Anyone here know how to make money?

[howman]

Serious question... does anyone here know how to make a lot of money?

I have been a student of the self-help genre for many years. Robert Kiyosaki, Anthony Robbins, David Allen (heard of him?), Robert Allen, Ken Roberts, etc. I've bought into different money making systems. Nothing has worked so far. I'm not blaming the gurus or their systems mind you. I am just explaining where I am coming from.

While doing a mind dump for GTD, I created a someday/maybe item for myself that says:

"Earn a full time salary through passive income."

Looking at that sentence now I realize it is a goal and not a project. That's okay. The important part is that I captured it in my trusted system. Now I need to process it.

I know this forum has a diverse crowd. I would like your opinion on how you would go about achieving this goal - breaking it down, defining it better, taking actions, whatever. If you already earn a full time salary from passive income, I really want to hear how you did it.

Thanks!

 

[TesTeq]

There is no free lunch.

Serious question... does anyone here know how to make a lot of money?

"Earn a full time salary through passive income."

It is nothing personal but I hate such attitude. It is a lazy man attitude.

Examples of successes are very rare and just because they are rare - they are successes. How many people can sell pixels on their website? How many people can sell 1000 paintings with numbers from 1 to 1000? How many people earn full time salary from Google ad programs? And these people were not thinking how to do nothing and earn money but they implemented a one-time brilliant marketing idea.

There is no free lunch. I believe that only active people who are working with passion can earn decent money.

But just in case I have two real life examples how to make easy money:
1. Buy a good quality copy printer and carefully distribute fake money.
2. Create Future Advanced Knowledge Enterprise Company (FAKE Company), persuade investors to invest in your Internet Multimedia Web 2.0 project and disappear with the money (or construct investment agreements that will allow you to take money without any risks).

 

[kewms]

The classic approach is to inherit or accumulate sizable assets and live off the income. The new approach is to sell your company to Google (or Microsoft, or whomever) for a gazillion dollars and live off the income. Either way, you've got to have money to make money: the income is earned by some form of existing asset.

How you achieve that will depend on your time frame, your existing resources, and your personality. You could start a company, you could invest in real estate, or you could get to know your rich uncle Fred.

You might track down a book called "The Millionaire Next Door," which examined people who became independently wealthy in a single generation (ie not via inheritance). Most of them were entrepreneurs. Very few were highly paid professionals, like doctors and lawyers.

Also, most of them worked very hard to achieve their goals. As TesTeq said, there ain't no such thing as a free lunch.

Katherine

 

[remyc88]

The easiest way to earn more money is to spend less! Remember that for every dollar saved, that's almost like 1.3 dollars earned (or more depending on your tax rate)

 

[Popeye]

money for nothing ???

Hey c´mon...

it´s easy...

There is a few ways to get rich without hard work..

1. but a ticket in a lottery and hope, hope, hope...

2. find a rich person and get married...

3. invent something that people all over the world needs two times a day...

or... here comes the winner...

4. start working and save your money you get from your active income....

and...

"I know this forum has a diverse crowd. I would like your opinion on how you would go about achieving this goal - breaking it down, defining it better, taking actions, whatever. If you already earn a full time salary from passive income, I really want to hear how you did it."

If I had this gift to get rich from a passive income... it would be my secret. ;-)

Remember, you harvest what you are sowing. there is no shortcuts...

 

[Steve Wynn]

Find something you are passionate about

I think the simplest way is to find something you are really passionate about, and that could be anything, then see if you can make a career out of it. You tend to find that the people that have been really successful in this world have had a real passion for something.

I don't think any income is passive, the word passive means 'lacking energy or will' , 'lacking initiative or forceful qualities' how can you generate income based on that?. Even with Web products that might be sold 24/7, there is always hard work involved. Orders to be processed, complaints, refunds, administration. I don't believe passive income exists.

Behind every successful person is one key element, a lot of really hard work performed over a substantial period of time. If that hard work is directed in a worthwhile manner then one of the benefits may be lots of money. But I think if you are doing anything just for the sole purpose of making money, you will probably fail. You need to focus on providing a product or service that people want. Providing your customers with something of value.

"Earn a full time salary through passive income." is a potential outcome of finding something you are really passionate about, making a business out of it and working hard. But I wouldn't view it as a goal to start with. Your goal needs to be measurable and specific. If you are going to set goals, set them high, then work hard to achieve them.

All the best

Steve

 

[mcogilvie]

Serious question... does anyone here know how to make a lot of money?

.

Experience and observation suggests it usually involves working your a** off.

While doing a mind dump for GTD, I created a someday/maybe item for myself that says:

"Earn a full time salary through passive income."

What's a full time salary for you? $30K? $60K, $100K? $200K?
What assets do you have now?
As a rule of thumb, right now you can generate about $30K after inflation per year per million dollars of assets at very moderate risk, and low effort. That's a 3% return. More risk and more effort can earn you more money, but not necessarily.

 

[ommoran]

Serious question... does anyone here know how to make a lot of money?

Just to be facetious... it's three easy steps.

1. Realize that people struggle with Time Management.
2. Write a book on time management.
3. Live off the proceeds.

:grin:

 

[crankit98]

The Only Real Way To Earn Money Is To......

