Beginners guide to becoming WEALTHY

[radiodude]

Duffdog-
You make good, accurate points of what’s happening right now.

Key being: Right Now

This is where owning and investing come into play. Owners and investors take that knowledge YOU have and use it for their GAIN. That and their own knowledge and abilities as buyers and sellers.

There will always be owning and investing on some level because human nature will see to it.

People will still want to eat, live in shelter, wear clothes and then buy products. Therefore, there will always be companies created to serve those needs and those companies will have owners and likewise investors that will hold stake in them for return. Companies will always grow and change, succeed and die and move around as necessary to survive and/or give the ownership/investors what they need.

Man has an innate need to find creative ways to make money. Whether it be working for someone or employing someone to help carry on an idea that he himself created.

We can talk about social justice, sunshine and smiles, equal reward so on and so on all we want. And yes, man will always desire these things and these concepts will always be in practice and be relevant. But once these concepts get in the way of man bettering his life and prospering further, once these concepts LIMIT his capabilities beyond that which he can justify, he will then stop those ideas in favor of letting his natural inclination of living his life to his utmost potential take over again. It's a give and take.

What I hear coming from our Universities and colleges nowadays, and I went there and got a degree so I could increase my income so I know because I heard it over and over, is that what we ALL need to do is pursue lives where we have a 'trade' or 'skill' we must work at our entire lives, while occasionally going back to school of course , and thereby keeping occupied at our desks and work stations sitting in our chairs and working toward that day in our misty future when we finally can retire and enjoy our final years on a measly pension/IRA-mutual fund/maybe Social Security and see our children and grandchildren go through the same thing over and over again.

Furthermore, we should like this existence because it's GUARANTEED and SAFE and we know we won't be on the street or going hungry or heaven forbid 'risking' anything as long as we work HARD enough for our boss (12 hour days plus weekends with no ultimate reward later on) until we get the privilege of holding a somewhat higher position that requires yet more time for yet another decade or so.

This is the BIG LIE that people buy into and I even sadly have started to participate in, though I have other plans.

This BIG LIE is that you will be happy being a drone, living your life working for someone else until your 65 (it will be 70-75 for anyone under 40 nowadays)

The hard truth is that a much lesser percent of the population actually has a passionate desire to work at a trade their entire lives. It's as if you’re FORCED now to become passionate and excited about something school oriented so that you can be excited and passionate about working at an activity everyday for most of the rest of your earthly existence.

If you are excited about being an economist, then awesome! Good for you! But there are just as many who went the same route as you who have found they don't like nearly as much as they were led to believe they would.

Man has a right to try and better his existence. And he has a right to better it so that he doesn't have to do the 9-5, 8-5 or 7-7 M-F/S/S for the rest of his life if he doesn't want to

 

[TheGameMaster]

Having got half way through the Russ Whitney book, I have noted some positives and negatives.
On the plus side, there are points in there that are timeless business tips, thus making the book worth your time.

On the negative side, the book was written at a time when property prices were lower. Rent rates have not increased enough, compared to property value increases which have gone through the roof. The idea of buying a property now and having positive cash flow because the income from rent is higher than the mortgage rate is no longer a viable way of building wealth because of the prices of properties now.
Ofcourse there are exceptons but not many. The book was written at a time when properties that were run down were supplied in abundance. Most of those properties have now been regenerated. The money has been made in real estate. Like I said there will be exceptions but as a general rule, it is not an area that wealth can be accumulated from these days.

Finally, having typed "Russ Whitney" into google news, i discovered that he is in the process of being sued for scamming his clients. The lesson of "listen but make your own evaluations" of peoples views, advice etc was well reinforced in my mind here.

 

[Deniska]

So 9 replies and 6 pages worth of text of knowledge and no one is wants to make money??

Sad.

