Obama ~ Time Wasting
“With iPods and iPads; Xboxes and PlayStations – none of which I know how to work – information becomes a distraction, a diversion, a form of entertainment, rather than a tool of empowerment, rather than the means of emancipation.”
~ President Barack Obama
I’m with the president! If you want to be financially free and aren’t, you should take these words on board.
So many young people nowadays mis-use their time (and money) on such things as Twitter, Face Book, iphones, blogging etc. Gadgets abound. Information is burning their time instead of being used to improve their lives in some way.
I blog as I enjoy it but also because I really hope to inspire people into taking financial control. It horrifies me that people can get into such a terrible financial mess through a lack of basic financial education.
Blogging is a tool for me. Twitter, on the other hand, ruled me for a long time until I decided to go ‘cold turkey’. Apart from being a time waster it’s so addictive!
Time is precious. If you are serious about escaping the rat race you must use your time wisely. Spend some time learning to read financial statements. Read, read, read! Listen to motivational material on your Ipod! Don’t spend your money on doodads or liabilities. Income producing assets are what you need. Once you are out of the rat race you can play all the computer games and chat to all the friends you want!
You don’t have to throw out all your technological toys or close your Face Book account, but take control and limit their use. Spend your time planning your future. It’s called delayed gratification!
See 9 Initial Steps to Financial Freedom
Great picture by marcn
‘Leverage’ is the Magic Word
Do you want to accelerate your path to financial freedom? If so, you need to know about the power of leverage and how it applies to investing. Leverage is amplifying the power of your money, time and knowledge.
To illustrate this, let’s make a comparison between investing in the sharemarket using no leverage, and investing in positive cash flow real estate using leverage.
The difference is because the banks won’t normally lend to invest in the sharemarket, but will often lend 80% or more to enable you to purchase real estate.
Sharemarket: $100,000 invested is $100.000 of your own money in shares.
Returns- if the return is 5% your return is just that; 5% on your own money
Property: $100,000 invested, but $80,000 (80%) is borrowed and you put in only $20,000 of your own money.
Returns- 5% return on $100,000 invested = $5000. As only $20,000 of your own money was invested this is a 25% return on your own money.
Using the above figures, the return on your money invested in property (using leverage), is five times greater than the return on your money invested in the sharemarket (no leverage)!
Caution: with any leveraged/geared investment your gains can be increased, but so can your losses. Ensure your property is cash flow positive i.e creates you a profit before tax when all expenses, including borrowings, are included.
There are other types of leverage you might want to utilise. You can leverge your time by getting a good property manager and you can leverage your knowledge by using people who have already done it.
Read Robert Kiyosaki’s book “Retire Young, Retire Rich.” It’s all about leverage.
Disclaimer: this is not intended to be financial advice and is for guidance only. If you are interested in using leverage please consult a professional.
CashFlow 101- How to Play It
In I Don’t Want to Retire Old and Broke I said how I decided to follow Rich Dad’s philosophies on real estate to escape the rat race and become financially free.
The very first step is to get financially educated. Put down that glossy magazine; throw out that new boat catalog and learn to read financial statements. To be successful in life you need to know how to look after your money.
We actually went as far as employing a successful property investor (who had the same approach as Rich Dad) to mentor us for a while. He helped us find our first rental properties in Auckland. It’s imperative that you start right if you want to build a successful property portfolio.
We also bought the game “CashFlow 101″ , an educational board game which Robert Kiyosaki built to help teach the concepts of passive income and financial freedom, to get you out of the ‘rat race’ forever.
The game takes a bit of figuring out in the beginning. Make sure you have a calculator! As you progress you learn about income statements and how to fill in a balance sheet, and the difference between assets and liabilities.
Firstly, you get given an occupation. You may draw an airline pilot, a nurse or a janitor etc (a tip here..the higher paid occupations have high expenses too and aren’t necessarily the best job to have cash flow wise). The game pieces are coloured rats; you throw the dice and the rats go around the circle (rat race), picking up opportunity cards (much like monopoly…which was Robert’s favourite game!) until you make it onto the fast track, where money is plentiful and life is easy!
The ‘opportunity cards’ are frought with peril…getting downsized, having children, the compulsary buying of doodads (money wasters like wide screen TVs or eating at expensive restaurants) can suck up all your income However, there is the chance to make a lot of money on property, shares and business!
This game can take hours to play and until you learn its lessons, it can even take days! However, once my husband made it out of the rat race and onto the fast track in the first ten minutes! (I recall he did this by having very low expenses and drawing a card which allowed him to buy some cheap shares. The next card allowed him to sell them for a huge profit so he could purchase a high cash flow business which, in turn, gave him a large passive income that covered his outgoings. Financial freedom)!
