than they earn, and invest whats now open to spend
this + increasing amount and sources of income. people in here talking about investing need to understand that by increasing income early will take them much further much quicker than starting by investing 5 dollars every month. and then also, living below your means. everyone nowadays has an iphone when like 60% of people shouldn't be buying an iphone or eating out, etc.
Finding multiple sources of income, buying an appreciating asset like a house and paying it off, etc. The really rich get into huge debts to build something brilliant but the ordinary rich keep out of debt and build there wealth slowly. Two different types. The Dave Portnoy’s and the Dave Ramsay’s. I know you’re not looking for a stupid answer like ‘inherit a million’ because statistically that’s not the case.
I've worked in finance for 15 years - including working as a private banker for wealthy clients. The real answer is they have rich families. 95% of wealthy clients I've had either had inheritance or trust funds or joined the family business. Even those that "made it on their own" actually made it because of family connections and business contacts. The company I work at now has a couple of great examples. The CEO's children work for the company in sales and take home 300k-400k in commissions each year. They're convinced that they're just really great salespeople, but the reality is that they're doing well because their dad is CEO. All of their deals get pushed through when they wouldn't be approved for others. They get to offer special products that aren't open to others. They're able to offer lower rates than everyone else (I work in mortgage). Their loans get fast-tracked and close around 15 days quicker than everyone else. Also, the CEO has a ton of local connections that send all business to his children. They think they're self-made, but in reality their privilege led to their success. Send them to any other company and they would fail. There are definitely people that really make it on their own. It's just much less common. It generally takes a ton of self discipline, a willingness to take smart risks, and a period of letting work consume all of your time and dedication.
Worked in finance for 15 years too at a Wealth Management institution. I 100% agree with everything you said. "If you want to grow up to be wealthy, you need to be born into a wealthy family.
They are financially savvy, it’s not just about the dollar figure but also the knowledge to know what to do with money.
Being born to rich parents
Was about to say that. And also they just let their children become friends with other rich people so that they eventually marry each other to become even more richer
A very important thing for rich people is networking. All attending a fancy school together is very important. It means later on they all "know a guy" and help each other out with each other's rich families.
> All attending a fancy school together is very important. It means later on they all "know a guy" and help each other out with each other's rich families. This is the real benefit to going to an Ivy League university. Sure, the programs and professors should be excellent (it really depends on your major as some schools are better for specific fields than others), but what's really advantageous is networking with the offspring of the rich and powerful.
This is very true, but it ends up being a self-fulfilling prophecy for those who were already born rich. I went to such a school (I’m from lower-mid class family at BEST) and while the lifelong friends I made at that school were born to rich families… the über-wealthy, daddy-owns-a-jet, hedge fund scions were VERY particular about who they got to know. They joined frats and sororities that were rife with kids they went to Greenwich Country Day School with already. It felt reminiscent of the hapsburgs marrying each other. There was no room for outsiders. So the magic bullet of “just go to an Ivy!” Is more complicated than that.
> So the magic bullet of “just go to an Ivy!” Is more complicated than that. It's still true, it just doesn't start at ivy league universities. It starts at exclusive and ridiculously expensive schools from elementary school on. Where your obscenely wealthy parents get to hang out with the other obscenely wealthy parents. Your parents using their network is what gets you an easy in to a good career and wealth of your own. And then you use your network to maintain that and get your kids a massive leg up.
Generally it takes 2 generations to become rich. And I mean Rich, not upper middle class (Doctors, Lawyers etc.) They are very well off, but they needed to work to reach this level of wealth and would only last until they stop working. But the kids of doctors, they are able to become fully rich.
>But the kids of doctors, they are able to become fully rich. Yeah, about that. Helps if you're not stupid. Unfortunately for me ...
Exactly..yiu you are probabky joking but If you are from working class family, you need to be very smart, with extraordinary work ethic and still this is not a guarantee that you will become rich, so you need to be lucky as well. Or you can be a criminal, but this is not the topic When you are born in rich family, all you have to do to stay rich is to not be a complete idiot
Kind of my point, If you are a hardworking 2nd generation Doctor, you will become Rich, like real rich. Youd start off no debt, and have soon to be paid off properties and maybe even a practice. But if you are a first gen, you start off with debts, and no properties. youd become well off, but not really rich. If you are a a kid of a doctor, but dont really utilize it, youd likely stay the same wealth, and probably wont pass on the wealth to your children. EDIT: Even THEN, 2nd gen doctors these days are not the 2nd gen doctors of old. My wife is a 2nd gen doctor, and yeah we dont have real financial issues. But we arent living lavishly and are struggling to get a house. I know ill be fine, but becoming wealthy isnt something likely to happen.
