How To Become A Millionaire

by Malot Oquendo

Almost anyone can be a millionaire. All you need is to have the discipline to regularly set aside a portion of your disposable money and place it a high-yielding instrument.

Now, just how long would it take for you to have P1M? There are three factors to consider: a) how much are you willing to set aside in month or a year, b) how much interest is money earning in the instrument of your choice, and c) how long are you willing to save.

The table below shows the number of years you need to reach P1M.

	Number of Years
Savings/Month	5yrs	10yrs	15yrs	20yrs	25yrs	30yrs	35yrs
P 1,000/mo or P 12,000/annum	90%	35%	19%	13%	9%	6%	5%
P 2,000/mo or P 24,000/annum	71%	25%	13%	7%	4%	3%	1%
P 3,000/mo or P 36,000/annum	59%	19%	8%	4%	1%	0%	0%
P 4,000/mo or P 48,000/annum	50%	15%	5%	0.5%	0%	0%	0%
P 5,000/mo or P 60,000/annum	43%	10%	2%	0%	0%	0%	0%
P 10,000/mo or P 120,000/annum	20%	0%	0%	0%	0%	0%	0%
P 15,000/mo or P 180,000/annum	5%	0%	0%	0%	0%	0%	0%
P 20,000/mo or P 240,000/annum	0%	0%	0%	0%	0%	0%	0%
RATE TO REACH P1M

At present, the most popular saving instrument is a time deposit account, which generates a gross interest of 8-9% p.a. or net interest of 6.4-7.2%p.a. However, if your timeframe is less than 15 years, you may want to look for an instrument where your money will have greater growth potential, such as stocks, bonds or mutual fund. However, before investing in any of these three instruments, one must first understand the risks involved in investing in equity, bond, and mutual fund, and accept that higher growth potential comes with greater risk.

Employee vs. Entrepreneur:

What's the Difference?
In honor of Robert Kiyosaki's induction into the
Amazon.com 10th Anniverary Hall of Fame
By Robert Kiyosaki

In 1983, the Harvard Business School published "A Perspective on Entrepreneurship," a paper that defined the differences between entrepreneurs and employees. This paper, written by Professor Howard H. Stevenson, is one of the most articulate articles on this particular subject that I have read. While many differences were examined, I found two in particular to be especially insightful.

The first difference between entrepreneurs and employees is:

1. Employees are resource-oriented. Entrepreneurs are opportunity-oriented.
A person with an employee mindset might say, "I would start my own business but I don't have the money." Or "I'd love to invest in that piece of real estate, but I don't have the down payment." In both of these examples the person focuses on their resources--in this case their lack of money, rather than the opportunity.

In a similar situation, a person with an entrepreneur's mindset might say, "Let's start the business and we can finance the business from the cash flow." Or "Tie up the property and we'll find the money later."

My poor dad was a man who saw many opportunities, but failed to act on them simply because he was resource-oriented. Instead of taking action, he often said, "I wish I could do it, but I can't afford it." Or "I would go into business for myself, but I need a steady job. I have a mortgage and you kids to feed."

My rich dad (my best friend's father, an entrepreneur who taught me a lot about how the rich think about money) was a man who started with nothing, but eventually became one of the richest men in Hawaii. Today, when you look at Waikiki Beach, you see some of the biggest hotels along the ocean on land his family owns. He said, "If you do not have resources, you need to become resourceful." That is why he forbade his son and me from saying the words "I can't afford it." He said, "Poor people say 'I can't afford it.' That's why they're poor." Instead he insisted we learn to say, "How can I afford it?" He believed that when we said, "I can't afford it" our minds were turned off and went to sleep. When we asked ourselves, "How can I afford it?" our minds, our greatest resource of all, were turned on and put to work.

The second difference between entrepreneurs and employees is:

2. Employees prefer to manage via hierarchical structures. Entrepreneurs manage via networks, utilizing the resources of other people and organizations.

This means that employee-type leaders would rather hire people and bring their talent "in-house." Rather than have an outside firm do their creative work, an employee-type leader would prefer to hire the talent and have them under their control. While there are economic reasons for doing this, the report stated that the primary reason is control. This is because employees gravitate to a leadership style that is more suited to a military command-and-control type of organization.

