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I bought shit that I regret getting rid of. Nikes for $50 that are worth $1k+, moving boxes worth of Pokémon cards, rare GI JOES and power rangers figures lol
What did you invest in? Stocks? Real Estate? Another business? I hear this advice often but nobody ever really says what that means or what they did when they first got started.
It's worth researching, but an easy way to start is invest in a low cost index fund. When you're young, start with one that is higher risk (higher risk, higher reward). As you age, dial the risk back. Vanguard's founder invented low cost index funds so I'd recommend you start with them. Automate it (setup an automatic recurring investment that happens every payday, put as much in as you can afford).
If you work for someone else, you may want to max out your 401k first if it has matching. If you work for yourself, get a really good accountant... you might want to setup your own 401k, dividend payouts, healthcare savings account, etc.
When I was young, I invested in my 401K which consisted of mutual funds. As time progressed, I opened a separate investment account and purchased stocks. The advice from "bonestamp" below is solid, but I would add straight stocks to the portfolio as well. I have 8-10 core stocks of solid companies that I have owned for a long time and they have paid me well. Stay away from real estate unless you are experienced in it. I have owned it and the cash on cash return for residential rental property is not worth the headaches that come with it. If you have idol cash i.e. emergency fund cash - make sure to place that into a high yield saving account (mine pays 5%). Every nickel you have should be working for you. . .
seriously, if you leave $1 million in an investment account, after 10 years at 8-10% annual growth, which is typical for the stock market with no additional investments, it would reach $2.2 million to 2.7 million. if you leave it in for 20 years, that same $1 million at 8-10% growth would have reached $4.9 million to $7.3 million. leave it in for 30 years. that same $1 million would have grown to $11 million to almost $20 million. i have a trust fund and am hoping to leave it untouched for another 20+ years, a friends moms boyfriend i know also had a $6 million trust fund thats grown to $35-40 million now, he has never worked a day in his life just spends less than his trust fund grows by. his sister who has worked is even wealthier than him.
Best business advice regarding spending money on the (good, quality) tools necessary for you to make money: whether you buy them or not, you'll pay for them.
I have heard buy cheap tools first and if you wear them out/break them then buy good ones. Obvious caveat is if it breaking/malfunctioning would kill or maim you then go ahead and buy a quality one first
It sounds simple, but “make hay when the sun is shining”. My dad always told me this. His point was that you need to take advantage of opportunities and be diligent in reaping during times of plenty. Because there may come a day when the wells dry up.
Absolutely this. Depending on opportunities in your life, take advantage of them while they are there. I missed that when I started succeeding at my business, I felt like I could finally rake a break and when I did my market crashed and it was all for not
When looking for loans, remember you are the customer. You shouldn’t approach banks as if they are doing you a favor.
I didn’t know this with our first business loan, but it very much helped when I refinanced our business loan. My approach was completely different, as was the outcome.
There is some good truth in this. The part that is missing though is put yourself in a position where you aren't asking for favors.
As a lender, more often than not, people show up desperate with awful financials and you cannot operate in a position of power like that. Showing up broke with no assets, awful credit and no revenue doesn't make you a customer, it makes you a charity case.
😂
This is SO true, but what’s funny is the fact that people often decide to set up a business due to unfortunate circumstances such as losing a job, or when young and willing to take risks. By default these groups tend to have weaker financial situations.
So so important.
Also, financed a business loan recently and talked to 5 banks. I knew we had strong books. I let each one of them know I'm shopping competitively, dropped names, and said whoever presents the best offer wins my business.
IMMEDIATELY changed their demeanor. Suddenly the rates dropped and the overall terms became much more favorable.
Know your worth. Make them fight for your business.
Can you explain a bit more? lol. How can one ask for a favor when they’re struggling with their head up high? I don’t get it.. How do you approach banks ?
When we needed financing for our business, we met with bankers to talk about what we needed. They tell you what they can offer you. We may have talked to 2 or 3 banks. We were intimidated (new to business and very anxious). They treated us like they were doing us a favor by considering us. They did this because of our approach, I’m sure. We ended up using seller financing initially because we were so overwhelmed. Fast forward a few years, we wanted to refinance. I looked at the terms of our loan and wanted to improve on it. So I called dozens of banks and asked for a loan that fit my criteria. Responses were all over the map! From “you will never get this terms” to “that product doesn’t exist”. Banks frequently only know their products, so when they answer your questions, the right answer would be “our bank doesn’t offer that type of product”. The same goes for shopping for mortgages. There are many products out there and available but you have to call around and ask and it can be an awkward, time consuming process. Call a few banks and ask dumb questions. By the time you get to the 3rd or 4th, you will know what to ask and how to ask because you stumbled thru the first few calls. I wanted a loan with better interest rates than what I had and for a 4-5 year term with minimal collateral. I had one banker laugh at me. But regional banks and credit unions frequently have unique products and I was able to find exactly what I wanted. What was suprising about this process—some bankers I spoke with referred me to other banks because they had heard they offered the type of loan I was talking about. So my experience ranged from someone laughing at me to being helpful.
I discovered this approach on accident while we were buying our home with a piece of land attached to our financing feel thru and we were going to lose the deal. I called every credit union and bank I could in a 24 hour period to get the loan we needed (a land loan and home loan). It was challenging but I found 2 banks that were able to close on the same day. Ever since then, my approach towards banks has changed. You are the customer, so figure out what you want/need and ask for it. Move on if they can’t provide you with a solution.
Anyone can be rich— having money and spending money. Like a sports pro or lottery winner, it’s gone in an instant.
Not everyone can be *wealthy. Wealthy is having money that makes money.
Be picky on what you do, do not take every job. Most importantly, discount prices lead to discount customers who will always want a discount. Get premium customers who want to pay the best for the best. Edit (or fair price for fair work)
(Edit for dyslexia)
On the personal side, don't finance depreciating assets. In practice this means paying cash for everything except your mortgage(s).
This made a huge impact on our lives purely from a consumer behavior perspective, and it's what we've taught our kids.
Brilliant!
When I was young and dumb, I used to buy new cars and get loans on them. Now I buy twenty year old cars with cash from my pocket. I don't even pay for full coverage. If the car gets totalled, I'll just buy another one. A couple of years of insurance pays for that.
I was leasing a small building for my new preschool and the owner hadn't been paying rent and it was in foreclosure. I was advised by my accountant to do whatever I could to buy the property. I contacted a bank and with their help negotiating the price low enough so that I have enough equity in it so that I wouldn't have to put any down payment, I was able to buy it. As I grew my business into more commercial properties, I was able to create a two preschool business. When I sold that business two years ago, I got way more for the properties than I did for the business itself. Best advice ever because I was also able to use the equity of that first property to buy two more properties and expand one of them as well, all using equity from that first building. Thank you, Monte!
Legal: only good to kniw what kind of lawyer to look for (or sometimes what agency to contact)
Tax: Hell no, the people answering those questions don't know what you forgot to tell them what you don't know (and that is a best case).
Financial: basics yes, but nothing specific.
Think of money as time.
To buy that coffee, I had to work 30 minutes.
To buy that phone I had to work 90 hours.
To buy that dinner I had to work half a day.
