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 The stocks I recommend - like those in my Personal Portfolio - should be the first thing you consider as the backbone of your asset allocation plan.
+====== Foundations of Wealth #1: Net Investable Wealth ======
+Making money is not the most important thing in life. And getting rich shouldn't be your no. 1 goal.
+But whether you're a young person embarking on a career or just past middle-age and feeling unprepared for retirement, wealth building should be on your agenda. Because - like it or not - your financial situation will affect your ability to enjoy every other aspect of your life.
+The present program is based on wealth-building principles I developed and have written about for many years. But I've tailored the ideas presented here specifically to you.
+As someone just starting out on the path to becoming wealthy, you have a powerful advantage that makes it easy to get rich - even easier, the more decades you have left. And the purpose of the essays in this series is to give you a blueprint for doing it.
+If you start practicing the wealth-building skills that you will learn in this series (I'll show you how), you'll be on your way to financial independence before you know it.
+'Wealth': What Does That Mean?
+When I've asked readers to define wealth in the past, here are a few of the hundreds of answers I've received:
+Having everything you want
+Having more than you need
+A million rupees in the bank
+A million in savings
+Making several millions per year
+Living the life of a rock star.
+Even experts disagree on what it takes to be wealthy. Here are just two examples:
+To Blanche Lark Christerson, director of the Wealth Planning Group at Deutsche Bank, wealthy is a net worth of $15 million. Christerson figures that for married couples with two young kids, today's 'pricey lifestyle' costs about $375,000 a year. If you are single with no dependents, Christerson says $10 million will do. (She's assuming that you'd have 45 years ahead of you and that you'd want to preserve capital and leave it to your heirs or charities. She's calculating a conservative 3.5% return on investments.)
+To certified financial planner Jon Duncan, it's a net worth of $7.5 million. Duncan is making the same assumptions as Christerson in terms of kids and life span, but he thinks it only takes about $200,000 a year to live rich. And because the stock market has historically yielded about 10%, he's figuring on you getting a much better return on your savings.
+So, yes, wealth is a relative concept. But in order to talk about it productively, we must agree on a definition. For the purposes of this essay, then, I'm going to ask you to accept this one:
+Wealth is a store of something valuable, something you can use or enjoy later. Financial wealth, therefore, is the money you have put aside for spending in the future. I call this your 'net investable wealth.'
+Your net investable wealth (N.I.W.) is the money you have saved that doesn't need to be used for any current needs or any current debts. That is to say, your N.I.W. is the amount of money you have put aside that is free and clear for future use. (I'm going to recommend you invest a good portion of it in ways I'll explain in upcoming lessons.) If I had to put a formula to it, it would look like this:
+N.I.W. = Your Income Minus Your Expenses/Debts
+Minus the Value of Assets You Want to Hold
+Some financial experts (such as Christerson and Duncan) classify wealth as your net worth. Net worth is the total of all your financial assets (e.g., cash, house, car, jewelry, etc.) minus all your debts (e.g., mortgage, credit card debt, etc.).
+My definition - using your net investable wealth - is a little more stringent. I'm not letting you count the financial value of your house, your car, or any other key possessions that you wouldn't be willing to get rid of someday.
+The reason for this stricter definition is simple: You are always going to need a house and a car, so you can't really count them as part of your wealth. (This is an oversimplification. If you figure your wealth this way, you will be erring on the side of conservativeness. That's a good thing. It means you will always be richer than your numbers say you are.)
+The truth is: When I decided to retire for the first time at 39, I was confronted with this distinction. As I stopped bringing in active income and began spending down my wealth, I quickly realized there were many assets I would be unwilling to give up in retirement: my valuable art collection, my cars, my house, my wife's jewelry...
+Therefore, I determined to keep some assets outside of my overall financial picture.
+If you accept this definition - or even if you would rather count your wealth using the standard net worth formula - you must still recognize one important fact: You need more than a high income to be wealthy. It's amazing how many people, young and old, don't understand this. Too many folks equate making 'mucho dinero' with being rich.
+A good example: the popular HBO television show Entourage. In Entourage, the main character is a fictionalized version of Mark Wahlberg after he became famous as a Hollywood actor. Mark's character and his friends spend all their time and money buying toys and chasing girls, while their accountant sits in his office and screams at them.
+The entourage is hell-bent on spending every cent of the multimillion-dollar income their buddy is earning. And that makes them feel rich. The truth is, however, that they are just as broke as they were when they were living in Brooklyn. The only difference is that they are spending more.
+To be truly rich, you need lots of money in the bank. A big income can give you a great lifestyle. But if you're spending it as fast as you're making it, when you stop working, or when a financial emergency arises, you'll very quickly find out how un-rich you really are.