My poor dad was successful in the hierarchical structure of the government, eventually rising to the top of the educational system as Superintendent of Education and running for Lieutenant Governor for the State of Hawaii. After losing that race--and his position as Superintendent of Education--he tried his hand at entrepreneurship. He purchased a national ice cream franchise that failed in less than a year. Why? While the reasons were many, one reason was his leadership and management style. When he said, "Jump"... no one jumped.

Instead of the military's command-and-control leadership style, my rich dad used a more cooperative and collaborative style of leadership. He encouraged his son and me to learn to lead and manage people who are not required to follow our orders--people who did not need to jump when they heard the word "Jump." Rather than hire people and bring them in-house, rich dad networked with other people and organizations, which tended to reduce his costs and at the same time increase his resources and influence in the marketplace.

Today, The Rich Dad Company follows my rich dad's advice. Instead of becoming a stand-alone publishing house, we choose to cooperate via a joint venture agreement with The Time Warner Book Group, as well as licensed publishers around the world who offer our books in 43 languages. In this way, we keep our core staff small, yet we utilize the thousands of employees of publishers around the world.

But leveraging the assets and resources of partners is not enough. It's important to choose the right partners--ones who are aligned with your goals and values. Choosing the right partners can make the difference between success and failure--as I've learned the hard way.

As The Rich Dad Company has grown, we have worked with partners who have opened doors to opportunities that were much greater than what we could have been able to pursue on our own. In an entrepreneurial spirit, we formed alliances with major media organizations and international promotion firms that leveraged the Rich Dad brand with their worldwide networks.

In doing so, we--as entrepreneurs--stay small, yet increase market share by cooperating rather than competing... by networking rather than hiring employees and bringing work "in-house."

In 1989 the world changed. That's when the Berlin Wall came down and the World Wide Web went up. Instead of a world of walls, we became a world of webs... networks of people working cooperatively rather than competitively. It is a special honor for me to be recognized by Amazon.com, a pioneer in the brave new world of the web, founded by a great entrepreneur, Jeff Bezos. We at The Rich Dad Company join in celebrating Amazon's successes and salute your leadership in this world of webs rather than walls.

There are key, fundamental differences between the mindset of an employee and the mindset of an entrepreneur. One of the great things about this world of webs is that the world is now open for business to billions of people who choose to think as entrepreneurs--rather than employees.

*Time is money, so start early*

PHILEQUITY CORNER by Ignacio B. Gimenez

The Philippine Star 03/13/2006

The most important key to wealth building is to start saving as early as possible. Many young workers today spend most of their salaries on clothes, gadgets, or eating in fancy restaurants. And little, if there is at all, is left for savings/investment. Sadly, some even go to the point of overspending by making major purchases through debt early on, thinking that they can make up with higher investments in later years. Unfortunately, money does not work that way. Thanks to the power of compound interest, cash invested today has a geometric (ever-increasing) impact on future wealth.

To illustrate the point, consider two would-be investors; both assume a retirement age of 60 and a 10 percent compounded annual return on investment.

Jack is 20 years old and decides early on that he will save for his retirement by investing P1,000 every month for 10 straight years before taking it easy afterwards. Nicolas, also 20 years of age, decides that he will defer saving until he is 30 years old, but afterwards he will invest P1,000 a month for the rest of his working years.

Upon retirement, Jack would have invested a total of P120,000 and Nicolas would have invested a total of P360,000. Yet, Jack would retire with P4,063,591.66, almost twice the P2,260,487.92 that Nicolas would get.

By investing earlier, not only would Jack increase his money 33 times compared to Nicolas' five times, but Jack would have taken only a third of the time (10 years) that Nicolas spent in investing (30 years).

In fact, Jack could even stop saving after the first five years and still be ahead of Nicolas upon retirement. *Want to be like Warren?*There's no better example to illustrate the power of compound interest than to talk about Warren Buffett. Warren who? For those new to the investment world, Warren Buffett is considered the world's greatest investor. Quoted from Lowenstein's book, Buffett: The Making of an American Capitalist, "In the annals of investing, Warren Buffet stands alone. Starting from scratch, simply by picking stocks and companies for investment, Buffett amassed one of the epochal fortunes of the twentieth century. By virtue of this steady, superior compounding, Buffett acquired a magical-seeming net worth of $9.7 billion, and counting."