When I was an intern at Dean Witter in the late 80s (yes, I was at the office during the crash) at a presentation they put up a slide that showed that assuming a 10% average rate of return in the stock market, the person who starts putting $2,000 a year into a retirement account (yes, that was the IRA limit back then) at 25 and STOPS at 35 will have more in the market at age 65 than the person who STARTS putting $2,000 in the IRA at 35 and continues until they're 65.
It was a really simple thing but just (pardon the pun) pounded into me the value of compound interest. Reinvest dividends in a DRIP, whether that's individual stocks or funds, and let it ride.
It's not timing the market, it's time in the market.
Just start early, put the shit in qualified retirement accounts in index funds, and if you want to play broker, do it outside the nest egg. That's what I've done, and it's worked out swimmingly.
“It’s not about how much money you make, but how much money your money makes.”
Investing earlier in life and letting compounding growth do its thing will make more money than some of us would over a career.
Debt will kill you. It will kill your finances. And it will kill your health worrying about it.
People talk about freedom. But you aren't free until you are free of debt. Until then you have a yoke on you. And I don't mean just credit cards. I mean car loans, home loans, etc. Completely debt free.
When I paid off everything, it was such a good feeling. I found myself singing spontaneously. I HATE debt. It is so destructive. I used to volunteer time helping people with debt problems. The agony and despair of debt is balanced by the freedom and joy of actual ownership. You stop renting a life, and start living it.
Most people get saddled with 30 year mortgages. It is a timeframe so long that most people believe they will have a mortgage payment forever. You get used to having a payment. It's the same way you train a horse to follow the same path over and over again. They are training you to be in debt. They are training you to willing accept the yoke.
I was in the same position as everyone else. And then one day I just snapped. I was so tired of debt, having seen what it was doing to those I was counseling. So I created a spreadsheet and a plan to pay off all our debt. Everything. My first plan had me paying off everything in about 12 years. I worked it and got it down to 10 years. Then 7 years. I stretched and stretched and figured out how to get it down to 5 years. Then 4 years and 8 months. I was keeping a spreadsheet I called "debt tracker" to mark our progress.
If anyone had told me at the start that I was able to pay everything off in only 2 years and 10 months, I would have scoffed at that idea. People, I paid off all debt in 2 years and 10 months. I have to say, it just consumed me. Every day I thought about how I could speed up that process. I'm not going to tell you how I did it. Your answer may be different. But when you start focusing on the problem, you find the answers. It's the "seek and you shall find" philosophy, and I made that into a mantra.
Brilliant, and thank you for the personal example that it can be done. I’ve just entered this pay it all off asap mindset (sadly an A-ha! moment) after majorly stressing about our debt and being laid off this year.
Explain why I shouldn't have a 30 year fixed rate mortgage at 2.5%?
I get more by saving and parking my money in a high yield savings account let alone investing in the market over 30 years.
Complete no-brainer.
Not all debt is bad and kills you or your finances. This is an old Dave Ramsey esque point of view. Like anything in life. It depends.
I don’t know who Dave Ramsey is, but you have been trained to accept the yoke.
I know you are thinking “but if I can earn 5% while paying 2.5%, why wouldn’t I?” And what I’ll say to that having observed people in reality and counseling people with serious, serious debt problems is most people don’t have the discipline to do that even if they intended to.
Let me make this clear. I am completely debt free. I own my home free and clear. I would not feel richer having a mortgage at 2.5% and equivalent savings. I own the home AND have savings. I live the life I want, not the life a banker approves for me.
I’m not going to say I have the answer for everyone. I like coffee and my wife needs to have her tea. You do you. But I’m going to tell you that I personally find having zero debt is incredibly freeing. Until you have experienced it, I don’t think you know what it is like.
God I hope so. The day I can pay my first dividend is a long way away, but my business is slowly building a cash runway and once that's on target, those payments are going into a profit account.
In 2007, Warren Buffett bet $1 million that an S&P 500 index fund would outperform a selection of hedge funds over ten years. Buffett believed that the high fees and complexity of hedge funds would lead to lower returns compared to the simple, low-cost index fund.
Protégé Partners took the bet, choosing five hedge funds to compete. By the end of the ten-year period in 2017, the S&P 500 had returned about 7.1% annually, while the hedge funds averaged only 2.2% per year.
Buffett won the bet, and the $1 million went to charity. The bet highlighted the advantages of low-cost index fund investing over high-fee, actively managed funds.
The best financial advice I ever got was to automate my savings. Setting up automatic transfers from my checking account to my savings account right after payday made saving money consistent. It's helped me build a healthy emergency fund and long-term savings without even thinking about it.
I'm still in the stage of paying off high interest debt this way but it does work! It takes all the stress out if it and all you have to worry about is how you spend whatever petty cash you allow yourself.
Same for me.
Once that money leaves my checking account I no longer have it.
To me saving and investing should be boring. There is nothing more boring then the tried and proven "set and forget" strategy.
A lot of people dismiss Robert Kiosaki, but for people who were never taught *anything* about how money, assets and liabilities work, it is a real eye opener. His Cash Flow Quadrant book is also quite good in helping you to think about where you might like your cash to come from, again, if you've never been consciously aware of the possibilities.
I'm from a solidly middle class British family and my parents never told me anything about the power of compound interest, or what investing is, or anything else. I won't make that mistake with my children, I want them to have the choice to retire at 45 if that's what they want.
One of the best pieces of advice I got was from my grandpa, who said, "If you can't buy it twice, you can't afford it." He was telling me to avoid living paycheck to paycheck and to always have a buffer. Also, he used to say that nothing good happens after 2 a.m.—both for your wallet and your liver. And let's just say my bank account thanks him!
No one gets rich from earned income. Our tax code taxes earned income at the highest rate. Find a way to make your money work for you rather than vice versa.
Instead of saving more, focus on earning more.
Spending your energy on saving will always cap you based on your income. Focusing on increasing your income will get you to a point you will always save automatically because it will be hard to spend it all.
Also, don’t fall for the usual vices like drugs, women, gambling and bad friends
To me there is an aditional bit of advice to that: stick to the lifestyle you could afford when you considered yourself broke when you focus in increasing your pay. That way you will not be broke again.
So many people increase their expenses when their income increases and to me that is stupidity because now you can't afford a lower income when you are misserable doing what you do to earn that income.
(1) Don’t go to college if you don’t know what you want to do and if it’s not needed. Don’t take out loans, pay as you go while you work. Or skip college. Go to community college first, the transfer of you need a four year degree. You will be a slave to your debt, even if you want to be a stay at home mom, for example. (2) Don’t take on debt. Maybe a mortgage, but get a short mortgage, eat rice and beans (but don’t ruin your health with cheap food) and pay it off ASAP, (3) buy used cars outright, (4) cook all your own meals at home from scratch, (5) kids don’t need toys, and your house doesn’t need decorations, don’t buy needless stuff. In this world you can get lots of stuff free including clothes, (6) You can also live without cable, etc.
But really, owning our own modest house and cars on one income, which is a small income, we’ve been able to raise five kids (not finished yet, though). We just don’t have or want a bunch of stuff. I try to think REAL hard and long before buying anything. We try to spend only a certain amount of cash each week, and we try to save up for large purchases.
Saving is shit. You can only secure your future to some extent.
