Rich Dad, Poor Dad... have you read it?
 

ok, let's hear it. The good the bad and the ugly. Have you read it? Have you heard it on tape?

I recently heard it, and it changed my life entirely. I am programmed to be poor. I say things like, "Time is money", "I can't afford it right now", "We got to save up for..."

This little book opened our eyes to the possibilities. Maybe we're weak, and need to be told, "we can do it, if we really put our minds to it." Maybe we're at a point where everything that was said, made 100% perfect sense to us. Everything was crystal clear. In the past we were saving for the wrong reasons.

If someone told us we could retire wealthy, we wouldn't believe them. We're in this business for one thing. To become filthy rich. But how many of you really do have a life financial plan in place? How many of you make a ton of green, and spend a ton of green, and say, "I'll save later." Or maybe you put some away now, but is it enough.

100K a year breaks down to 8333.33 a month (net). Do you make that much after bandwidth, and chargebacks, and content, and processing fees?

Let's say you make 100K a year, for 40 years, and for shits and giggles you happen to save every penny of it. That's only 4 million after 40 years earned (minus intrest assuming you have it in an intrest bearing account). Is that enough?

Well first, do you really think you're going to push porn for 40 years?

Accounting for inflation, would 4 mil be enough? No. Unless you plan on living like a cheap ass, but then what's the point of saving for retirement if you don't enjoy it?

This book has really caused some damage here. LOL It's made us restructure our lives. It's opened our eyes, and ears. We hear "poor mentality" on a daily basis now.

Has anyone else read it? (or the other books in the series?) Well, Let's hear it. The good, the bad, and the ugly.

Flame on if you must, I'm a big "person" I can take it.
(yes this went to another board, but I want the most feed back as I can get... especially when it comes to finances)

Hmm... sounds interesting.

I read it and all his other books, tapes, misc stuff, and saw him speak at the yearly CREO convention in Atlanta. I'm not as rich as he is, but I don't have to work at a 'job' again. Hit me up if you want some other books just as good.

I heard good ol' Dr. Phil say, in one of his, "you set the stage for your own behavior" type things, that if you take all of the money away from a rich person and give it to a poor person.. in 2 years' time, they'll both be back in the same situation they were in before the switch.

Thats just stupid. If you put $100k a year in the bank, yeah it would be 4 million. But if you arent dumbass, it would be over $40 million. How would $4 million even not be enough? To the average person, that is $200k a year in a simple 5% interest CD.
You'll be making twice what you made before.

WOW. I bet that's true. If you gave a ton of money to a poor person, they spend it all on stupid shit.

A friend of the family died when I was a kid. It was an oil-field explosion. His wife ended up with a huge settlement (at least 2 mil, this is back in the mid to late 80's) And we all lived in a small hick town. The first thing she did, was bought a porsche and a BMW, (because the kids didn't want to have to go to school in the same car two days in a row) then she bought her house outright, and installed cable TV in each room, (including the kids bedrooms) 33" TV's for every room, and a big screen for the living room of course.

Then she decided to move to Manhatten. So she bought a condo, in manhatten. About a year later she returned back to our small town life where people knew her. Now 15 years later, she is renting a mobile home, she has no car, and she barely can scrape the $300 for rental space each month. She probably went bankrupt within 5 years. (she's been in that mobile home for quite a while now.)

Just think, if she was smart she would have had at least $100k a year for life.

If you aren't a dumbass, right. But the average investor isn't as smart as you. The average investor can't get 9% over 40 years. Which is what I figure you'd need to have just barely 40 mil.

And I don't know why 4 mil wouldn't be enough... but it just wouldn't. I'm not smart enough to give an indepth answer as to why it's not enough... it's just not. They say that 1/3 of your life is spent in retirement. I don't know if it's possible to live on 4 mil for 25+ years. Especially when al them medical bills for all my colostomy bags come-a-rollin in. I remember sitting down with a financial advisor when we were just married. I remember him telling we'd need X amount when we retire. And it was more than 4 mil. Inflation... cost of living... medical expenses... It's just not enough. Plus, I don't want to wait till I retire to enjoy it.

Our financial education begins today. THen I'll be able to answer this more indepth.