But that was way back in 1995 when the book was written. Today, Buffett is ranked second richest man in the world (according to the latest Forbes survey) with $42 billion in assets – next only to Microsoft's Bill Gates with $50 billion.

In the same way, the public shareholders who invested with Buffet also got rich. If one had invested $10,000 with Buffet when he began his career in 1956 and stuck with him all throughout this years, he would have an investment worth $351,419,100 today.

Of course, even by today's standards, $10,000 is way above what a typical Filipino investor can afford to invest. But what if we try to apply Buffett's magic of steady, superior compounding to an investment program that even an average Joe can afford? *The Average Joe can* In our previous example, we used a P1,000 monthly investment because we think this is an amount affordable to an average Joe. Even students can afford to save this much, if they just save P50 from their allowance (equivalent to a burgermeal for their merienda) for just 20 days in a month.

Now, let's assume that an average Joe starts investing at the age of 20. He invests P1,000 a month all throughout his working years up to his retirement at 60 - for a total investment of P480,000.

See how Joe's money grows using different annual rates of return (assumed constant for the next 40 years).

At five percent — If Joe places his money in time deposit with a much higher rate of five percent, he would get P1,526,020.16 upon retirement. At this rate, Joe would have increased his investment two-fold.

At 10 percent — If Joe places his money in a combination of equity and fixed income funds earning a compounded annual return of 10 percent, he would end up with P6,324,079.58.

At 15 percent — If Joe places his money in an aggressive equity fund earning a compounded annual return of 15 percent (which is very good by today is standards), Joe would end up with P31,016,054.77.

At 20 percent — If Joe places his money in a superior equity fund consistently earning a compounded annual return of 20 percent (among the world's best by today's standards), Joe would retire a multi-millionaire with P167,384,879.55. *Joe Millionaire's money upon retirement It illustrates the magical powers of compound interest. The longer the investment period and the higher the rate of return, the greater will be geometric growth of your investment. The end figures themselves are almost inconceivable especially when investments are made for over a long period of time.

So, is Warren Buffett's secret then just a simple haat trick? Turning $10,000 in 1956 to more than $350 million by 2006 is just equivalent to earning an annual compounded return of slightly over 23 percent.

It may not seem that daunting, especially since the Phisix itself has gained an average of 26 percent for the past three years. However, Buffett's magic not only lies in delivering high returns but on consistently delivering high returns – and for half a century at that.

Realistically, even if average Joe's returns are half or even a third as good as Buffett's, he will still end up as Joe Multi-millionaire upon retirement. And so can you. The key is to start early and to invest regularly. So what are you waiting for?

How important is life insurance?

By: Charles Amoroso

I have been investing for almost 3 years now. My mind was opened regarding Investments and Entrepreneurship by the book “Rich Dad Poor Dad” it totally changed my way of thinking regarding the subject of money. From that simple book, I have read almost every book regarding personal finance but none of them gave so much emphasis on life insurance.

For some, life insurance is subject they don’t want to talk about… because it is about death. Well, they are right… but I have to remind them that death is inevitable; sooner or later all of us will have to die some due to accidents, disease, or just due to old age. Whatever it is, there’s no way of knowing when we would die…

Now, where does life insurance comes into play in terms of building a strong financial foundation? Any Financial Planner would agree that life insurance is the corner stone of a personal financial plan. Because of the importance of proper protection in case you die sooner your family would not suffer from financial problems (Estate Tax, Funeral, Debt, Mortgage, College education). It is much more important for someone who is the breadwinner of the family, because if he dies all his dreams for his family will just fades away… Now, you don’t want that happen to right?

Life insurance primary role is to protect the family until it can build up other financial resources. It does not replace “YOU” but it replaces the income you produce which the family is dependent upon. But sooner when you build up ASSETS your INSURANCE needs will go down, unless in some cases life insurance is use for the payment of ESTATE TAX (this is another topic).