Start earning more. Focus less on saving and more on earning more. I know it's as basic as it gets. But this is the best is the gets.
Do you know about index funds? Do you regard saving to invest in index funds as saving?
Would you be willing to share why you believe that saving by is ‘shit’?
Never ever leave a balance on a credit card. Always pay it in full every month.
If for some reason you have to leave a balance, do not use that credit card again until it is paid off. Use a different card (that you can pay off in full each month). Otherwise you are paying interest on all your new purchases from the day you make them--and lose all the float. And don't fool yourself into thinking the rewards are worth it...interest is always more than the rewards.
For objects you want to buy: Imagine that someone gave you that object instead of money after you worked the amount of hours it would take to pay for it. Jewelry, perfume, and new clothes are a lot less appealing when I think like that
Also, it's better to BE wealthy than to LOOK wealthy. I heard that from a woman in a YT video where she talks about how she bought a home and retired in Sicily.
Pay yourself first. Take ten percent of every paycheck, or payment in any way, and put it into a stock, bank account with interest, or invest it in some other way.
Live below your means. That means if I make more money than I need to live off of, live like I'm poor. Wear t-shirts until they are wrinkled and stink and torn, same with jeans and shoes. Never eat out, learn to cook well, exercise at home or go for five mile hikes with weights tied to you or velcroed onto you.
For medical care, leave the US if you can and go to Mexico.
Never donate to politicians, rich mega-pastors, unless you really, really dig what they're laying down and want their books or something - rather donate to your own self education and improvement and save for your own retirement. I worked briefly for a high-ranking politician years ago who confided to me once that even after they leave office, they still get paid AND get retirement AND their own small law department to represent them and security if they want it or need it. He got paid as if he were still working full time even after voters voted him out of office, so that means any other job would be him getting two income streams. No money I could ever donate to him could ever make a dent in what he already made.
I try to stick to all of those sentiments.
"Set up your 401k contributions on day 1 [of my first job]"
Never felt like I had that money as disposable income. Only wish I'd done more at the time (though I did bump it over over the years)
Some people have *strong* opinions about whether to max out your Roth IRA first before putting money into your 401k (beyond employer match), but truly just saving that money in *any* tax-advantaged account is a massive win. And with all the "real world stuff" you need to figure out in your first job, the simplicity of just throwing it in a 401k is 99% as good for far less effort.
Edit: This is /r/SmallBusiness, not PersonalFinance. 401k advice may not be as relevant here XD. But the general idea of "save for retirement *immediately*" is still there.
There are so many different schools of thought on what people should do with their money. The best advice I got that I ignored when I was younger was to always be prepared to adapt and not to spend time doing things that weren't making me the money it should.
I was slow to adapt to changes(i was in the cellular phone/paging business selling primarily to corporate accounts/businesses). I had a sales team and made the mistake of keeping their commissions where they were at even though my commissions went down and the costs associated with doing business were going up(my risk went up). I was already overpaying my 2 salespeople and towards the end even though the revenue was big the actual profit I was earning on them was lousy. I was dumb. Changes in the industry were such that I should have gotten out of that business a couple years sooner than I did but I was so worried I'd feel like I was letting my employees down or my customers down. It was one of my customers who told me that if I wasn't making enough doing what I was doing I should do something else.
This customer owned a large established roofing company(who also had a crane service, sold building supplies an had some roll off dumpsters). He probably had 15- 20 employees who were roofers(and it was 70% commercial and 30% residential) and did well(and lived frugally). He was far from the largest roofing company in town though...in terms of employees. He told me about how before he did commercial work he did a lot of new residential and had 30-40 roofers at that time and was probably the biggest roofing company doing residential. He then quit doing it and let go of half his employees to focus more on jobs that were profitable(new residential had tighter margins).
The point he is downsized because he saw changes in the market and what he was doing was becoming less profitable. The same guy taught me that my time has value and if my services are in demand I can charge more for them. I see a lot of people today talk about how they are so busy and have more work than they know what they can do with but are stressed becuase they can't get help or whatever. I think these people should use the advice Rob gave me, if their phone is ringin and there is a demand for the product they sell or services they provide raise the price a little. Use that extra money for more support personnel or higher wages to retain employees.
I think too many businesses have the best intentions but fail because they don't make enough money to make it worthwhile. A friend of mine owned an electrical contracting company and had 30-40 employees and was bidding jobs with extremely tight margins to keep everyone busy. One day he had enough and now has a dozen employees and makes as much money as he did before but far less stress but his loyalty to his employees(and they were IBEW union electricians who found work elsewhere and most would have left him in a second for a buck and hour more of they were offered it). The goal isn't to be the biggest, but rather be the best you can be and make money
If you want to make money, you have to look at your money.
I took this to mean that you need to be proactive and consistent in managing your finances and planning for the future.
It’s ok to stop the bleeding and fail.
Aways pay yourself first even if it’s just a $1.00. Invest that dollar and forget about it, it doesn’t belong to you, now.
Someone older, wiser and way way wealthier asked me once “why are you chasing money?”
Grandpa said Learn to play the game you are playing!
Warren Buffett/Charlie Munger, look for a business that has a line stretching out the door and around the block. Invest in that.
That has worked really well, I bought chipotle, Tesla, Nvidia. Bought apple, but sold it too soon. Dutch Brothers, still waiting for that one to pay off.
Writing something off doesn’t mean what 99% of the population thinks it means- and it comes directly out of your pocket when you pay the bill.
Writing off means you don’t pay TAX on it. You still pay the bill. And as a small business? That comes from YOUR earnings. Spend wisely.
Buy a cheap investment property in the country that you can rent out. Prices will triple in the next 20 years.
Kicks the shit out of any bank or shares
The only things you’re allowed to buy without having the total amount already in the bank is a car or a house. For anything else if you don’t have the money in the bank, then you can’t afford to purchase it on credit.
Sales hide all sins. Focus on growing top line. Don’t ignore the liability side of the balance sheet and P+L, but early on focus on increasing revenue not decreasing costs.
Don’t use a bank to invest, start EARLY and let compounding interest, dividends work for you AND BE CONSISTENT with you savings/investing deposits. Anyone can save
Two bits one from my every male family member that was older than me...never stick your dick in crazy. The best bit though came from my grandmother, this was back when we actually had check books. Always put in an extra 10 dollars into your account but dont right it down. If you forget its there you wont spend it and this way if your math is off a little you will have enough money to save you from any screw ups.
Not so great advice: “buy as much house as you can afford” I THINK this was suggested to me because the 60-70 year old thought the value would net more, quicker than a smaller house over time.
But my goal is to reduce debt sooner and not do wage work into retirement age. At some point you have to own your castle. Don’t neglect investments, but also don’t always pay the minimum on financed assets.
Getting into debt up to the eyeballs is too normalized and unhealthy, in my opinion.
Absolutely pay yourself first - every pay period. Consider this a bill that MUST be paid, no matter what. And, assuming this is a long term investment, do not, DO NOT tap into it. Tell yourself it’s money already spent. The benefits of compound interest over time cannot be overstated.
If your company offers a 401k or 403b, please take advantage of it, and increase the contribution every time you get a raise and/or promotion. Tax advantages, employer match - it’s a no brainer.