That's very true.
Over 90% of all lottery winners file bankruptcy within 5 years of winning. And the size of their jackpots had no correlation to whether or not they went bankrupt. (I.E. the guy who won 100mil files bankruptcy just as much as the guy who won 2 mil)

People who are poor are poor because they don't know how to manage money, not because they don't make enough.

According to "The Millionare Next Door" the average American millionare is 53 years old and has a yearly income of about 60K.

What that means is that they were smart with money for about 30 years to get where they are. They have "above average" salaries, but not even close to breaking 100K a year.

Surprisingly, most people who make exorbitant salaries (in excess of 200K per year) are very deep in debt, and won't have enough money to retire on.

You could earn a 5% return on tax free investments fairly easily.
That means that on 4million you would NET $200K yearly in interest without touching your principal.
(And that's NET, if you were still working, your salary would probably have to be 350-400K to net that much)

And considering that when you're at retirement age your biggest expense (mortgage) is paid off, and your childrens education has been bought and paid for, if you can't live off of 200K/yr you've got serious problems.

ok, so you make 100k a year your whole life. Then when you retire, you make 200k a year by simply putting your 4 million in a CD with 5% interest. But making 100k MORE a year then you did before you retired, its not enough. Many people retire on less than 1 million and it lasts them their lifetime.

---------------------------

The average investor doesnt have to be smart to get 9% return. The average mutual fund over the last 20 years has averaged better than 12% annual return. Put 100k a year in a mutual fund. Simple. (Those figures are according to Dave Ramsey, a radio financial advisor guy, who is a millionaire)

That shit doesn't make sense, my granddad retired with a little over two million in the seventies and when he died in '92 he had closer to three million.

Big money grows, it doesn't shrink. It's like critical mass.

I guess it all comes back to a persons strength of character, Some people are happy to go a workplace and work for someone each day, not knowing what tommorow will bring.

Others feel the need to be independant and to be in control of their own destiny and financial independance.

Personally, I've worked for enough arseholes since I left school to give me more than enough willpower to find other ways of getting through to retirement than finding myself working for yet another arsehole :Graucho

This topic brings me in mind of the book "Who moved my cheese",
Stupid book, but the theory is good and so true !

My dad gave me that book a few years ago. Very good read. Certainly got me thinking.

I remember reading the first few chapters of that book a few years back, but unfortunately my roommates (Who owned the house we lived in) decided that Crack was more important than paying the electricity bill so that made it kind of hard to read at night... I understand the underlying theme though about "Thinking Poor" vs. "Thinking Rich" It's a very hard cycle to get out of, but I've broken away from working for someone else. I have a few ideas and projects that could be very profitable for me right now, but at this point in my life, if I can pay my rent and feed myself, with a few nights out to howl without having to punch a fucking clock or wait for someone else to sign my paycheque, I'm more than happy. Who am I kidding, I WANT SOME FUCKING TOYS!!!

Read "Think & Grow Rich" by Napolean Hill. Everything you need is in there.

Nutshell = Real Estate Makes The Best Investment.

The stock market averages about 10% a year in the long term. not talking about trading or trying to time the market. Historically it is 10% a year. Bull and bear years don't matter that much if you look long term.

Real estate (residential) isn't as good as a return. It's 3% long term. Obviously last 10 years in hot markets clouds the returns, but one shouldn't bank on huge gains. There are other considerations such as the power of margined money. Say putting 20% down on a piece of property and borrowing the rest. So you are getting a gain on the full amount. But you are paying interest. But it is tax deductable.

ALso read The Millionaire Next Door. Easiest way to save money is to not spend it. That BMW is worst inverstment possible. All it does is lose value. It doesn't increase like an investment portfolio.

Then again I like driving my 540.........

Haha.. I have to repsond to this thread. Not like I'm a financial adviser (Those people are scam artists, anyway)...

I hate banks, investment firms, and insurance companies. I've always marvelled at who owns the largest buildings in downtown areas. It's always a bank or an insurance company. Why is that? Cuz they are scamming everyone into thinking that their money is safe with them. They come up with stupid little slogans like "Put your money to work" .. they leave out part.. it should read "Put your money to work for us.." They pay .8% interest on checking accounts, and charge 7% for mortgage loans. It's a big joke. How do you think they afford those skyscrapers? Conning suckers into giving them their money, that's how.. Insurance companies are the same way. Everyone is really pussy and conservative, and they'd rather have some steady job with benefits than take a risk and get rich..