Look at it this way, If YOU unexpectedly die who would take care of the family, financially? Who would pay for the funeral expenses? Who would pay for the Hospital bills? Who would pay for the amortization of your house? Who would pay for the tuition fee of your children? That is also one of the reason our Kababayans grow deeply in DEBT because of the untimely death of the breadwinner of the family… there resort would be to “UTANG” which is not the right thing to do, that is why adequate protection is needed.

The next question is how much protection (life insurance) you need? (This is another topic).

Frugality: the Filipino-Chinese Secret

By: Charles Amoroso

In my life I had always admired Filipino-Chinese because they live in SIMPLICITY no wonder they are part of the upper 5 % of the population who controls about 95% of the wealth in the Philippines. If you observed them they are very THRIFTY and do not indulge themselves in new cell phones, new cars and new clothes and does even eat in fancy restaurants.

Just to illustrate my point: one owner of a bank where I work uses a second hand car (Mercedes Benz 90’s model) I was stunned by what I saw but it’s not new to me, way back in College I had this professor who wore a faded jeans a simple white shirt who doesn’t look rich in anyway but believe me he is filthy rich he owns many businesses (lotto outlet, OTB, restaurants, water stations, apartments and a mining company) mind you he prefer to ride a jeepney considering he owns 3 ford explorer.

Many of these Filipino-Chinese are not rich when they came to the Philippines, the reason they came to our country is to escape poverty in China. After 50 years look at them now, they are ICONS of the next generations; they are the shakers and movers of the Philippine economy.

If there is one secret of there success it is FRUGALITY they live below there means and INVEST there money in Investment vehicles and other Investment Opportunities that will make there money work for them. In layman’s term they BUY ASSETS not LIABILITIES.

Actually it’s not new to most people that if you want to be RICH you must accumulate ASSETS and dispose of your LIABILITIES but unfortunately most people do the opposite but if you ask them what do you want to become? Most of them will answer I want to be RICH! But how can someone who spends everything before they even get a paycheck be rich?? I pity those people because they are just DAYDREAMING.

I’m not saying those things to insult those people but to AWAKEN them to REALITY that you must be FRUGAL and LEARN to INVEST your money in order to ACCOMPLISH what you want to BECOME.

6 Steps to Financial Independence

by: Charles Amoroso

Financial Independence can be achieved in 6 simple steps according to the IMG Financial Strategy to building wealth. Follow these simple steps and I guarantee you that you’ll retire wealthy. A word of wisdom before we start… “Most People DON’T PLAN TO FAIL, They Just SIMPLY FAIL TO PLAN.”

Step 1: The Discipline to Increase Cash flow

You can increase cash flow in 2 ways.

Increase income (through sidelines/business.)

Reduce expenses (Know what is your needs from your wants)

Step 2: Debt Management

Nothing can ruin your financial dreams faster than excessive, high interest debt. (credit cards)

1. Consolidate debt.

Eliminate debt (pay off the higher interest loans/debt) before investing

If possible avail of a lower interest debt and pay the higher interest debt.

Step 3: Create an Emergency Fund

Set aside at least 3 to 6 months worth of expenses in order to address for any contingencies that may arise.

DO NOT TOUCH the Emergency fund unless it is an emergency!

Place your fund in liquid investments such as Time Deposit/Money Market Fund.

Step 4: Ensure Proper Protection

What if you die too soon? Who will take care of your family?

Solution: Income protection. To have peace of mind, provide proper protection (Life Insurance) for your family while building up wealth/passive income.

In the event of untimely death, life insurance protection can help you replace your income, help finance children’s education, pay for basic needs, pay estate tax, pay debts, hospital bills, funeral expenses, etc…

Step 5: Build Long-term income producing ASSETS

What if I live too long? Who will take care of yourself?

Solution: Build Long-term ASSETS (Passive Income)

Accumulate ASSETS not LIABILITES

Move lower interest Savings to HIGHER INTEREST Savings

Know how to make MONEY WORK for you, not against you

Understand RATE OF RETURN, TIME VALUE OF MONEY, COMPOUND INTEREST, TAXATION and the Effects of INFLATION.

Step 6: Preserve your ESTATE

Build a family legacy – make sure that your children inherit your estate.

Protect what you’ve build… A proper estate plan can take care of your children during you life and after death.