 

[strong like bull]

On the negative side, the book was written at a time when property prices were lower. Rent rates have not increased enough, compared to property value increases which have gone through the roof. The idea of buying a property now and having positive cash flow because the income from rent is higher than the mortgage rate is no longer a viable way of building wealth because of the prices of properties now.
Ofcourse there are exceptons but not many. The book was written at a time when properties that were run down were supplied in abundance. Most of those properties have now been regenerated. The money has been made in real estate. Like I said there will be exceptions but as a general rule, it is not an area that wealth can be accumulated from these days.

just wondering... where do you live?

out here in arizona, you can buy a decent 3bed 2ba house with pool for 100k (many for less). 30yr fix mortgage roughly 500/m. taxes and insurance add 200 being generous.. $700/month is your cost and that house would rent for $1000 easy, if not more. many people are paying $800 bucks a month just for a one or two bedroom APARTMENT.

also, there are many fixers uppers on the market. tons of foreclosed houses at rock bottom prices that need updating and upgrades.

in general, the investors are having a field day right now. everythings on sale.

the statement of "the money has been made in real estate" is simply not true. the situation is that you can buy an asset at rock bottom price, at pure cost, either live in it yourself or rent it and cash flow while somebody pays it off for you, and know that 5 years, 10 years from now the value would have grown exponentially.

with all of that being considered, how is there no more money left to be made? the rich people know that real money is made during the down cycle. because that is when they BUY up all the assets other people dont hang on to, at low prices. that is why theyre rich. thats why when the stock market crashed warren buffet sank 8 billion dollars into it. he was shopping for stocks and everything was on clearance.

as long as you can buy at cost, hold and milk your asset or sell at higher cost (now or later), there will always be money to be made. times change, strategies change.. but the basics and core concepts will always remain the same.

interesting notes about whitney though. i heard about the same things after i read building wealth. dunno what path he took after writing the book... but a lot of his ideas regarding real estate were great.

-SLB

 

[The Message Boy]

The Game Master says,

The money has been made in real estate. Like I said there will be exceptions but as a general rule, it is not an area that wealth can be accumulated from these days.

Just like I asked Duffdog, (which HE TOTALLY avoided), instead of making these claims that RE is over provide facts and proof. Show proof that MAJORITY of the good-average RE investors are all failing right now.

You can't because that's not what's occurring for the most part.

In any business, the guy that doesn't know what in hell he's doing is the one that will get creamed.

Hell the RE numbers OVERALL, are UP across the board.

 

[TheGameMaster]

OK fair enough, I probably should not have written that the ££££ to be made in RE is over, because I was only thinking of my home country when considering my writing. That country being the UK, where property prices are now starting to come down because people can't afford to buy them.

 

[The Message Boy]

fuzzx says,

lets forget about the get rich quick schemes and actually solve some problems... thats where the money is.

And that's the difference between a business owner, stock investor, RE investor, etc. They are well balanced and know how to run the day to day operations and understand that profits and true financial freedom does not come OVERNIGHT.

The part of "RE is over" that Duffdog and some others are talking about is more related to the newbies who jumped in thinking they were going to be rich overnight and didn't have the creativity, ability, or know-how to manage the business properly. They almost see it as some sort of lottery ticket or something.

That's why earlier in this thread I offered my criticism of the "Gurus" becuase they pump guys up without also telling them the TRUTH of running a business so the guys can make a good decision on IF they can do that or not.

 

[synergy1]

Hell the RE numbers OVERALL, are UP across the board.

This poster is living proof that any clown with a keyboard can type words into a text box. Arguing here is like trying to convince someone that the sky is blue.

forget RE and open small businesses... you know what is really needed right now? Medical business, Power Industry, Farming, Transportation Technology (Space, Air, Land, Fuel)... lets forget about the get rich quick schemes and actually solve some problems... thats where the money is.

History has shown that spending towards info structure does not result in currency inflation. One can only hope that the stimulus spending on infrastructure will prove the prior statement correct. The quoted post pretty much nails it: myself and some friends have joined the ranks of entrepreneurs and have applied for a government grant with the DOE in order to get funding for our company. Its doubtful we will get the large government allocated funds as many others are further ahead than we are, but we have managed to sequester funding from a smaller vendor for a feasibility study.

Our first daunting task is to secure funding in order to work on our projects. I won't go into specifics with what we want to do, but the projects are very engineering intensive. All the pieces are in place, but funding will be the number one show stopper if we don't get any. If we get funding and a revenue stream, the company could take off and all of us could be millionaires by the time we are in our mid 30's. If I am still posting on SS, this will be a good way to follow how this might ( or might now) be done.

Want to see how to get rich? follow a rank amateur like myself through the perils of learning the ropes and see where we all end up. one thing is for certain ...it should be one heck of a ride.