With that said, though, CONSISTENT money is infinitely better than one lump sum. This is why things like real estate are such a good investment. If you want to do something with your money, go buy condos in Florida with 10% down, hire a management company to run them for you for 25%, and in ten years you own a $300,000 condo for only $30k. Beats a CD.. Hell, buy one every month. But, really, I can't stress how important consistency is. I've learned that. I used to think "Oh, a parking ticket! That's just a sign up! Gee.. these prada shoes! Just about 10 sign ups.. " Man, I blew so much money! But all of a sudden, I've grown up and realized what's important... :) Being a spend thrift is pretty stupid, and it's really hard to curtail your spending when your level of income is so much higher than a typical person's... But, you have to, or you'll end up broke.

I would suggest reading Think and Grow Rich, as well.. and if you want to know about investing, maybe read The Intelligent Investor, by Benjamin Graham (It's Warren Buffet's road map type book.. he is kinda a pussy but he is still rich, so maybe we can learn something from it)

But, yeah, I just saved you a shitload of money you woulda spent going to Fidelity or Merril Lynch or some other scam operation.. :) All you need is a plan that you stick to -- in other words, CONSISTENCY.

Cheers

The thing about Kiyosaki's books is that while the general message is sound, it could all fit into one book, not the 3 or 4 that it took. Not a bad choice from a revenue standpoint, though:Graucho

I read Rich Dad, Poor Dad and thought it was good. BUt one of the later ones on real estate investing was way way oversimplified and unrealistic.

You're absolutely right, DTK. And he can't write for shit. It's like reading a book about big ideas from a 16 year old.

I just got done reading it the other day, coincidentally. I guess if it's your first book about finance and business, it would help.

But I think the #1 motivator behind all of his books/tapes is money, not sincerely "offering help". It's always a little see through when that's the case.

So it goes.

Yeah, it's like "Do this, do that, then watch the money roll in. IT'S JUST THAT EASY!!!"

Yup, that's the scam. Nice work if you can get it....

Its a very good read that book but its the same basics as many others the road less traveled is a good one to try.
Money is made flat so its easy to stack

Y'all just remember these motivational books were written by authors with the motivation of taking your money in exchange for the book.

Carlton Sheets anyone?

Kiyosaki's main mission is the "upsell." He gives the masses an easy to understand message, and tell them they how to master it - through additional books, seminars, tapes, etc.. It's a full featured marketer's delight. I downloaded a bunch of his audio stuff via P2P and can't believe anyone would pay for it.

I agree! Anyone can write or talk a good line... It's a whole different story to live it.

I'm not big on the "motivational" speaker bit. Hell... I'm a good public speaker, and well... that does not mean I live all of my "idealisms" to the letter. I sure as hell could talk a great line though.

We all make choices... no such thing as being programmed to fail... If you believe that you will spend tons of time trying to figure it out... Why not take that time and energy and apply yourself? It?s called hard work. You either want it bad enough to work your ass off for it or you don't... Plain and simple.

Theirs no magic in words, but there is magic in actions. Work hard... see results. Pretty basic. I sure don?t need some $30.00 book or $200.00 motivational conference to figure that out. I?m not bashing them at all, but I never thought I had a motivational problem till I read one of their books or went to a ?motivation? seminar. Truth is... I didn?t have a motivational problem... They made me think I had one so they could sell me the book.

When teachers would ask me what I wanted to do when I grew up I would answer that I was going to work for myself and own my own business. They'd always ask what kind of business I wanted to own. Obviously, they just didn't understand the depth of my answer.

Clearly, their dads were poor.

:thumbsup

Cheers,

Brad

Yeah it might but what idiot would put there money in the stock market now??? I was going to and then decided not to, thank god cause about 3 months later the Towels crashed a few planes into some big towers and it could of cost me big time.

I'm not touching the markets till the net boom.

Sammy

I know a guy who won 12K on the lottery about 6 years ago.

He has just filed bankruptcy, he should never of had to worry about money again. but the women in his life decided they would go on a spending spree.

He's bankrupt and his girlfriend drives a leased Jaguar, which he pays for?????