Playing this game regularly changed our spending and investment habits for life. It’s an entertaining way to learn about finance and turns a ‘dry’ subject into a motivating and fun experience.
Make sure you heed the warning on the box as, in real life, you must deal with sharks as well (tell me about it)! It says:
“Some people have gotten so excited playing this game that they have gone out and made foolish decisions. This game teaches the foundations of wealth. We recommend further education as well as always seeking competent advice before making any financial decisions.”
You have been warned!
I Don’t Want to be Old and Broke
This is where it all began about nine years ago…
Financial freedom had never even crossed my mind, until one evening my husband said “You know, we won’t have much money when we retire”.
I was floored by this remark. We were both on excellent salaries and were good savers, and we faced a government pension (if we were lucky) and an old people’s home in our old age? I was not at all happy with the idea but didn’t know what to do about it.
Interestingly, not long after I caught a snippet of an interview by Robert Kiyosaki on Morning Radio. He was talking about his new book “Rich Dad Poor Dad.” He said he had toyed with the idea of calling it something along the lines of “If you want to Be Rich and Successful don’t go to School”!! Interesting!
When I saw his book at the airport bookstore, I bought it and the journey to financial freedom (and face it, there is no true freedom without financial freedom) began:
“Rich Dad Poor Dad” is a great for someone starting out. Some people find it pretty basic but the ideas are important. Don ‘t toss it to one side. Persevere. I know some people who started with this book, who are now very rich!
His next book “The CashFlow Quadrant” digs deeper. Which quadrant does your cash flow come from? How do you get paid? Are you an employee, self employed, a business owner or an investor?
The whole idea is to build enough passive income i.e money you don’t have to work for, to cover your expenses. Rich Dad’s message basically is; to get financially free you must get your money to work for you, not the other way around.
What is the best way to do this? Rich Dad and Robert did it through real estate, so we decided we would do that too. Following Rich Dad’s rules, we started a property portfolio. The secret to success is to buy ‘below market value’ and make sure your investment is ‘cash flow positive‘. This means that the rental must cover all expenses and give you money leftover.
Apart from reading these books the other important thing is to become financially literate. If you want to be rich you need to be able to read a spreadsheet. Just knowing the difference between an asset and a liability is invaluable (one puts money in your pocket and one takes money out of your pocket…so, your house is a liability!). Controversial stuff and the cause of much heated debate.
Another good tip at this stage is to watch where your advice comes from. Free advice is often the most expensive advice. Make sure the person giving the advice has actually done it themselves. Don’t be afraid of paying for good advice if you have to.
Of course everyone has a different path and yours will no doubt be different from ours. Some people make a lot of money out of business, or out of stocks and shares. We did have a lot of shares at one stage but I wasn’t really interested enough to learn a lot about them and eaving your money in someone else’s hands is risky. No-one looks after your interests as well as you can. We did OK with shares but I was a lot happier when we got rid of them and focused on property investing. I liked property and it’s a good way to build passive income.
These were our first steps toward financial freedom. We won’t retire old and broke. Bring it on!
Photo by kevindooley
Gidday Mate!!
There’s a ‘fair dinkum’ Australian greeting for you!
It makes me laugh when they call me “mate!” In NZ only men call their male friends “mate”! I’m not complaining however; everyone is very friendly here in the “Lucky Country”. It’s a wonderful place to live and enjoy the great outdoors.
The initial purpose of this blog, to show our journey to financial freedom, has been achieved. We find it amazing how everything came together in the end! Robert Kiyosaki was the catalyst and we will be ever thankful to him. Kurek Ashley helped so much with self-development. You have to get your head right first. We learned the lessons of business by building, operating and selling a motorhome hire company. Then finally, along came the Law of Attraction which allowed us to finally ‘break through’. We were very focused and pushed it to the wall. You can read more at Coral’s Journey.
Financial freedom won’t happen overnight, but persevere. It is possible. Good luck!
Escape the Rat Race; Read these Books
Here are ten of the many great titles that helped us on the road to financial freedom:
Rich Dad Poor Dad ~ Robert Kiyosaki
Cash Flow Quadrant ~ Robert Kiyosaki
Retire Young Retire Rich ~ Robert Kiyosaki
Think and Grow Rich ~ Napolean Hill
The Science of Being Rich ~ Wallace D. Wattles
The Secret ~ Rhona Byrne
The Power of Intention ~ Dr Wayne W. Dyer
Conversations with God 1-3 ~ Neale Donald Walsche
Your Best Life Now ~ Joel Osteen
The 4- Hour Workweek ~ Timothy Ferriss
These books have been indispensible to us; a quick precis:
Firstly, Rich Dad paved the way with his lessons on handling money and the importance of being financially literate. A great start.