Edit:

if anyone has links to good entrepreneurial message boards, please post them. I think it would be fun to chronicle this whole experience and see what other more knowledgeable folk have to say.

 

[Teflon_Mcgee]

Edit:

if anyone has links to good entrepreneurial message boards, please post them. I think it would be fun to chronicle this whole experience and see what other more knowledgeable folk have to say.

www.startupnation.com is a good one.
www.youngentrepreneur.com Don't let the name fool you, it's a good site.


Definatley chronicle your experience. As I work to launch a venture I find nothing better that to hear from people who have BTDT.

I had a real cool experience last night as I got to see a guest speaker in an entreprenuer class. This guy just graduated from college (with a pretty worthless degree) and was broke as a joke when he and his buddy decided to open a business. Now, two years later, they are franchising with over 25 stores.

 

[The Message Boy]

synergy says,

This poster is living proof that any clown with a keyboard can type words into a text box. Arguing here is like trying to convince someone that the sky is blue.

Ok, well, I will provide facts based on the words I provided. RE boomed basically to a high point in the middle of this decade because PEOPLE THAT SHOULD NOT HAVE BEEN in RE was in there along with other things occurring. Houses and property was selling. GOOD, FAST. RE only fell when the crisis hit. However, RE's numbers are UP since the fall, which is what I said, if you follow up on ANY amount of business analysis you will know that. However, in case YOU synergy have not been following up on business information, I will provide those statistics for you lol.

See synergy I'm not doing RE now I'm focused on business, but I read up on ALL OF IT because these things effect businesses regardless.

I call you out and Duffdog because you make claims that do not relate to present day reality. I asked Duffdog to provide facts and statistics for his claims and he decided to NOT do so, you noticed that right? Instead, he continued to make claims.

IF you are going to say that RE is over, Luck is all there is to business, and pass that on as gospel and myself knowing this is WRONG, I just want to know where the hell you get your information lol.

IF you know about some numbers I don't, I'm willing to learn. BUT, if you are just talking out of your own FEARS, well, don't pass that on as gospel.

snyergy says,

Want to see how to get rich? follow a rank amateur like myself through the perils of learning the ropes and see where we all end up. one thing is for certain ...it should be one heck of a ride.

How can you criticize Str8up and others when they talk about "Getting Rich Schemes" but yet promote your own personal one lol?? Who are you John T. Reed now lol. It's good you are getting into the game. And I hope you guys obtain the funding you need to get going. But when you are growing your business and working day in and day OUT, which is what you typically do when you first start, I would find another "buddy" on these forums as Duffdog will tell you all of our overtime means nothing because LUCK is all there is to your success lol.

 

[Duffdog]

Ok, well, I will provide facts based on the words I provided. RE boomed basically to a high point in the middle of this decade because PEOPLE THAT SHOULD NOT HAVE BEEN in RE was in there along with other things occurring.

LOL! "other things"...that's very specific you know. I should have learned forecasting from you. The "other things" that you mention is what you should be talking about. Not people in real estate who "should not have been there". The simple fact is that anyone who made lots of money in real estate at the right time should have been there and if they did not make any money, then they should not have been there. Again, it comes down to luck. If you were lucky enough to sell your properties at the high point, then you are an economic guru who is all knowing and rules the universe. If you were not lucky enough, you weren't supposed to be there anyways. Typical.



Houses and property was selling. GOOD, FAST. RE only fell when the crisis hit.

So, this crisis you mention was what? A giant real estate meteor that fell from the sky and made everyone's house value drop? NO--the "crisis" was engineered from the beginning as a massive fraud that some people knew that they could get away with. And they did get away with it. Those who weren't in on the scheme yet tried to use it got sent to jail or ended up in the news.

However, RE's numbers are UP since the fall, which is what I said, if you follow up on ANY amount of business analysis you will know that.

I won't begin to tell you how incredibly stupid you are for writing this. The .reason that laypeople believe that "real estate is up" is because they do not and cannot have access to the real information that would tell them the real story. I guarantee that you do not have access to internal bank documents that show how huge the losses will be in this coming year. The only information you have access to is the information that the financial institutions want you to have. In short, if you got information for free on the internet and did not pay for it, I guarantee it is totally fraudulent and intended as a method to entice novice investors to jump back into the market and lose their life savings

However, in case YOU synergy have not been following up on business information, I will provide those statistics for you lol.