+The Sad Story of Mike Tyson: A Spending Fool
+During the 20-year span of his career, Mike Tyson's net worth exceeded $400 million. Yet in 2004, before his 39th birthday, this amazing moneymaker was $38 million in debt. He had some assets - equity in some mansions, some cars, and some jewelry - but insiders speculate that their total value was less than $3 million. For the sake of wishing him well, let's assume it was twice that much. That would put his personal net worth at minus $32 million.
+Think about that. Minus $32 million!
+With a negative net worth that large, Mike Tyson was 160,000 times poorer than the average wage earner from Sierra Leone, the poorest country in the world, with an average annual income of $200 per person.
+By every recognized standard of accounting, he was poor. Extremely poor.
+But he didn't think so. And that's part of the reason he got so poor in the first place. The faster money came in, the faster it went out. Stories about his profligacy are legendary. Tyson employed as many as 200 people, including bodyguards, chauffeurs, chefs, gardeners...
+He spent:
+Nearly $4.5 million on cars and motorcycles
+$3.4 million on clothes and jewelry
+$7.8 million on 'personal expenses'
+$140,000 on two white Bengal tigers and $125,000 per year for their trainer
+$2 million on a bathtub for his first wife, actress Robin Givens
+$410,000 on a birthday party
+$230,000 on cell phones and pagers during a three-year period from 1995-1997.
+The purpose of this is not to shake a finger at Mike Tyson, but to alert you to the dangerous temptation to spend more when you make more. As someone who grew up drinking powdered milk and wearing hand-me-downs, I understand the strength of that temptation.
+But I should also point out that, nowadays, 'Iron' Mike has come around. He's working hard, acting, making appearances, and doing what he can to salvage his life.
+I admire the new Mike Tyson - he shows you that you can recover from a terrible financial loss, even one that came from your own bad habits, simply by adopting a positive mindset and getting to work...
+If you want to become wealthy - in terms of having lots of money put away for a rainy day or money to spend after you stop working for it - you are going to have to learn how to save and invest a significant portion of your income.
+But here's the good news. This is a really good time for you to start saving money. No matter where you are in your life, it's not too late to break bad spending habits and start good saving habits. If you start now, you'll be rich before you know it.
+But let's get back to this idea of stored value, which - in financial terms - translates into savings.
+The purpose of saving money is so that if and when you stop working, you can draw on your savings to pay for your living expenses.
+But that would require you to have to 'guesstimate' how much time you have left after you retire (and before you pass). You would have to apportion it such that you spend your final pennies on your final day on this Earth... unless you wanted to leave some behind.
+Perfectly calculating how much time you have left and budgeting accordingly is absurd. That's why, for many people, the ideal situation is to have enough money saved that they can live off the interest they are making on that savings.
+Let's say, for example, your lifestyle (including paying your debts) costs you Rs 400,000 per year. You have Rs 5 million in savings generating 8% interest (or Rs 400,000 in income). In this scenario, you are financially independent.
+Another, rather crude, way of saying this is that you have 'Get Lost' money.
+Get Lost Money. Isn't that a good objective? Wouldn't you like to have the ability to not work, tell your boss off, and yet continue to pay for all your living expenses? Wouldn't it be great to spend your time focusing on the activities that give you the greatest satisfaction in life, without worrying about money?
+That's exactly what I'm going to show you how to do: Create a plan to get you from where you are today to a state of financial independence - which requires having a comfortable level of Get Lost money. (I'm assuming you are broke and saddled with debt now. If you are better off than that, my plan will work much faster for you.)
+Okay. So how do we figure out how much in savings is enough?
+The first step is to figure out how much income you think you will need to live the life you want to live...
+I'll show you how to do that in the next installment.
+====== Foundations of Wealth #2: The Important Relationship Between Income and Quality of Life ======
+Editor's Note: Welcome back to Foundations of Wealth. In the last installment, we left the discussion at the concept of 'net investable wealth.' Mark stressed that the purpose of saving money is so that if and when you stop working, you can draw on your savings to pay for your living expenses.
+Today, he goes deeper into what financial freedom means, what good saving and spending habits are, and what your goal should be to achieve your desired quality of life.
+As a young man, I never had any ambitions about making money. I knew nothing about business and didn't care to learn. My goal in life was to write a great novel, marry a beautiful woman (who liked my novel), and travel.
+Apart from finishing that novel, I got what I wanted. And along the way, I also got rich...
