Your first memory of wanting to be..

Do you remember the very first time you knew you wanted to be wealthy and go after your dreams and it became a quest from then on to go in that direction. What was your very earliest recollection of when this happened? Or was it more a gradual process over time?

For me, I remember very clearly. I was 13 years old watching Pretty Woman and completely in awe of this guy who seemed to have it all: wealth, power, and a great life. I was hooked from then on. I didn't know how I would do it but I knew I would. Then when I turned about 17 years old it all started to fall into place.

What's your first moment?

 

I'm still turning tricks hoping to find the right one

 

Strangely being wealthy was never a dream, although it kind of turned out that way, through luck (property boom of the last 20 years unlikely to be repeated for current generation), and some hard work at things I liked doing.

My dreams have been more about travel, adventures, etc. Have achieved many of them and the money helped, but wasn´t essential.

 

My aunty just told me what my Chinese name is last night. Grandma basically said it translates to Prosperous!

I wanted to use property to get rich/financially free pretty much from reading Poor Dad Rich Dad. A take home story was that your money needs to work for you (and give you cashflow) rather than you simply working for money as a wage slave.

I also saw how properties in our cities tend to get more expensive over time. Rent covers a lot. Plus there's the tax benefits that make it a good way to invest money.

I attended seminars, saw how property allows leverage.... so even if it grows a little bit each year, its also able to be done on very little actual money of your own. Plus give it a few years and your properties might be worth 2x or better.

Seminars also mentioned that only something like 2% of Australians are wealthy when they get to retirement age. I think that % may be better these days (or is it because I mix with you lot it seems not so difficult?)

The typical person only has a paid off home to show for it at the end of their working lives and a very high percentage of our retired population relies on a pension only. This is really quite sad.

Its also really bad that a lot of the people who havent acquired wealth are women because often they take time out of the workforce for childrearing, lower wages and part time work in general. If there's a divorce you can't rely on a man to support you, you need to do it yourself.

To sum it up... this means that property investing is for me.

 

I was inspired by my uncle. I told everyone as a young teenager I wanted a Ferrari by 40. 4 years to go

 

And she only told you last night?? It doesn't get much clearer than that !

 

I recently met a very successful businessman who told me Ferraris are for old men only, he recommends a Lamborghini. I told him look, I won't be too picky here

You got 4 years to go!

 

I know even in primary school I was thinking about money.
I wrote an assignment back in year 3 about how the prices of Aeroplane jelly had gone up. Used to be 20 cents and now they were 50 cents at the supermarket. How could it go up that much so quickly/the no name brands were now for sale for little over 20 cents? It was my first clear piece of writing expressing my opinion/writing an argument on something.

We also did a performance at the schools spectacular (this was around 1988 - NSW bicentenary) and I asked the teacher if she had to pay a spectator fee to watch lol

 

I realised from a young age too that your life circumstances were a choice

 

Yeah believe it or not @Xenia it took me awhile to realise this was utterly true, especially for the majority of folks, not talking about the truely unfortunate in life who are born in extremely difficult circumstances. But for the majority of folks I realised that their current life is basically a result of hundreds of millions of decisions they made along the years. I saw it all around me. It's really no secret why we end up where we end up. Problem is the answer is so simple it's just dismissed straight away.

 

Hearing my grandmothers talk about how much they struggled during the war and afterwards. Them having to literally worry about where their next meal was going to come from really got to me and I don't remember ever not being frugal with money. It could also be somewhat genetic though as my mum is even more extreme than I am.

 

I can remember visions quite early on at about 5 or 6 years old, pretty much knowing I'd be a millionaire. A mil is not much these days but 35 years ago a millionaire was considered rich.
It was just a confident feeling I had, cant really explain it.
Went through a lot of get rich quick schemes and scams all through my school days right through to mid 20's, and never held onto any money to that point.
Started getting into self development material from 18 years old.
Finally broke through by about 35 years old to become financially free at that point and never looked back.
Every single loss I took in the past was a valuable lesson and don't regret any of it.
Once the lessons are learnt, everything's easy.
Problem is that most people are too scared to take a loss, so don't take action and then they don't learn the required lessons.
My advice from personal experience is to make your losses early so you still have time to use the lessons learned.

 

Great advice and reminder thanks.

 

Mate i cant tell you how many ppl i know who have a similar experience and motivation. Seems to be an extremely powerful reason for many super successful ppl .

 

The other key here is persistence.
One who gets knocked back, adjusts their methods by learning from past mistakes and has another go until finally breaking through really can not fail.

 

I think it's a gradual process for me. I want to be wealthy for as far as I can remember.... I grew up with a lot of fighting about money within my family - the lack of thereof, the spending habit and greed of others. I grew up thinking there must be a better way other than fighting about the lack of money?

Apart from that I was told by relatives half jokingly "marry a rich and wealthy person so you will have a good live" and at one point I realize I want ME to be rich, not the hypothetical rich partner

 

I come from a middle class family, in high school my favourite subject was, and still is, maths. I always aspired to have my own business doing what I am passionate about. In my senior years of high school I set up my business and it's been ever growing and expanding still to this day.

Thankfully I have learnt from my mistakes in the past about what NOT to do with money and that has been the best lesson to happen to me. I'm now getting myself out of debt, curved my spontaneous spending habits and allow myself 1 week to think about buying something first. Usually by the end of that week you realise you don't need it, you wanted it.

Lately after starting up many side ventures that have been successful I want to start building up my investment portfolio

In essence, my parents always encouraged me to do what I love and I knew deep down that with enough persistence and passion it would pay off in the long run.

 

Mine was similar, but I was watching Metallica play live as a youngster, being in awe, and thinking "That's what I want to do!"
Clearly I'm no James Hetfield
But doing the "get rich slowly" thing in real estate is a good back up.

 

I've always aspired to start a business.
I have a great skillset but seems to constantly fall down in execution.
Maybe it's a mental state more so then anything else.

I started a business 2 years ago (something really small and part-time) in an industry I am passionate about and love ; but I constantly get dragged back to real life in order to make some solid/stable income for job security etc.

 

How much of your success today do attribute to the self development part in this equation?

It's no secret that for me I believe its huge. I'm a strong believer that for the most part (there are always exceptions) but for the most part, income/wealth growth rarely exceeds personal growth.

My mentor once told me if you ever want to know how successful someone is in anything, just take a look at their attitudes/mindset.