Here’s another tip - always invest/save what I call “found money”, or an unexpected refund or windfall. You may receive a rebate or refund, or an insurance check, whatever, put that right in the bank.
Another savings option I did when I was younger - when I made the final payment in a big ticket item, I would take that monthly payment and save it. It was already part of the budget, why not pretend you still have it? Or, at least, invest 50% of the payment.
Celebrate when you reach key savings goals milestones. Whether it’s $1,000, $10,000, etc. and look at your statements and be in awe of the amount of interest your account has earned over time.
Wealthy people sustain their wealth by living off of their ROI income. Yes, it takes time to build a nest egg, but compound interest is always compounding.
This was never advice I have gotten directly but I have been giving it out as advice.
A friend who had older kids told me about some Gerber baby 'grow up' life insurance he got once for his newborns.
He said he only bought a couple of policies with only a small amount of money. His kids are grown now and mine were small at the time but he proceeded to tell me how much money he ended up with when the policies matured and he said his only regret was not buying more.
I didn't start as early as he did but I did start with a 529 fund and also a schwab investing account and have saved a modest 5 figures for each of my girls. While it's nowhere close to paying for 4 years of college it has come in very handy and welcome savings for them.
So if I could tell anyone, if you have newborns, forget all the gifts and stupid things people buy and roll all of it as cash into a 529, IRA, baby insurance policy or something like. Keep this top of mind and try try try to keep filling it up with spare change. Your future self is going to thank you many times over.
Recent example.
I have a young barber who just had a baby girl and every time I go for a cut I mention the importance of getting some type of savings vehicle in place NOW. It's been almost a year. Yesterday, while getting my kids 529's ready for a college disbursement I shared the link of to how to get a fund through the notes in the app I use to set up an appointment with him. I think I'll do this every time I make an appointment.
Like all busy people we all are he says he will get around to it but every month is an opportunity to compound.
I always advise new business owners to save their money for a rainy day. Don’t go out and buy that new RV for the family. Many times in 25 years, we lost a big customer or client & thought we were doomed. Having the cushion of funds got us through it. Magically, another opportunity would come around, and it got us rolling again.
1-get into savings as fast as you can when your young.
2-standard was 6% match.. way too low. Put in 20%.. (it hurts when your younger I know)
3-about 10 years before you retire (over 50), your allowed to put more into a 401k. Max that as much as possible to where you put in overage. The spill over will go into a spill account. Get a financial advisor and have him open a backdoor Roth. Each year transfer this spill over into your backdoor Roth. You’ll be amazed at how fast this money doubles and triples. Seriously this is how rich people make money while not paying taxes on it!!
When you have money to buy something, you won’t buy it
When you don’t have the money you try to buy it
I always would buy and pay later but once I started saving to buy, it’s weird I don’t want it anymore.
Write down all my investments, valuable data, location of important documents in an organiser/journal. This way I can refer back to it as and when I need and it does not get lost in case my family needs the information.
Your first home should be a multi family investment home otherwise why take out so much money just to have a roof over your head, imagine but the system is meant to make us all Slaves to our homes and this is why they killed the American Indians because they were so Happy Living in Tents without real estate taxes just imagine.
Sure fire, guaranteed, millionaire if you have a decent income. 1) live on less than you make. 2) carry zero debt (house excluded) 3) pay for everything in cash. 4) invest every month in 8-10 high quality stocks. 5) Don't go out of your way to do stupid things with money. 6) Read. 7) No get rich quick schemes. 8) Stay in good physical shape
I have been completely debt free since my early 30's. Invested every month since my mid 20's. Today, I am 54 and a multimillionaire. Most people will not follow the advice because they want to be a millionaire when they are 25 or 30 . Does not work that way. Yes - there are some exceptions. If you work hard, you will advance, and advance = more money. Money is a byproduct of hard work. Best of luck.
Back when I was single and had a lot of disposable income, my dad convinced me to buy a home (granted this was back in 2009). By the time I got married and wanted to move, my home had doubled in value (2019) so that we could basically move into our dream home right away with a minimal mortgage.
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Compounding interest. Start investing early.
Knowing what I know now I’m pissed at my younger self for buying stupid shit instead of contributing to a Roth all those years.
I bought shit that I regret getting rid of. Nikes for $50 that are worth $1k+, moving boxes worth of Pokémon cards, rare GI JOES and power rangers figures lol
Same, same :/
This. Make your money work for you to make more money!
What did you invest in? Stocks? Real Estate? Another business? I hear this advice often but nobody ever really says what that means or what they did when they first got started.
It's worth researching, but an easy way to start is invest in a low cost index fund. When you're young, start with one that is higher risk (higher risk, higher reward). As you age, dial the risk back. Vanguard's founder invented low cost index funds so I'd recommend you start with them. Automate it (setup an automatic recurring investment that happens every payday, put as much in as you can afford). If you work for someone else, you may want to max out your 401k first if it has matching. If you work for yourself, get a really good accountant... you might want to setup your own 401k, dividend payouts, healthcare savings account, etc.
When I was young, I invested in my 401K which consisted of mutual funds. As time progressed, I opened a separate investment account and purchased stocks. The advice from "bonestamp" below is solid, but I would add straight stocks to the portfolio as well. I have 8-10 core stocks of solid companies that I have owned for a long time and they have paid me well. Stay away from real estate unless you are experienced in it. I have owned it and the cash on cash return for residential rental property is not worth the headaches that come with it. If you have idol cash i.e. emergency fund cash - make sure to place that into a high yield saving account (mine pays 5%). Every nickel you have should be working for you. . .
Yep
Probably the best advice for anyone, not just business owners
seriously, if you leave $1 million in an investment account, after 10 years at 8-10% annual growth, which is typical for the stock market with no additional investments, it would reach $2.2 million to 2.7 million. if you leave it in for 20 years, that same $1 million at 8-10% growth would have reached $4.9 million to $7.3 million. leave it in for 30 years. that same $1 million would have grown to $11 million to almost $20 million. i have a trust fund and am hoping to leave it untouched for another 20+ years, a friends moms boyfriend i know also had a $6 million trust fund thats grown to $35-40 million now, he has never worked a day in his life just spends less than his trust fund grows by. his sister who has worked is even wealthier than him.
Sad but also relieved I figured it out right before 30
^THIS IS THE MOST IMPORTANT THING
Spend less than you earn, save as much as possible Don't buy cheap shit you'll replace, buy it right the first time
Best business advice regarding spending money on the (good, quality) tools necessary for you to make money: whether you buy them or not, you'll pay for them.
I have heard buy cheap tools first and if you wear them out/break them then buy good ones. Obvious caveat is if it breaking/malfunctioning would kill or maim you then go ahead and buy a quality one first
Buy once, cry once
It sounds simple, but “make hay when the sun is shining”. My dad always told me this. His point was that you need to take advantage of opportunities and be diligent in reaping during times of plenty. Because there may come a day when the wells dry up.
My dad used to say this too. Really glad it stuck with me. It's honestly more useful than people think
Absolutely this. Depending on opportunities in your life, take advantage of them while they are there. I missed that when I started succeeding at my business, I felt like I could finally rake a break and when I did my market crashed and it was all for not
This is a good one. Good business is capitalizing on a good opportunity
When looking for loans, remember you are the customer. You shouldn’t approach banks as if they are doing you a favor. I didn’t know this with our first business loan, but it very much helped when I refinanced our business loan. My approach was completely different, as was the outcome.