Your statistics are useless. See above.

See synergy I'm not doing RE now I'm focused on business, but I read up on ALL OF IT because these things effect businesses regardless.

I call you out and Duffdog because you make claims that do not relate to present day reality. I asked Duffdog to provide facts and statistics for his claims and he decided to NOT do so, you noticed that right?

Every "fact" that you think you have presented is really just an opinion formulated by management and handed down to some subordinate office worker who was told to make a chart/ table that shows whatever management wants it to show. You show me a chart saying the economy is good, Ill show you one saying its bad. Show me a chart that says global warming is real and Ill show you 50 that show its not. It just depends on whomever benefits from the dissemination of the chart.

Instead, he continued to make claims.

And you should listen to them as they are correct.

IF you are going to say that RE is over, Luck is all there is to business, and pass that on as gospel and myself knowing this is WRONG, I just want to know where the hell you get your information lol.


IF you know about some numbers I don't, I'm willing to learn.

No, obviously you are not willing. But, just in case you are willing to learn, please look up "shadow inventory" as it relates to real estate. When you realize that you were completely wrong about all aspects of real estate right now, I will accept your apology.

BUT, if you are just talking out of your own FEARS, well, don't pass that on as gospel.

Yeah, I'm "afraid"...thats it.

How can you criticize Str8up and others when they talk about "Getting Rich Schemes" but yet promote your own personal one lol?? Who are you John T. Reed now lol. It's good you are getting into the game. And I hope you guys obtain the funding you need to get going. But when you are growing your business and working day in and day OUT, which is what you typically do when you first start, I would find another "buddy" on these forums as Duffdog will tell you all of our overtime means nothing because LUCK is all there is to your success lol.

If you take my meaning of luck to be the unquantifiable x-factor which I defined earlier, then you too should realize the folly of your statement.

Whats the matter Message Boy? Got owned too hard in the other thread so now you come crawling back to this one?

 

[synergy1]

Before you jump into something huge do something small. The most important skills you need to learn will come from trying to make a small business produce. For instance you need to develop marketing, sales, networking, proper money management, product research and development, competitive pricing... you can't learn any of these without diving into whatever it is you are doing.

A vast majority of start-up companies secure loans/grants, spend all over the place and are bankrupt within a year because they weren't able to handle what they had. Your first endeavour shouldn't cost you much money, You can open a small operation and make it produce for under $500. Make it your goal to start small and build upwards. You will be alot happier without the pressure of having to make it work cause you have thousands invested in the project.

actually this is exactly how we structured our process. The pieces are in place: finance, engineering, networking, and initial costs. Our initial endeavor is small- a feasibility study. If our contractor likes what we came up with, we will try and get phase 2 going and start developing our technologies. Concurrently, we will have networking going on and hopefully be finding new customers.

We have a good team of folks, and with a little ingenuity, I think we can make this work. Its tough being vague here, but so much falls under our NDA that I don't want to violate it!

 

[The Message Boy]

This thread is BY FAR the best financial thread this site has ever had. I want to keep it going and not ruin it with worthless arguments.

If you think the basics covered in this thread are stupid, way off base, etc., then do the rest of us who wish to continue discussing this topic a favor and JUST NOT READ THIS THREAD.

Back to the subject.

Anybody doing RE right now? How are things going? Str8up I know you said you had about 30 posts left, I think you should invest those last posts in this thread provding more tips, insight, etc. because this thread will more than likely make you a Sosuave Hall of Famer, forget the discussions on women, we all know about the ins and outs of that subject and the women topics have been beat to death.

I have a small business, RE I've been reading up on and studying but haven't gotten into it. I might eventually though.

So everybody else, who's investing in RE or business? How is it going? Share your experiences, tips, insight, etc.

 

[Vice]

I read this post about a year ago, and bookmarked it. I have no idea why I did it; it was a subconscious thing. I also joined a real estate investors group in my local area. I had no idea what the hell they were all talking about for my first few meetings. I had ZERO knowledge; I have never owned or even RENTED my own place. I lived in college dorms. (Still do)

I didn't think anything of it until about a few months ago, when my car's transmission broke, and I realized that scrambling for money was not the way I wanted to live. This thread surfaced from the shadows of my subconscious, and I went out and bought Rich Dad Poor Dad. And I read the whole book in two days. And then I went out and bought more Rich Dad Poor Dad material, and more and more. I downloaded audiobooks. And read. And read.

