When I wrote a money book called ‘Join the Rich Club’ I made it short and sweet so that people would be inclined to read it. The sales were good, but I’d like to think a lot more people got to read it (but maybe expecting people to read is so old hat – even the term “old hat” is old hat and maybe I should’ve written “so yesterday.”)
The quote on the front from the comedian, Sophie Tucker sums up why I like teaching people money lessons in an entertaining way. Sophie once said: “I’ve been rich. I’ve been poor. Rich is better.”
Getting there, that is getting rich, is easier said than done. But actually saying to yourself that you want to get rich is a starting point. You have to commit to a change before it can actually happen under your own steam.
Sometimes external forces can make us change — a loss of a loved one or a sickness event — can prod us to reform silly ways but without such dramatic stimuli, we all need to commit to new ways of thinking and acting.
Verne Harnish in his “Mastering the Rockefeller Habits” talked about leading staff with simple rules that are repeated often. And it works with kids too, if you as a parent have the guts to stick to it!
So, what are the simple rules to get richer? Try these:
- Set a HUGE goal, such as a $300,000 salary, a $2 million house, a great start-up business.
- Write down a plan to make it happen. For example, buy cheap properties, renovate them, flip them until you’re sitting in a $2 million property. It could be borrowing $30,000 to study at Harvard and coming back to Australia to get a $300,000 job!
- Aim to find more money in your life to use to invest in assets that will grow in value. Look at what you earn and spend and make a decision to work harder to get more income or to spend less or both!
- Commit to buying great stocks or units in great funds or property when markets are in panic mode and then wait for the long-term rebound. Be a buyer when most are selling and be a seller when everyone wants to buy.
- Read and listen to every smart person out there who writes books, does videos or podcasts that will make you smarter by the day.
These five steps are the building blocks to becoming richer and smarter than most but here is my most important piece advice — you have to really want it and you have to really believe it.
Take this lesson from Muhammad Ali: “It’s the repetition of affirmations that leads to self-belief and once that belief becomes a deep conviction, things begin to happen.”
Write down what you want for yourself and see it every day and you will do something every day to make it happen.
If you can’t do that, you don’t really want it.