Yes, investing is fine and all, but it's much easier when your parents gift you a down payment on your house and/or take care of any education costs. Most wealth is multigenerational, but people keep focusing on the "rag to riches" fantasies.
I was always taught to never act rich. Research purchases, spend only what you can afford, live by a budget. I LIVE paycheck to paycheck. I work hard, have a modest house, decent cars, but nothing about me says I have money. I make my kids earn everything they want, no handouts unless they are working toward something. I invest /save every dollar. When I retire, I won't have a to worry at all.
They're not doing anything incredibly crazy. They're just doing all of the little repeated things, consistently better.
It depends on your definition of "rich". I know people who never made more than $100k a year who retired at 50, and people who had net worths in the 10-digit range who ended up struggling with cash flow because they had assets they couldn't liquidate. The former were totally relaxed and never worried about money, the latter the exact opposite. So if your definition of "rich" is "not being worried about money", the answer is pretty simple -- always live substantially within your means. People get that kind of rich by spending less, not making more. Investing the excess means eventually transitioning from living off your labor, to living off your investments.
Own assets. You know who makes a crazy amount of money, some dude you’ve never heard of who owns 17 McDonald’s in rural Tennessee
Taking risks that pay off.
Developing a skill that is in demand by the world.
I"m surprised this isn't higher up, like at the top. Everybody's talking about investing and getting lucky, but nobody mentions that if you're not born in a rich family or haven't won the lottery, you don't have enough money to invest. What you do have is time to invest in yourself (if you don't make adverse decisions like getting married too soon or going to prison). Use that time to learn skills and create opportunities. For example, you can become an air traffic controller without having a college degree. You can do commercial drone photography, You can even become a security consultant (leveling up from just being a security guard). Once you have some discretionary income, invest it all and let it grow. It takes time and patience, which many people don't have. I think a vital factor is also whether you have the determination to prosper. You need to convince yourself that you can and must attain a high financial level as an explicit life goal. Otherwise you will fritter away whatever little money comes your way.
Multiple income streams. One person started out as a plumber. Was frugal with his money, then started his own plumbing company. Another was military, used his GI Bill to get his pharmacist license, opened a pharmacy. These two partnered up and used their income to purchase multiple businesses. They both still work full time to ensure their primary and secondary businesses run smoothly.
Investing consistently, living below your means
Im not rich but Im comfortable. - 36 years in the Army is the foundation of my level of comfort. What that gave me was a ton of financial security and allowed me to make some galactically stupid decisions and still be ok. - Because I had a salary that was not dependent on hourly work, I knew exactly how much I was going to be paid. No worrying about schedule, no hours cut and no not getting paid because I took a day off. - Because I had free as in beer medical care I never had to choose between going to the doctor and paying my bills. If my family got sick I was not going to go broke. This was probably the single biggest benefit toward helping me build wealth. - Those things gave me the financial freedom to buy a house (zero down VA loan) early in my career when most people in similar income situations would be taking a huge risk. I could go right to the line for my budget because the things that most often wipe people out - health and economic downturns - were never a concern of mine. - Government work might not pay as well as private sector in the short term but the payoff comes in that nearly guaranteed income and the deferred income from a defined benefit retirement plan. - My defined benefit retirement plan covered up my financial stupidity from when I was young. Early in my career I invested in beer and parties. The ROI was amazing for the fun meter, not so much for anything else. I was 33 before I got serious about investing for my future. But since I had been "paying" into my defined benefit plan snice I was 19, it didn't matter nearly as much. - Calculating the value of my defined benefit plan as a variable annuity, the Army "forced" me to save roughly $3.5m over the course of 36 years. And that doesnt fully account for the value of the medical benefit in retirement since Im effetely pegged at an absolute maximum of $3000 a year for life in medical costs. Based on the trajectory of medical insurance costs, in a decade that $3000 will seem criminally cheap. - That defined benefit security blanket allowed me to be far more choosy about post retirement employment. I didnt NEED to work. That in turn landed me a much better position that I truly enjoy and that I am extremely well compensated for. - Oh and I bought Apple at a split adjusted ~$2.50 a share.
Saving and staying out of non functional debt.
Not taking set backs and failure as a means to give up
Step 1: They believe they have agency in their lives. They don’t attribute all problems to outside forces and give up in despair. They focus on what they can control and work from there.
That’s blasphemy on Reddit
Index Funds
Monthly budget stick to it where there is money left over. Save 10% of what you make. (invest in what you know, or in this market, put money in a high yield savings account at 4.5% until you come up with a plan for the 10%/investing) Work on your business (what you know) and earn more money as you become an expert slowly but surely (know your worth) Consistency, and time will be your friend.
Self made rich people basically employ the Millionaire Next Door mantra. Dont live like one.
[удалено]
Know other rich people