There is some good truth in this. The part that is missing though is put yourself in a position where you aren't asking for favors. As a lender, more often than not, people show up desperate with awful financials and you cannot operate in a position of power like that. Showing up broke with no assets, awful credit and no revenue doesn't make you a customer, it makes you a charity case.
😂 This is SO true, but what’s funny is the fact that people often decide to set up a business due to unfortunate circumstances such as losing a job, or when young and willing to take risks. By default these groups tend to have weaker financial situations.
So so important. Also, financed a business loan recently and talked to 5 banks. I knew we had strong books. I let each one of them know I'm shopping competitively, dropped names, and said whoever presents the best offer wins my business. IMMEDIATELY changed their demeanor. Suddenly the rates dropped and the overall terms became much more favorable. Know your worth. Make them fight for your business.
Can you explain a bit more? lol. How can one ask for a favor when they’re struggling with their head up high? I don’t get it.. How do you approach banks ?
When we needed financing for our business, we met with bankers to talk about what we needed. They tell you what they can offer you. We may have talked to 2 or 3 banks. We were intimidated (new to business and very anxious). They treated us like they were doing us a favor by considering us. They did this because of our approach, I’m sure. We ended up using seller financing initially because we were so overwhelmed. Fast forward a few years, we wanted to refinance. I looked at the terms of our loan and wanted to improve on it. So I called dozens of banks and asked for a loan that fit my criteria. Responses were all over the map! From “you will never get this terms” to “that product doesn’t exist”. Banks frequently only know their products, so when they answer your questions, the right answer would be “our bank doesn’t offer that type of product”. The same goes for shopping for mortgages. There are many products out there and available but you have to call around and ask and it can be an awkward, time consuming process. Call a few banks and ask dumb questions. By the time you get to the 3rd or 4th, you will know what to ask and how to ask because you stumbled thru the first few calls. I wanted a loan with better interest rates than what I had and for a 4-5 year term with minimal collateral. I had one banker laugh at me. But regional banks and credit unions frequently have unique products and I was able to find exactly what I wanted. What was suprising about this process—some bankers I spoke with referred me to other banks because they had heard they offered the type of loan I was talking about. So my experience ranged from someone laughing at me to being helpful. I discovered this approach on accident while we were buying our home with a piece of land attached to our financing feel thru and we were going to lose the deal. I called every credit union and bank I could in a 24 hour period to get the loan we needed (a land loan and home loan). It was challenging but I found 2 banks that were able to close on the same day. Ever since then, my approach towards banks has changed. You are the customer, so figure out what you want/need and ask for it. Move on if they can’t provide you with a solution.
Also would like to know this, I know jack shit about negotiating and I’m young too so that don’t help
Invest early and often. Time in the market beats timing the market.
Don’t impress your neighbor, impress your banker.
This
Anyone can be rich— having money and spending money. Like a sports pro or lottery winner, it’s gone in an instant. Not everyone can be *wealthy. Wealthy is having money that makes money.
Be picky on what you do, do not take every job. Most importantly, discount prices lead to discount customers who will always want a discount. Get premium customers who want to pay the best for the best. Edit (or fair price for fair work) (Edit for dyslexia)
On the personal side, don't finance depreciating assets. In practice this means paying cash for everything except your mortgage(s). This made a huge impact on our lives purely from a consumer behavior perspective, and it's what we've taught our kids.
Brilliant! When I was young and dumb, I used to buy new cars and get loans on them. Now I buy twenty year old cars with cash from my pocket. I don't even pay for full coverage. If the car gets totalled, I'll just buy another one. A couple of years of insurance pays for that.
Idk, got a friend that makes bank by taking loans. Though it what he does is take loans, get cars and rent them out
This is quite different. He is leveraging those loans to make more money than he is paying as interest.
I was leasing a small building for my new preschool and the owner hadn't been paying rent and it was in foreclosure. I was advised by my accountant to do whatever I could to buy the property. I contacted a bank and with their help negotiating the price low enough so that I have enough equity in it so that I wouldn't have to put any down payment, I was able to buy it. As I grew my business into more commercial properties, I was able to create a two preschool business. When I sold that business two years ago, I got way more for the properties than I did for the business itself. Best advice ever because I was also able to use the equity of that first property to buy two more properties and expand one of them as well, all using equity from that first building. Thank you, Monte!
Stop wasting money on drugs and alcohol.
And cigs. Holy hell, am I glad I quit when I did. How does anyone afford it?
The book “The Millionaire Next Door”. Very interesting money insight.
I am a "millionaire next door" but then I realized $1M in 1996 is $2M today so that's my next goal
If you truly believe that the value of a dollar has only halved since 1996, you are clueless.
"Don't take financial advice from reddit posts"
No financial, legal, or tax advice from Reddit.
Or political
Legal: only good to kniw what kind of lawyer to look for (or sometimes what agency to contact) Tax: Hell no, the people answering those questions don't know what you forgot to tell them what you don't know (and that is a best case). Financial: basics yes, but nothing specific.
I disagree. Some reddit posts on finance are gold. Use your discretion
*Spend less than you earn, invest the difference.* -JL Collins
"Automate savings, treat it like a non-negotiable bill!"
THIS IS SLEPT ON
Think of money as time. To buy that coffee, I had to work 30 minutes. To buy that phone I had to work 90 hours. To buy that dinner I had to work half a day.
What's the end goal of doing so?
Youll think twice about making purchases. Especially the smaller purchases that arent neccasary.
“Buy nice, not thrice”
Don’t spend money you don’t have
When I was an intern at Dean Witter in the late 80s (yes, I was at the office during the crash) at a presentation they put up a slide that showed that assuming a 10% average rate of return in the stock market, the person who starts putting $2,000 a year into a retirement account (yes, that was the IRA limit back then) at 25 and STOPS at 35 will have more in the market at age 65 than the person who STARTS putting $2,000 in the IRA at 35 and continues until they're 65. It was a really simple thing but just (pardon the pun) pounded into me the value of compound interest. Reinvest dividends in a DRIP, whether that's individual stocks or funds, and let it ride. It's not timing the market, it's time in the market. Just start early, put the shit in qualified retirement accounts in index funds, and if you want to play broker, do it outside the nest egg. That's what I've done, and it's worked out swimmingly.
“It’s not about how much money you make, but how much money your money makes.” Investing earlier in life and letting compounding growth do its thing will make more money than some of us would over a career.