Napolean Hill introduced the importance of the “Power of the Mind”‘ along with Wallace D. Wattles who had a mental and spiritual approach to getting rich. Wallace D. Wattles ‘thinking stuff’ was an early forerunner to the “Law of Attraction”, a la “The Secret”. The LOA is a very popular concept nowadays and rightfully so, though it’s nothing new.
Dr Wayne Dyer’s book is in a similar vein, the “Power of Intention” being a force in the universe that allows the act of creation to take place. I love his meditation CD, “Getting in the Gap” also.
The “Conversations With God” series is for the open minded. God spoke to Neale Donald Walsche! The ‘conversation’ is riveting and answers many questions about life, the universe and everything. I really enjoyed these books, though they made my head spin for a while!
Joel Olsteen is a senior pastor at Lakewood Church, Houston. He is quite progressive and open-minded and his book, about living at your full potential, is inspiring.
Tim Ferriss is a radical (in the nicest way of course!) and wraps up this list well. His book, “The 4-Hour Workweek” is about throwing out old outdated concepts and living your life as you want it. He calls it ‘lifestyle design’. Very interesting.
The “Law of Attraction” Works!
I’ve got another hot tip for you; the Law of Attraction works!
Now, I’m not going into a lot of detail about LOA here. For that I suggest you read
“The Secret” by Rhonda Byrne. But, in short, the LOA states “Like attracts Like” so whatever you think about comes about. Your thoughts create your reality. It’s the secret to life.
Now for all the doubting Thomas’ out there, I thought I’d give you a few examples of what the Law of Attraction has done for us, but firstly I want to say that we were quite a long way along the track to financial freedom by the time we learnt about the LOA, but somehow we couldn’t make the final break-through. The LOA did it for us.
When we first started out we watched “The Secret” DVD over a dozen times. On the DVD Joe Vitale advocates just asking the Universe for what you want “Like you’re ordering it from a catalogue”.
As a test run we decided to ask for $50,000. We had no idea where it was going to come from, but we gave ourselves til the end of the month to achieve this. Only a few days later my husband’s superannuation statement arrived in the mail. There was exactly $50,000 more in the account than we expected. We were blown away!
For several years now we’ve had dream boards (also known as vision boards) on which we’ve pinned pictures of all our goals and dreams. They were on our dining room table so we saw them constantly throughout the day.
One board had all the things we wanted regarding our future life in Australia. The other was more general; places we wanted to visit etc. On it I had a picture of a sportscar that I really liked, with a little picture of me pinned on it (our son called it “tiny mummy”!). Well, within a couple of months I got an Alfa Romeo TS147! The business had done well and my husband decided it was time to reward me for all my efforts! We never spent money on extravangances like this!! I’d driven rust buckets all my life. Wow, I liked this LOA stuff!
See this photo of Sunshine Beach in Queensland, Australia? It was on our dream board. We now live there. We walk on this beach every day. It really is so astounding that we pinch ourselves (well, we pinch each other actually…it’s more fun!) to make sure we’re not dreaming!
You can attract what you want too. Know what you want and visualise it as though it’s already happened; as if you already have achieved your goal.
Ask, Believe, Receive! It is yours. Good luck!
All Thanks to Rich Dad!
Have you thought about retirement?
Do you have a nice retirement nest egg? Will you struggle on superannuation? Maybe, you’ll end up living with your relatives. There is another choice… financial freedom. That’s when your passive income (i.e money you don’t have to work for) exceeds your outgoings, so your money works for you when you can no longer work for it.
If this sounds good I suggest you go to a book shop or local library and get a copy of “Rich Dad Poor Dad” by Robert Kiyosaki. When you’ve finished that read “Cashflow Quadrant” and then “Retire Young Retire Rich”. You will learn that it is possible to be financially free and out of the ‘rat race’ of life if you follow Rich Dad’s philosphies.
For those of you who’ve been in outer space for the last ten years or so this is the story: Robert had two dads (Rich Dad was the father of his best friend)) who had opposing views about money. One dad would say “I can’t afford it” and the other dad would say “How can I afford it?” He decided to listen to Rich Dad.