+It was 1983. I had just been hired as editorial director for a fledgling newsletter-publishing company in South Florida. And after turning myself into a financially invaluable employee, my yearly income grew to $100,000 per year. (That's about $250,000 in today's dollars. I explain how I did this in another Wealth Builders Club program, Intrapreneurship 101.)
+This was more money than I had ever imagined I'd make. So I wasn't quite sure how to feel about it.
+'You should feel very good,' Ron (my accountant at the time) told me. He found my innocent excitement amusing. Ron was used to working with high-income earners-most in the $1 million-plus category.
+'Welcome to the world of the rich,' he said.
+'Come on,' I said. 'A hundred grand is nothing compared to what most of your clients make.'
+'It's time you learned something about money,' he replied.
+I perked up and listened. To this day, I've never forgotten what he said: 'First of all, you have to recognize that as far as earning income is concerned, you are already in the top 5%. Second, you need to know that $100,000 is enough to live like a billionaire.'
+'How can you say that?' I asked.
+'Think of it this way,' he said. 'When you have a family income of less than $50,000, it's a struggle.'
+'Tell me about it,' I replied. 'I have been struggling ever since I graduated from college.'
+'Then, when you boost your income to between $50,000 and $100,000, you have everything you need... but you have only some of what you want.'
+Since my transition to $100,000 had been so quick, I had never had the time to experience living at the level of income 'in between.' So I asked him what he meant.
+'I mean this. You can afford a nice, modern, modest home. And you can pay your bills. You can even go out to dinner at a good restaurant once a week and spend a few weeks a year vacationing. But you can't do any of those things too elaborately, and you can't afford to buy yourself toys.'
+'Toys? Such as?'
+'Such as sports cars, boats, expensive watches, and so on.'
+'My $35 Casio watch is fine for me,' I said. 'And I get seasick. But I wouldn't mind a little red sports car.'
+'Well, guess what?' he said. 'Now you can afford that, too.'
+'Do you really think so?'
+'Sure. Buy yourself a little 5-year-old convertible for $3,500.' (Remember, this was 1983.) 'Keep it in your garage. Take it out on weekends.'
+'I'd love that.'
+'Now that you are in the $100,000 club, you can have everything you need and everything you want. You just have to be sure that you don't overspend on what you want.'
+'Like limiting the money I spend on my sports car to $3,500.'
+'Exactly. The only difference between your lifestyle and the way my wealthiest clients live - and I'm talking about guys who rake in eight-figure incomes every year - is the price of your toys. Other than that, you are living the same.'
+'That's a great thought,' I told Ron. 'Very comforting.'
+'And here's something else you need to know,' he said, as he packed up his papers and started to walk out of the room. 'You'll get just as much fun out of your $3,500 sports car as any of my other clients get from their Lamborghinis.'
+That conversation with Ron left a deep impression on me.
+It was definitely a turning point in my financial life. Were it not for the advice he gave me, I might well have gone on to do what most high-income earners do: spend my money as fast as (or even faster than) I made it.
+Overspending is a major problem for high-income earners for several reasons:
+They want to show off their income by purchasing status symbols.
+They want to reward themselves by buying expensive toys.
+They feel that as long as they can pay for what they buy, there isn't any problem. If they spend every dollar of what they make this year, there'll be plenty more dollars next year.
+The trouble with this sort of thinking is obvious: It makes it very difficult to save. And if you don't save money, you can't get richer.
+Wealth is not about how much you make. It's about how much you have to spend in the future.
+Put in financial terms: Wealth is not your income...or many of your 'things'...but your net investable wealth.
+Ron's conversation was immensely helpful to me, because he made me understand, at the beginning of my high-income-earning years, that spending extra money on ever-more-expensive toys wasn't going to gratify me. All it was going to do was put me on the same treadmill with everyone else in my category, most of whom would never end up wealthy.
+Of course, the most valuable lessons are often hard won. I wasn't always loyal to Ron's advice...
+When it reached the $250,000-350,000 range, for example, my family and I moved to a big, custom-built home in a fancy gated community, put our kids in private schools, bought ourselves luxury cars, and went to Europe or Hawaii once each year.
+I liked living that way. I was proud of what I had achieved and eager to show off my material wealth to friends and family. It was also fun to splurge on stupidly expensive things (like booking a suite in the Hotel George V in Paris, easily over $1,000 per room per night).
+But was the quality of my life better? Did the actual pleasure I got out of life increase when I was making double... quadruple... and then 60 times $100,000 per year?
+It did not.
+In fact, I liked that middle-class neighborhood much better than I liked the gated community. Our neighbors were not only more accessible but also more considerate and more authentic. (I'm still friends with many of them.)
+And what about booking that suite in Paris?