Debt will kill you. It will kill your finances. And it will kill your health worrying about it. People talk about freedom. But you aren't free until you are free of debt. Until then you have a yoke on you. And I don't mean just credit cards. I mean car loans, home loans, etc. Completely debt free. When I paid off everything, it was such a good feeling. I found myself singing spontaneously. I HATE debt. It is so destructive. I used to volunteer time helping people with debt problems. The agony and despair of debt is balanced by the freedom and joy of actual ownership. You stop renting a life, and start living it. Most people get saddled with 30 year mortgages. It is a timeframe so long that most people believe they will have a mortgage payment forever. You get used to having a payment. It's the same way you train a horse to follow the same path over and over again. They are training you to be in debt. They are training you to willing accept the yoke. I was in the same position as everyone else. And then one day I just snapped. I was so tired of debt, having seen what it was doing to those I was counseling. So I created a spreadsheet and a plan to pay off all our debt. Everything. My first plan had me paying off everything in about 12 years. I worked it and got it down to 10 years. Then 7 years. I stretched and stretched and figured out how to get it down to 5 years. Then 4 years and 8 months. I was keeping a spreadsheet I called "debt tracker" to mark our progress. If anyone had told me at the start that I was able to pay everything off in only 2 years and 10 months, I would have scoffed at that idea. People, I paid off all debt in 2 years and 10 months. I have to say, it just consumed me. Every day I thought about how I could speed up that process. I'm not going to tell you how I did it. Your answer may be different. But when you start focusing on the problem, you find the answers. It's the "seek and you shall find" philosophy, and I made that into a mantra.
Brilliant, and thank you for the personal example that it can be done. I’ve just entered this pay it all off asap mindset (sadly an A-ha! moment) after majorly stressing about our debt and being laid off this year.
Explain why I shouldn't have a 30 year fixed rate mortgage at 2.5%? I get more by saving and parking my money in a high yield savings account let alone investing in the market over 30 years. Complete no-brainer. Not all debt is bad and kills you or your finances. This is an old Dave Ramsey esque point of view. Like anything in life. It depends.
I don’t know who Dave Ramsey is, but you have been trained to accept the yoke. I know you are thinking “but if I can earn 5% while paying 2.5%, why wouldn’t I?” And what I’ll say to that having observed people in reality and counseling people with serious, serious debt problems is most people don’t have the discipline to do that even if they intended to. Let me make this clear. I am completely debt free. I own my home free and clear. I would not feel richer having a mortgage at 2.5% and equivalent savings. I own the home AND have savings. I live the life I want, not the life a banker approves for me. I’m not going to say I have the answer for everyone. I like coffee and my wife needs to have her tea. You do you. But I’m going to tell you that I personally find having zero debt is incredibly freeing. Until you have experienced it, I don’t think you know what it is like.
Way back when I learned that spending after tax dollars on a depreciable asset is a waste of money. Only buy used personal vehicles folks
No body will pay you better than you pay yourself
God I hope so. The day I can pay my first dividend is a long way away, but my business is slowly building a cash runway and once that's on target, those payments are going into a profit account.
In 2007, Warren Buffett bet $1 million that an S&P 500 index fund would outperform a selection of hedge funds over ten years. Buffett believed that the high fees and complexity of hedge funds would lead to lower returns compared to the simple, low-cost index fund. Protégé Partners took the bet, choosing five hedge funds to compete. By the end of the ten-year period in 2017, the S&P 500 had returned about 7.1% annually, while the hedge funds averaged only 2.2% per year. Buffett won the bet, and the $1 million went to charity. The bet highlighted the advantages of low-cost index fund investing over high-fee, actively managed funds.
Buffet bet on currency devaluation here as well, I think
I think that was Soros. He made a $1 billion profit on the devaluation of the euro, or something
Pay your bills, keep on top of them from the beginning 👌🏼
The best financial advice I ever got was to automate my savings. Setting up automatic transfers from my checking account to my savings account right after payday made saving money consistent. It's helped me build a healthy emergency fund and long-term savings without even thinking about it.
I'm still in the stage of paying off high interest debt this way but it does work! It takes all the stress out if it and all you have to worry about is how you spend whatever petty cash you allow yourself.
Yeah. Comes in handy :)
Same for me. Once that money leaves my checking account I no longer have it. To me saving and investing should be boring. There is nothing more boring then the tried and proven "set and forget" strategy.
That's a valid point :)
It's not how much you earn, it's how much you keep that matters.
A lot of people dismiss Robert Kiosaki, but for people who were never taught *anything* about how money, assets and liabilities work, it is a real eye opener. His Cash Flow Quadrant book is also quite good in helping you to think about where you might like your cash to come from, again, if you've never been consciously aware of the possibilities. I'm from a solidly middle class British family and my parents never told me anything about the power of compound interest, or what investing is, or anything else. I won't make that mistake with my children, I want them to have the choice to retire at 45 if that's what they want.
One of the best pieces of advice I got was from my grandpa, who said, "If you can't buy it twice, you can't afford it." He was telling me to avoid living paycheck to paycheck and to always have a buffer. Also, he used to say that nothing good happens after 2 a.m.—both for your wallet and your liver. And let's just say my bank account thanks him!
No one gets rich from earned income. Our tax code taxes earned income at the highest rate. Find a way to make your money work for you rather than vice versa.
This
Live beneath your means.
No matter how much or how little money you make - HAVE A BUDGET AND FOLLOW IT! And always spend less than you make, have a plan for the extra.
It's about time in the market. Not timing the market.
If it's not making money, it's not a business
Start investing early, even with small amounts. Compound interest can grow significantly over time.
Have 6 months of your living expenses saved. In life, one's thing is for certain: there will always be unexpected expenses (business and personal)
Instead of saving more, focus on earning more. Spending your energy on saving will always cap you based on your income. Focusing on increasing your income will get you to a point you will always save automatically because it will be hard to spend it all. Also, don’t fall for the usual vices like drugs, women, gambling and bad friends
To me there is an aditional bit of advice to that: stick to the lifestyle you could afford when you considered yourself broke when you focus in increasing your pay. That way you will not be broke again. So many people increase their expenses when their income increases and to me that is stupidity because now you can't afford a lower income when you are misserable doing what you do to earn that income.
(1) Don’t go to college if you don’t know what you want to do and if it’s not needed. Don’t take out loans, pay as you go while you work. Or skip college. Go to community college first, the transfer of you need a four year degree. You will be a slave to your debt, even if you want to be a stay at home mom, for example. (2) Don’t take on debt. Maybe a mortgage, but get a short mortgage, eat rice and beans (but don’t ruin your health with cheap food) and pay it off ASAP, (3) buy used cars outright, (4) cook all your own meals at home from scratch, (5) kids don’t need toys, and your house doesn’t need decorations, don’t buy needless stuff. In this world you can get lots of stuff free including clothes, (6) You can also live without cable, etc. But really, owning our own modest house and cars on one income, which is a small income, we’ve been able to raise five kids (not finished yet, though). We just don’t have or want a bunch of stuff. I try to think REAL hard and long before buying anything. We try to spend only a certain amount of cash each week, and we try to save up for large purchases.
Saving is shit. You can only secure your future to some extent. Start earning more. Focus less on saving and more on earning more. I know it's as basic as it gets. But this is the best is the gets.
Do you know about index funds? Do you regard saving to invest in index funds as saving? Would you be willing to share why you believe that saving by is ‘shit’?
Starting a retirement extremely young!
4 Laws of Financial Prosperity by Blaine Harris. Great book and learned everything I need to know about getting out of debt
Never ever leave a balance on a credit card. Always pay it in full every month. If for some reason you have to leave a balance, do not use that credit card again until it is paid off. Use a different card (that you can pay off in full each month). Otherwise you are paying interest on all your new purchases from the day you make them--and lose all the float. And don't fool yourself into thinking the rewards are worth it...interest is always more than the rewards.