Eva still checks the prices of detergents and refuses to buy designer clothes. I wanted and can afford a Mercedes, I got a Ford Focus instead. OK it is the Ghia with all the trimmings, I went for the quiet life instead of the Merc:)

bullshit.

i'd like to see some real stats on lotto winners. the first thing they'd do would be either pay the mortgage off or buy a house outright and then a car - no matter how they pissed their money up a wall if you're not paying rent or a mortgage and you've got a spare few $ you're not going to be bankrupt in any real sense.
maybe the figure might reach 20 - 25%.. which i still find absurd.. if you won 2M you would literally never have to work again... nothing fancy.. nothing crazy.. no stupid insights.. buy a few houses, live off the rent and own appreciating assets.. thats at least 1k a week reasonably steady with inflation.. no idiot could fuck it up.

maybe a few lotto millionaires get fleeced by shonky investment schemes.. maybe a few spend too much.. but theres no way in hell anywhere near 25% of them owning their own home and car and only having to come up with food gas and electricity that could be paid for by a mcdonalds job really "loose the house" charly might be more on the road talking about getting fleeced in a divorce.. but still..

sounds like an urban myth designed to make people feel better about people getting to change their lot in life while everyone else is stuck or has to work at it.

and no poor people aren't poor because they don't know how to manage their money..
many "rich" people can't manage their money either.. it doesn't make them poor.. it makes them poorly managed rich people..
no matter how well you "manage" $3 an hour it doesn't turn it into millions... ever heard of the term "working poor"? ie work all day but after paying rent, food, bills don't have anything left over? the only way to get out of that is education and a higher paying job.. not money management in itself.

real poor people aren't there because they can't manage money.. it's because they don't have enough money to be able to mis-manage it for a variety of reasons.. educational level.. lack of family financial support.. lack of networking ability.. lack of work ethic etc etc. it's very naive to think that if all the poor people were given accounting courses and suddenly could "manage" their money they wouldn't be poor anymore.. thats ridiculous.
im not saying if they were given 50k a lot wouldn't piss it away and get back to where they were. just saying that being poor has far, far, far less to do with money management than it has to do with class/socio economic factors they were born into.. were not talking about the few that escape or the few idiots that piss it away and end up there.

Hit me on ICQ please.

There's plenty of idiots that could fuck up a lottery winning. If you continually by liabilities with your money, you are going into the negatives, no matter how far into the positives you start out with. It's just a way of thinking. People just don't understand money.

This book is definite recommended read, and it explains all of the problems people have. Having a lot of money does not mean you are rich. People fail to understand this.

... that's because she never deserved to be wealthy. Deserving wealth is a state of mind and responsibility, not on whether you are poor or not. Someone who does not, can not, or will not learn to fish does not deserve free fish everyday. That is the best analogy I could come up with quickly. Lottery winners go broke all the time, and it is the exact same thing.

human stupidity never ceases to amaze me.. however "bankrupt" and "90%" are two fucking weighty terms to be throwing around. if it was "50% lose it over 5 years of high living and go back to being middleclass" or whatever i wouldn't blink an eye.. i bet most of them are technical bankrupts to stop people/spouses getting at cash squirreled away.. not acutual having-less-than-they-started-with bankrupts.. at 90% it would be well known as a curse - "if you win the lotto you've got a 90% chance of losing your house and being bankrupt" when you won relatives would ring with their condolences ..but it's not.. it's BS.

Live above your means and you will go broke. Every new toy has a monthly bill that wipes them clean. The ones who win 10 times as much buy 10 times as many things. I would like to see the stats too, but everyone who has every actually been mega-rich (millions per year in income) has said the same thing about lottery winners. The majority go broke and end up in large debt than before.

I personally know that this would not happen to me, but I also understand money well and I am not a big spender at all.

Um which "mega-rich" have said such a thing?

yes.. I understand the concept well. im only disputing the figures presented. while there are a lot of morons out there and i'd not be surprised at 20 - 25% going broke, anywhere between 70-90% bankruptcy rate for people who won over 2M i believe is excessive.. if there is hard evidence i will of course change my mind and know yet a lower step in the bowels of human stupidity... i may be too optimistic and what little i do carry is too much faith. the "lot of lottery winners go broke" is the sort of saying that a 20-25% rate would bring... given riches to rags is such a juicy story.. no-one wants to hear about the guy who paid off his house, the kids education, bought a little investment property.. too boring.. anyways im interested now. might look into it after i've finshed a couple of things..

surely

It always has been the best deal long term.. My wife and I were debating over buying property last night and she says it is a lousy time 'cause the rental market is shitty right now up here (unless you are renting). My response was 'Good, we can buy them cheaper!' Don't think we ever came to an agreement.

i've found several preachy anti lottery christian places say that 33% go bankrupt.. so even with their bias its only 33% leaving me to believe it's actually a little less and closer to what i've been saying.

