My Personal Wealth Plan

Information about wealth is overwhelming sometimes. I remember when I was younger thinking that I could save my way into being wealthy. I heard that wealthy people have multiple streams of income and set my goals on getting there. Unfortunately, no one said they didn’t go to a physical job to get it! After trying to work three jobs at the same time, I realized I was not going to get rich this way. All the positions I was in were of entry-level style work and pay. Then I started to think that I would need some special talent. I would have to be an actor, athlete, inventor or some other very rare stroke of luck life would give me. Well that didn’t happen and I never felt these talents to be in my grasp. However, I realized their are many ways to get and maintain wealth. Even though my hard work was not lost, I was just in the wrong position. My physical work needed to be more mental. If we are average people, we need to work on creating or building our own skill! That is the key. then we add other incomes to aid in getting assets to pay us passively, or grow over a long period of time. Here’s my personal plan…

Shouldn’t need to be said, but this is my personal plan. you need to do your own research on what works for you and your abilities. It is wise, before investing to have a 3-6 month emergency fund. no point in building wealth if you have to take it out because of a layoff or car repair. It is also wise to not have any outstanding debt on liabilities. No point in interest on your investment if you are paying interest on a balance. You want to be net positive on interest coming to you!

First I found my skill in transportation. This is what my family and I live on. When we needed extra money for other things, That’s when I worked another job. When my income exceeded our basic needs, that’s when I started saving in my 401K. That’s my first step. this will help build up my income in assets in the stock market. The average return of the stock market has been in the teens for over forty years. This will make sure I get growth on every dollar that I invest. Over time different employers matched my contribution in different amounts. I always tried to put in the matched amount, but more if possible. This is the basic thing I can do to grow wealth.

If your trying to grow wealth with little effort, do that simple thing of putting money into a retirement account. It can be a 401K, IRA, ROTH IRA or other tax benefiting accounts. If your self employed or your employer doesn’t have a retirement plan, there’s no excuse. Many financial platforms offer IRA’s. Just don’t save cash. With inflation, it’s like paying 4% on every dollar you leave in the bank or in your mattress! The reverse of building wealth. This can keep you barely treading water when you retire. Lets avoid doing that!

Next, I need to fix the cost of living. One thing that happens, is the cost of everything keeps going up. Even though I may get a raise, I realized that it never equals how fast everything around me is going up in price. So when I did, I decided to get a house to stop the increase on rent that happens every year. This will in turn keep a certain cost associated with shelter from rising, something we all need. I also get to keep the value of every dollar I pay down on the mortgage with the hope of property values going up over time, increasing my net worth for just owning where I stay. Next is transportation. I currently live in the Dallas, TX metroplex. Even though the city has public transportation, the suburbs I live in do not. Having a car to work and get around is a necessity in my area. To combat the cost of a car payment, I buy very affordable vehicles. I’ve paid between 3 and 14 thousand for all my vehicles cash. This way I avoid interest to the bank or car company and the insurance company, who may want me to have full coverage with a $500 deductible causing a higher premium. Instead, I can raise the deductible to what I want to pay and change some of the requirements the lean holder would impose on the car to insure they don’t lose their value in case of an accident. Also paying cash in this stage of my life with relatively low values compared to new cars; it keeps me from losing so much depreciation that a new car will incur and sell it getting back almost all I put into it! These are the ways I found to help the cost living, while keeping and potentially increasing my net worth.

With that said, owning a home is not as simple as paying the mortgage that doesn’t go up. I wish someone would have explained the maintenance that goes into it. Both my home and paid for cars have constant maintenance bills that vary and unexpected repairs. These arguably make a home and cars liabilities. However, in the long run of many years I believe these are good assets to have and to set you up for building wealth.

Now, my wealth building train has started. It’s slowly growing consistently. What can I do to help it? For the longest I assumed I would only enjoy life when I retire, because I wouldn’t make a little better than average income. I didn’t realize, Just by doing retirement accounts, I’ve added two other income sources that don’t require me punching in a clock. my 401K and IRA! They not only grow with the market, they pay dividends that are reinvested to help them grow! So, I have three income sources at this point. I invest ~15% of my income. Income is put into different categories for bills, groceries, emergencies, clothes, vacations and other expenses. Over that, any extra money will go to another account that I hope will lead to more financial growth. One is this website and media platforms I’m investing in. I buy individual stocks and crypto. Next I hope to get rental properties. I also really would like a couple of franchises I like and my own billiard hall! None of these will immediately make me wealthy. In fact they may cost a considerable amount to get going and keep running. The idea is over time they will produce more and more cash flow (income). Eventually the rental properties will be paid for and the businesses will get stable giving another source of income. The best part, my kids can inherit it! This is the plan to be wealthy!

In conclusion, this is not a sprint or jump into wealth. This is a marathon anybody can be a part of. You can follow me as I will post all updates to the plan and progress on all the platforms. My goal is to encourage everybody to make a change in becoming wealth. Pit Bull, rapper, entrepreneur said (roughly), “People always wonder how I got so lucky and successful”, he said, “hard work!”. “The harder I worked the luckier I got!” I love that! We are not promised financial success by any means. However, the harder we work the better chance of a better than average income, creating wealth for us and the ones we love. Not settling, giving up or realizing we need to pivot is the best way we can achieve our desired income. We should never thinking we know everything, because we can’t receive new information! Lets ll get on a path to wealth!