The “Rich Dad” book series focuses on Cash Flow and Leverage. It’s about building your asset column so the money keeps coming in even if you’re not working. An example of this is a rental property where the rent covers all the outgoings and gives you some cash to put in your pocket as well.
As well as books, Robert devised an educational game called “CashFlow.” See my previous post here. It is well worth investing in if you are serious about becoming financially free.
As you probably know I’m a great fan of the ‘Power of the Mind”. This is what Robert has to say about our thoughts shaping our lives:
The power of our thoughts may never be measured or appreciated, but it became obvious to me as a young boy that there was value and power in being aware of my thoughts and how I expressed myself. I noticed that my poor dad was poor not because of the amount of money he earned – which was significant – but because of his thoughts and actions. As a young boy, having two fathers, I became acutely aware of being careful in deciding which thoughts I chose to adopt as my own and to whom should I listen – my rich dad or my poor dad? At the age of nine I decided to listen to and learn from my rich dad about money. In doing so, I chose not to listen to my poor dad – my real dad – even though he was the one with all the college degrees.Being a product of two strong dads allowed me the luxury of observing the effects that different thoughts have on one’s life. I noticed that people really do shape their lives through their thoughts.
I’ve been lucky enough to meet several people lately who became financially free by following Rich Dad’s teachings. Actually, they’re more than financially free…they’re rich.
I’d like to say a huge thank you to Robert Kiyosaki for writing these books. Rich Dad’s wisdom has helped a lot of people.
To everyone else; this is a strategy which works. Read these books; get financially educated. Start as young as you can. Good Luck!
9 Initial Steps to Financial Freedom
Would you like to be financially free? You know all the theory but, how exactly do you get started?
Everyone is different; we all have different backgrounds, interests and realities. We are in different financial positions and have different life goals, so it is difficult to give ‘step by step’ instructions on exactly what to do as far as getting financially free goes.
However, there are some basics, which are common sense and apply in general. Perhaps the world would not be in such a mess at the moment if people had paid more attention to the most important one, being Live Within Your Means. Don’t waste money on ‘doodads’; once you have built your asset column you can buy your toys.
So, to become financially free, your passive income (i.e money you don’t have to work for) must exceed your expenses. Your incomings have to exceed your outgoings. A good example of this is ‘positive cash flow property‘, where the rental covers all the bills and you get some cash too!
And, as always, you must take action! Just do it. Do anything.. write down your goals, read some books; The “Rich Dad Poor Dad” series is a good place to begin. (Robert Kiyosaki will tell you how to get started in the property game, if you’re interested). Borrow the books from the library if you have to. Download a podcast and listen to a motivational speaker. Just get moving! The younger you start the better.
The following 9 steps are a good start:
1. Live within your means
2. Don’t rack up bad debt (always pay in cash)
3. Pay your credit cards off every month
4. Pay off your mortgage as soon as you can
5. Don’t spend a lot of money on depreciating assets (liabilities) e.g cars, massive TVs
6. Work for yourself (JOB = Just Over Broke)
7. Save as much as you can
8. Buy income producing assets if you can (e.g positive cash flow rental property)
9. Have a positive mental attitude; visualise having already achieved your goals
Remember you are aiming for a better future; a comfortable retirement. Think of it as delayed gratification.
We drove around in dented old ‘japanese import’ cars for years, while our friends drove late model cars and bought boats. We lived in the same house for sixteen years (mortgage-free) while our collegues borrowed and upgraded to more expensive homes. Our peers went on extended holidays to Europe, while we back-packed around Asia.
Keep your mind on the ultimate goal of financial freedom. It’ll be worth it.
Asset Rich, Cash Flow Poor
Many people make the mistake of assuming that getting rich & financially free is all about accumulating assets.
This can be true as long as the assets are income producing (e.g business or positive cash flow real estate).
Often they will tell you that they need a fixed sum figure to retire on. There are some problems associated with this strategy. What will you do with your lump sum (if you manage to obtain it in the first place)? Where will you put it? In shares? In the bank? Little by little it will be whittled away. Have you saved enough to cover your expenses if you live to be a hundred?
Focus directly on achieving a core cash flow income and any capital gain you make is a bonus. Remember you cannot live off the money tied up in your beach house or section or boat. It can also be very hard if not impossible to access it, especially in a soft real estate & stock market like we are experiencing at present.
Every year there are businesses and individuals who have a lot of money, who go bust . The reason is that they have insufficient cash flow to cover their daily operating expenses and can’t access the equity tied up in their investments.
To understand more about the importance of cash flow read Robert Kiyosaki’s books,”Rich Dad Poor Dad” and “Cash Flow Quadrant”
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