+I'm glad I did it once. But when we go to Paris now, we stay in smaller boutique hotels. They aren't cheap, but they're usually less than half the price of the George V.
+So there you have it: When my income passed $100,000, then $200,000, and then $500,000 and beyond, I was able to spend even more extravagantly. That felt good for a while. But it was mostly the ego high of finally 'arriving' - the feeling of 'Holy crap! Aren't I great?'
+But ego highs don't last. Like drugs, you need more and more to give you a lift. And ultimately, they leave you feeling empty.
+You remind yourself that the best things in life are free, but you're addicted to the high you get from spending.
+So you keep working and you keep spending.
+You're also addicted to increasing your income because you have equated income with success. You have to make more money to prove to yourself that you're better than your friends and colleagues. It's all about keeping score.
+So you keep working and you keep spending.
+Am I going to tell you to stop trying to make more money? Of course not.
+But I want to make sure you never fall into the income addiction trap.
+That's why I'm stressing this important lesson now. As you follow the steps laid out in this program and begin to earn a higher and higher income (whether by becoming an 'intrapreneur' or developing multiple income streams on the side), don't fritter it all away by being lured into buying more expensive toys.
+Master wealth builders understand this secret, which took me many years to internalize. You would do well to memorize it now:
+You have to keep your spending down while your income increases.
+Let's take another look at the levels of income that Ron identified. I've amended them and translated them into today's dollars. You will pass through them all, so you must be aware of how they can affect your lifestyle and be prepared for what's coming.
+Why Strive for Financial Freedom Anyway?
+The main purpose of this series is to help set the stage for you to achieve financial independence.
+Think about the term financial independence. What does that mean? And why should you want it? Here are some possibilities:
+You may want more freedom in your life - more choice about where you live, how you live, how much you work, and so on.
+You may want more leisure in your life. You don't want to feel compelled to work 8-12 hours every day, or five and six days every week.
+You may want more tranquility in your life - an end to the stress that lack of money sometimes causes. You want to be able to sleep easily at night and enjoy your days without worry.
+Those goals are all reasonable, laudable, and possible. And they are all attainable if you'll follow the advice in the program I'm laying out for you here.
+The Relationship Between Income and Quality of Life: How Much Money Must You Make to Enjoy a Really Good Life?
+Here are six income-levels based on a family of four. For single people, couples, and one-child families, it could be lower. And it would vary somewhat depending your location. For example, it costs a great deal more to live in Mumbai than it does in any other Indian city.
+Income Level 1: You're making less than Rs 500,000.
+For a family of four with a household income of less than Rs 5o0,000, life is tough. You are renting an average apartment or dilapidated house, driving a car that breaks down regularly, clipping grocery coupons (if not food stamps), and accumulating debt. Debt is always a huge, omnipresent problem because - for some incomprehensible reason - credit has been extended to you.
+Income Level 2: You're making Rs 500,000 - 800,000.
+You are living in a small but decent place and driving an okay car. But you are struggling to pay your bills on time. You are trying to save money, but 'emergencies' keep eating it up.
+Income Level 3: You're making Rs 800,000 - 1,200,000.
+You are living in a nice house, driving a nice car, and paying your bills on time. You want to save a decent percentage of your income, but to do that you have to forgo regular dining out and nice vacations.
+Income Level 4: You're making Rs 1,200,000 - 2,000,000.
+Things are good. Your house is not showy, but you have everything you need...and a lot of what you want. You can drive a luxury car, but you may prefer to drive something more sensible. As you move up in this income range, you can go out to dinner whenever you like and take a nice vacation every year. Debt is manageable, even minimal. You're putting money away for the kids' college education and for retirement. You expect to be able to retire at 65.
+Income Level 5: You're making Rs 2,500,000 or more.
+You've got it all: a nice house, luxury cars, dinners out, very nice vacations, and a growing savings account. In other words, a financially worry-free life. If you are smart with your spending, you can retire early.
+Income Level 6: You're making crores!
+You can pretty much buy whatever you want without worrying about the cost. You're happy and comfortable - but no happier or more comfortable than when you were making Rs 2,500,000.
+Look at the levels above - it will be apparent where you are on the totem pole.
+So how much wealth do you really need?
+Having a 'net investable wealth' about 10 times the amount you need to live on is, in my opinion, an adequate amount of wealth.
+What it means is that if you earn an average of 10% interest on your savings, you'll be able to spend what you need for your lifestyle (barring financial emergencies) and never have to dip into your financial nest egg (your savings).
+That's a good goal: to squirrel away an amount of money big enough to let you live off the interest.
+But how much do you need to save to get there?
+If you complete the steps in the next lesson, you'll have a good idea.

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