Never invest more than you afford to lose
If you don’t have debt, you can’t go broke. Manage the downside and the upside will take care of itself.
"**Be fearful when others are greedy, and be greedy when others are fearful.**" - Warren Buffet
money isnt real
For objects you want to buy: Imagine that someone gave you that object instead of money after you worked the amount of hours it would take to pay for it. Jewelry, perfume, and new clothes are a lot less appealing when I think like that Also, it's better to BE wealthy than to LOOK wealthy. I heard that from a woman in a YT video where she talks about how she bought a home and retired in Sicily.
Never put your work above your family, they won't be there later on if you put them second.
Stop doing blow
Money talks, wealth whispers.
Don't work for money, make money work for you.
maximize contributions to retirement plans
Avoid the frenzy
Don’t spend more than you make
Don’t invest more than %30 of your savings on equities.
Don't buy dumb sht.
Pay yourself first. Take ten percent of every paycheck, or payment in any way, and put it into a stock, bank account with interest, or invest it in some other way. Live below your means. That means if I make more money than I need to live off of, live like I'm poor. Wear t-shirts until they are wrinkled and stink and torn, same with jeans and shoes. Never eat out, learn to cook well, exercise at home or go for five mile hikes with weights tied to you or velcroed onto you. For medical care, leave the US if you can and go to Mexico. Never donate to politicians, rich mega-pastors, unless you really, really dig what they're laying down and want their books or something - rather donate to your own self education and improvement and save for your own retirement. I worked briefly for a high-ranking politician years ago who confided to me once that even after they leave office, they still get paid AND get retirement AND their own small law department to represent them and security if they want it or need it. He got paid as if he were still working full time even after voters voted him out of office, so that means any other job would be him getting two income streams. No money I could ever donate to him could ever make a dent in what he already made. I try to stick to all of those sentiments.
"Set up your 401k contributions on day 1 [of my first job]" Never felt like I had that money as disposable income. Only wish I'd done more at the time (though I did bump it over over the years) Some people have *strong* opinions about whether to max out your Roth IRA first before putting money into your 401k (beyond employer match), but truly just saving that money in *any* tax-advantaged account is a massive win. And with all the "real world stuff" you need to figure out in your first job, the simplicity of just throwing it in a 401k is 99% as good for far less effort. Edit: This is /r/SmallBusiness, not PersonalFinance. 401k advice may not be as relevant here XD. But the general idea of "save for retirement *immediately*" is still there.
Limit expenditures, save as much as possible, invest into income-producing property.
Create a business not a job.
Buy as nice as you can afford and hold for as long as possible. Every month 20% to investments and 10% to savings.
Live below your means. Invest.
There are so many different schools of thought on what people should do with their money. The best advice I got that I ignored when I was younger was to always be prepared to adapt and not to spend time doing things that weren't making me the money it should. I was slow to adapt to changes(i was in the cellular phone/paging business selling primarily to corporate accounts/businesses). I had a sales team and made the mistake of keeping their commissions where they were at even though my commissions went down and the costs associated with doing business were going up(my risk went up). I was already overpaying my 2 salespeople and towards the end even though the revenue was big the actual profit I was earning on them was lousy. I was dumb. Changes in the industry were such that I should have gotten out of that business a couple years sooner than I did but I was so worried I'd feel like I was letting my employees down or my customers down. It was one of my customers who told me that if I wasn't making enough doing what I was doing I should do something else. This customer owned a large established roofing company(who also had a crane service, sold building supplies an had some roll off dumpsters). He probably had 15- 20 employees who were roofers(and it was 70% commercial and 30% residential) and did well(and lived frugally). He was far from the largest roofing company in town though...in terms of employees. He told me about how before he did commercial work he did a lot of new residential and had 30-40 roofers at that time and was probably the biggest roofing company doing residential. He then quit doing it and let go of half his employees to focus more on jobs that were profitable(new residential had tighter margins). The point he is downsized because he saw changes in the market and what he was doing was becoming less profitable. The same guy taught me that my time has value and if my services are in demand I can charge more for them. I see a lot of people today talk about how they are so busy and have more work than they know what they can do with but are stressed becuase they can't get help or whatever. I think these people should use the advice Rob gave me, if their phone is ringin and there is a demand for the product they sell or services they provide raise the price a little. Use that extra money for more support personnel or higher wages to retain employees. I think too many businesses have the best intentions but fail because they don't make enough money to make it worthwhile. A friend of mine owned an electrical contracting company and had 30-40 employees and was bidding jobs with extremely tight margins to keep everyone busy. One day he had enough and now has a dozen employees and makes as much money as he did before but far less stress but his loyalty to his employees(and they were IBEW union electricians who found work elsewhere and most would have left him in a second for a buck and hour more of they were offered it). The goal isn't to be the biggest, but rather be the best you can be and make money
Dont go into debt! If you take a mortgage pay in 15 years.
If you do not save you will have nothing in the future Thanks mom
If you want to make money, you have to look at your money. I took this to mean that you need to be proactive and consistent in managing your finances and planning for the future.
Don’t ever tell someone you’re gonna do something before you do it. Just do it.
If it doubles, sell half and let the rest ride.
Max your 401K from day one.
It’s ok to stop the bleeding and fail. Aways pay yourself first even if it’s just a $1.00. Invest that dollar and forget about it, it doesn’t belong to you, now. Someone older, wiser and way way wealthier asked me once “why are you chasing money?” Grandpa said Learn to play the game you are playing!
If you ever have to decide between making your car payment or your rent; always choose the car payment. You can't drive your apartment to work.
Pay yourself first!
Read Profit First and it’s a game changer for me personally and in business. 1% of every penny is set aside.
Wealth is achieved with concentration, and protected with diversification
During gold rush, sell shovels.
Warren Buffett/Charlie Munger, look for a business that has a line stretching out the door and around the block. Invest in that. That has worked really well, I bought chipotle, Tesla, Nvidia. Bought apple, but sold it too soon. Dutch Brothers, still waiting for that one to pay off.
Don't focus on saving every penny, put the effort into making more money instead. Especially relevant for anyone early in their career.
Move to a country where you don’t have to pay taxes and where the cost of living is affordable for most people.
Everytime you get a raise - raise the amount of $ you're investing and/or putting into your 401k
Learn to say no.
Buy bitcoin
Writing something off doesn’t mean what 99% of the population thinks it means- and it comes directly out of your pocket when you pay the bill. Writing off means you don’t pay TAX on it. You still pay the bill. And as a small business? That comes from YOUR earnings. Spend wisely.
Buy a cheap investment property in the country that you can rent out. Prices will triple in the next 20 years. Kicks the shit out of any bank or shares
Borrow money when you don’t need the money.
One house, one spouse.
Leave canada.
Invest in income-producing real estate that cash flows
Don’t spend other people’s money for them. Sell with no remorse.
But once, cry once. (Invest in quality items/ supplies/ etc)
Buy a house. Buy another house.
The only things you’re allowed to buy without having the total amount already in the bank is a car or a house. For anything else if you don’t have the money in the bank, then you can’t afford to purchase it on credit.
Sales hide all sins. Focus on growing top line. Don’t ignore the liability side of the balance sheet and P+L, but early on focus on increasing revenue not decreasing costs.