This guy John T. Reed has made it his mission to point out money sucking con artists like Kiyosaki and to debunk all their bullshit...

You have to read this guys website:
http://www.johntreed.com/Kiyosaki.html

That is his page attacking Rich Dad Poor Dad... Pretty insightful. His other website pages are no-hype advice on real estate investing and why those get rich quick feel good motivational books are so much bull shit.

:2 cents:

I've actually spoken with Reed a couple times (subscribe to his newsletter as well)....man, talk about a bullshit detector!

Yeah, that guy is a piece of work. I'll give him credit though, after you see how harsh he is on everyone out there, it gives you some confidence in what Reed himself has to say.

If he can get past his own criterion, thats really saying something.

Thanks! Cool link ...

I'm not sure if they said this but let's see if this helps...

M.C.Hammer. (huge... mega star, has nothing now. Blew it all)
Vanilla Ice (huge star, lost it all, basically had to start from scratch again)
Willie Nelson (had everything taken by the IRS, because of mis managed money)
Redd Foxx (same as willie nelson)
Any executive involved in the Enron scandal

I'm sure this list is a mile long...

i think its hard for people to have a big influx of money and try not to increase their goods. i remember when i first started getting paychecks, they went to college...then they went to cars, and other stuff that wasnt practical.

i think that we are in a business where we see fly by night millionaires that lose it all. i know people that i was paying 20k a month to that still lived in their little one bedroom apartment and there are those that took the 20k and spent it on a viper downpayment and couldnt make payments a year later.

the big money issue to me is credit. person a with bad credit will spend the same amount of money buying a honda(10-12% interest from the dealership), that a person with good credit spends buying a bmw(5% from the bank).

Please.... If you took the time to write down the vices of the people you listed..... You would certainly understand where the money went. Had nothing to do with the mis-management of money. All of the above had FAR worse issues then that.. which lead to there losses. Not the greatest example there my friend! :1orglaugh


This one however, just kills me!!! You actually said that in public? Those "executives". lied, cheated and munipulated their stock holders and employees out of MILLIONS!!! I frinkin lost my shirt with the shares I had in Enron. Was it because I mis-managed my money... fucking hell NO! I, along with thousands of other people were used and ripped off. Now.. fucking Keneth L. is sitting in one of his THREE mansions, while his employees who dedicated years of savings into there pentions and us stockholders who read trummped up earnings reports are left with our thumbs up our ass. Your "book" chould have saved us from that? Get over it.

Dude.. I hope youre not a salesman. You need to do your homework.

Sorry to be so harsh, but gzzzzz!

Look... work hard.. get paided! Youre not going to win the lotto, so forget about it and work. You will be more responsible with your money if you worked hard and earned it yourself.

Heres my book! It has one sentance. Chapter One: Work Hard
Chapter Two: See Results Chapter Three: If You Have Not See Results In Chapter Two... Refer to Chapter One.

No magic.

Its easy as hell for lottery winners to go broke. They dont realize with the 3 brand new $100,000 cars they just bought, that the monthly insurance and maintenence really adds up.

With that brand new house they bought, $25k a year in property taxes, $500 a month for electricity, plus all the other extras. After 2-3 years of this, they are down to owning the house and the cars, but not being able to pay the insurance/taxes on them. So they have no choice to sell, buy a lower cost house, etc. But they still have no job. So eventually they go broke.

I agree, however, I think money management plays a big part in becoming rich. There have been several wealthy people that have literally come from nothing. Then they write books about it. LOL.

Also, a higher education may be a simple solution to a temporary problem, but what about after they make more $$, I think aneducation in finances would be very beneficial to them as well. A higher education, and better pay, may get them to buy a house. And then they'll be where they were before. They'd need to work harder to make mortgage, home owners insurance, property taxes... More pay often means bigger expenses.