And read.

I spent my days after work reading. I neglected my social life. I stopped going to the gym as often. I continued reading.

I'm STILL reading. Almost exclusively Rich Dad Poor Dad material. I even signed up for a seminar, and spent $500 on a weekend long seminar on real estate investing.

I'm learning about precious metals investing.

How much money have I made so far? ZERO DOLLARS. What I have to show for everything I have worked towards so far, however, is that my financial intelligence has increased by ONE THOUSAND PERCENT. For less than the one thousand dollars and countless hours and weekends I've put into my education, I now have the potential to make millions, if not billions.

Thanks STR8UP!

 

[synergy1]

i can not tell if the above post is serious or sarcastic.

Always wondered what became of the O.P and how his newest venture was going. anyone hear from him at all?

 

[Jon55]

www.startupnation.com is a good one.
www.youngentrepreneur.com Don't let the name fool you, it's a good site.


Definatley chronicle your experience. As I work to launch a venture I find nothing better that to hear from people who have BTDT.

I had a real cool experience last night as I got to see a guest speaker in an entreprenuer class. This guy just graduated from college (with a pretty worthless degree) and was broke as a joke when he and his buddy decided to open a business. Now, two years later, they are franchising with over 25 stores.

Awesome, thanks for the links.

 

[Jon55]

I read this post about a year ago, and bookmarked it. I have no idea why I did it; it was a subconscious thing. I also joined a real estate investors group in my local area. I had no idea what the hell they were all talking about for my first few meetings. I had ZERO knowledge; I have never owned or even RENTED my own place. I lived in college dorms. (Still do)

I didn't think anything of it until about a few months ago, when my car's transmission broke, and I realized that scrambling for money was not the way I wanted to live. This thread surfaced from the shadows of my subconscious, and I went out and bought Rich Dad Poor Dad. And I read the whole book in two days. And then I went out and bought more Rich Dad Poor Dad material, and more and more. I downloaded audiobooks. And read. And read.

And read.

I spent my days after work reading. I neglected my social life. I stopped going to the gym as often. I continued reading.

I'm STILL reading. Almost exclusively Rich Dad Poor Dad material. I even signed up for a seminar, and spent $500 on a weekend long seminar on real estate investing.

I'm learning about precious metals investing.

How much money have I made so far? ZERO DOLLARS. What I have to show for everything I have worked towards so far, however, is that my financial intelligence has increased by ONE THOUSAND PERCENT. For less than the one thousand dollars and countless hours and weekends I've put into my education, I now have the potential to make millions, if not billions.

Thanks STR8UP!

And the authors, Robert Kiyosaki and Sharon Lechter, can't thank you enough for fattening their bank accounts. It's great to hear that you've grown so much with regards to financial intelligence, but please put it to good use. Take it from me, you can read all the material on the subject in the world, but until you actually start applying it and receiving the results you want, it's all a big waste.

 

[SmokingSquirrel]

Oh man, Duffdog, this certainly has been entertaining. While many of your arguments are right on the money, they are lost on many people. Those who are desperate to make money (especially the ones who turn to dating forums) do not want to hear that earning it does, to an extent, require luck; This is simply because luck is something that is beyond their control.

I feel for you bro.

 

[Vice]

And the authors, Robert Kiyosaki and Sharon Lechter, can't thank you enough for fattening their bank accounts. It's great to hear that you've grown so much with regards to financial intelligence, but please put it to good use. Take it from me, you can read all the material on the subject in the world, but until you actually start applying it and receiving the results you want, it's all a big waste.

Kiyosaki makes most of his money from a gold mine he started in China, as well as energy companies. But his company Rich Dad does make him money as well.

But I have been putting it to good use, and there's still a tremendous amount of information for me to catch up on.

But I've stopped spending so much time reading about personal finance and I've started to go out more again, and I've stopped reading so much material on meeting girls and instead I've just started going out and DOING IT. Not much success yet, I spent the summer studying personal finance and socializing minimally, now it feels like I'm starting back from square one again.

 

[todays_news]

actually quite inspiring... im getting those books.