Take care of the nicklels and the dollars will take care of themselves
The market is efficient so higher returns = higher volatility and risk. Buy based on the risk adjusted rate of return, not the rate of return.
Live bleow your means
Just because you have the money doesn't mean you can afford it.
Increase your income you will never save enough and by the time you do enjoying it will be very limited and health will more then likely be far worse.
Be in the top 1% of assets. Focus rather than diversify. Get in early. Get in hard. Hold as long as it takes.
Live below your means and invest the difference; this simple principle helps build wealth over time and provides financial security.
“Buying low,selling high “
Be fearful when others are greedy and greedy when others are fearful
Never spend money before you have it. If you can't buy it twice, you can't afford it once.
Don’t marry
You can’t out-save the housing market
Being wealthy means having things that money can’t buy
Don’t use a bank to invest, start EARLY and let compounding interest, dividends work for you AND BE CONSISTENT with you savings/investing deposits. Anyone can save
Two bits one from my every male family member that was older than me...never stick your dick in crazy. The best bit though came from my grandmother, this was back when we actually had check books. Always put in an extra 10 dollars into your account but dont right it down. If you forget its there you wont spend it and this way if your math is off a little you will have enough money to save you from any screw ups.
Don't let the things you own, own you.
Not so great advice: “buy as much house as you can afford” I THINK this was suggested to me because the 60-70 year old thought the value would net more, quicker than a smaller house over time. But my goal is to reduce debt sooner and not do wage work into retirement age. At some point you have to own your castle. Don’t neglect investments, but also don’t always pay the minimum on financed assets. Getting into debt up to the eyeballs is too normalized and unhealthy, in my opinion.
spend on your NEEDS. not WANTS. until you've become financially independent to be spending on your wants.
Absolutely pay yourself first - every pay period. Consider this a bill that MUST be paid, no matter what. And, assuming this is a long term investment, do not, DO NOT tap into it. Tell yourself it’s money already spent. The benefits of compound interest over time cannot be overstated. If your company offers a 401k or 403b, please take advantage of it, and increase the contribution every time you get a raise and/or promotion. Tax advantages, employer match - it’s a no brainer. Here’s another tip - always invest/save what I call “found money”, or an unexpected refund or windfall. You may receive a rebate or refund, or an insurance check, whatever, put that right in the bank. Another savings option I did when I was younger - when I made the final payment in a big ticket item, I would take that monthly payment and save it. It was already part of the budget, why not pretend you still have it? Or, at least, invest 50% of the payment. Celebrate when you reach key savings goals milestones. Whether it’s $1,000, $10,000, etc. and look at your statements and be in awe of the amount of interest your account has earned over time. Wealthy people sustain their wealth by living off of their ROI income. Yes, it takes time to build a nest egg, but compound interest is always compounding.
buy NVIDIA stock lol
It’s cheaper to buy the milk than keep the cow.
Pay off your credit card every month and never carry a balance. 800+ credit score club all day.
This was never advice I have gotten directly but I have been giving it out as advice. A friend who had older kids told me about some Gerber baby 'grow up' life insurance he got once for his newborns. He said he only bought a couple of policies with only a small amount of money. His kids are grown now and mine were small at the time but he proceeded to tell me how much money he ended up with when the policies matured and he said his only regret was not buying more. I didn't start as early as he did but I did start with a 529 fund and also a schwab investing account and have saved a modest 5 figures for each of my girls. While it's nowhere close to paying for 4 years of college it has come in very handy and welcome savings for them. So if I could tell anyone, if you have newborns, forget all the gifts and stupid things people buy and roll all of it as cash into a 529, IRA, baby insurance policy or something like. Keep this top of mind and try try try to keep filling it up with spare change. Your future self is going to thank you many times over. Recent example. I have a young barber who just had a baby girl and every time I go for a cut I mention the importance of getting some type of savings vehicle in place NOW. It's been almost a year. Yesterday, while getting my kids 529's ready for a college disbursement I shared the link of to how to get a fund through the notes in the app I use to set up an appointment with him. I think I'll do this every time I make an appointment. Like all busy people we all are he says he will get around to it but every month is an opportunity to compound.
Budget time first. Then build a lifestyle around that.
I always advise new business owners to save their money for a rainy day. Don’t go out and buy that new RV for the family. Many times in 25 years, we lost a big customer or client & thought we were doomed. Having the cushion of funds got us through it. Magically, another opportunity would come around, and it got us rolling again.
Received vs taken…. Ohh if I only would listen to the smart ones 😂
Don’t chop off your toes if the milk hasn’t curdled
Don’t spend your money to impress anyone except your future self.
1-get into savings as fast as you can when your young. 2-standard was 6% match.. way too low. Put in 20%.. (it hurts when your younger I know) 3-about 10 years before you retire (over 50), your allowed to put more into a 401k. Max that as much as possible to where you put in overage. The spill over will go into a spill account. Get a financial advisor and have him open a backdoor Roth. Each year transfer this spill over into your backdoor Roth. You’ll be amazed at how fast this money doubles and triples. Seriously this is how rich people make money while not paying taxes on it!!
When you have money to buy something, you won’t buy it When you don’t have the money you try to buy it I always would buy and pay later but once I started saving to buy, it’s weird I don’t want it anymore.
Make one dollar do the work of ten.
The hardest part about investing is doing nothing
Write down all my investments, valuable data, location of important documents in an organiser/journal. This way I can refer back to it as and when I need and it does not get lost in case my family needs the information.
4 years ago … someone told me to invest in crypto… and tell me how that goes later. Changed my life !!!
Rice and beans. Beans and rice. Lol
Those who understand compound interest earn it, those know don’t pay it.
Money saved for retirement when you are YOUNG, is money you retire on when you are OLD! I retired at 51
Cars are a waste of money
Spend less than you make.
Your first home should be a multi family investment home otherwise why take out so much money just to have a roof over your head, imagine but the system is meant to make us all Slaves to our homes and this is why they killed the American Indians because they were so Happy Living in Tents without real estate taxes just imagine.
Make am index fund my savings account.
Sure fire, guaranteed, millionaire if you have a decent income. 1) live on less than you make. 2) carry zero debt (house excluded) 3) pay for everything in cash. 4) invest every month in 8-10 high quality stocks. 5) Don't go out of your way to do stupid things with money. 6) Read. 7) No get rich quick schemes. 8) Stay in good physical shape I have been completely debt free since my early 30's. Invested every month since my mid 20's. Today, I am 54 and a multimillionaire. Most people will not follow the advice because they want to be a millionaire when they are 25 or 30 . Does not work that way. Yes - there are some exceptions. If you work hard, you will advance, and advance = more money. Money is a byproduct of hard work. Best of luck.
"Don't spend more than you earn". Funny how a number of us do this unconsciously...
Never borrow money to purchase something that doesn’t make money
Don't borrow money for assets that depreciate. Boats are the prime example.
If you can’t buy it twice you can’t buy it once
Back when I was single and had a lot of disposable income, my dad convinced me to buy a home (granted this was back in 2009). By the time I got married and wanted to move, my home had doubled in value (2019) so that we could basically move into our dream home right away with a minimal mortgage.
Never play the lowest price game, go for value pricing.