Hello All

The only real way to earn money is to WORK HARD.

Wether you start an online business as we have or
working offline.Hard and Dedicated work will get the job
done.No other way,online or off.

So,get with it.

 

[Mags]

Just my two cents worth...

Well, I understand the question completely. It sounds like we may have somethings in common.
As far as 'work hard" "find something you love" "etc'... all of that rigamarole... there's still more to it than that.
I haven't figured it out completely myself.. YET... but I am getting closer.
What I can tell you is that I have been working 15+ hour self employed days since 1986 and have not been able to achieve the INCOME that I made in 1984...when I was employed. I made $140,000 that year....and quit because I didn't like the work.
I'm close again...and I believe that GTD will help get me there. But in the interim, I've read Baldoni, Carnegie, Covey, Corcoran, Peale, Bruce, Blanchard, McKay, Ziglar, Peters, Popcorn, Cooper, Naisbitt, Robbins, Gibran, and just about anything else you can name.
All of those are great thinkers... but I don't thing (now) the books weren't ABOUT making money. They were about organization.
For me at this point, making money has to do with getting paid for your services, at a reasonable rate, and being fair with the customer.
At the beginning of this year, I began working on that part of my business.
I always have been lucky and have attracted good clients. Since I started billing for my time more 'appropriately', my income has tripled. My workload is still about the same...and I have lost a few clients...but I'm ok with it.
Anyway...that's my story and I'm stickin to it.
btw... I started this AM with setting up GTD on the OLD trusted system I used in 1984. It was suprisingly very similar to what I had... which helped me move pretty quicly.
Here is a link to the blog about it... with some pictures of my 'new' system.
http://www.surfinwithstan.com/gtd .... the images are under the "materials" tab... and there is a link to the cards I created. You'll have to have MS Publisher to view/print/use them though.

 

[treelike]

I think that an important thing is to keep your mind open to new opportunities which can appear at any time and any place. You get a lot more ideas from actually doing stuff, going places, communicating with people, watching things than sitting down in front of a blank piece of paper with a cup of coffee "trying to think of an idea". Take the piece of paper wherever you go and collect the everyday ideas for processing later. The more you look at things with an opportunistic attitude the more opportunities you see.

The second part of it is trying out all the ideas, 99.999999% of which will fail. Most fail at the first hurdle i.e. whether you have (or want to risk) the money and time required to try out the idea. You maybe only need one or two of the ideas to be really successful.

Having said all that I don't personally want to spend my entire life in the persuit of money. I want to minimise the time I have to spend doing stuff which I need to do but don't particularly enjoy so I can spend more time doing stuff I do enjoy. Money is just something I need which I don't particularly like.

 

[howman]

I never said anything about not working hard nor did I say I was looking for a "get rich quick" scheme. I think some of you are reading this wrong and/or have a preconceived notion about the phrase "passive income".

Maybe the problem is the way I worded the goal. According to Steve Wynn (great response by the way; thanks for your input), there is no truly passive income. I can see his point.

Maybe the goal should read something more like:

"Earn $X a year in income generated by a business venture or investments (not from regular salary)"

The underlying motivation here is, I do not want my financial health to be fully dependent on salary income. Consider the goal an insurance policy against job loss. Or consider it "diversification."

Mags, thanks for sharing your thoughts. I too was self employed for many years but recently moved into the salaried work force. I would like to suggest another book and author to add to your long list, Dan Kennedy, No B.S. Time Management for Entrepreneurs. Especially read chapter one where he explains how much you really need to charge for your billable hour.

Thanks everyone for your comments. Anyone else wish to add to this?

 

[TyQ]

I do not believe that there is truely passive income. Stocks and Mutual funds come close, but you still have to watch things fairly closely and do extensive work before hand to make a sound investment. And unless you are playing with a big chunk of change, it will be difficult to earn enough to live off of.

I have seen hands off business owners earn plenty without actively working in their business, but they still watch things like a hawk. And to get to that point they had to work very hard.

I think the best thing anyone can hope for is a semi-passive income (or incomes) that they watch very closely -- there never is a free lunch.

 

[jpm]

I never said anything about not working hard nor did I say I was looking for a "get rich quick" scheme. I think some of you are reading this wrong and/or have a preconceived notion about the phrase "passive income".

This discussion has been interesting from this forum as it is outside the scope of other forums I follow where these matters are discussed frequently. I think the reactions from several people have been interesting.

There are a lot of misconceptions about "passive income". Partly because there are late night infomercials selling a dream, partly because few people really understand investing.

Passive income is different. It takes less of your time, but is not effortless. Leave for Tahiti for a year and you will come back to find your passive income investments in shambles... but you can probably get away to Hawaii for a couple of weeks several times a year.

You'll typically need to spend a few hours a week managing your passive investments. Compare that to the 50,60,70+ hour a week job that many of us work today...

Maybe the goal should read something more like:

"Earn $X a year in income generated by a business venture or investments (not from regular salary)"

This is better. But I'd prefer you be more specific. What is $X? $50,000, $100,000, $200,000? Once you know what $X is you can determine what your asset base and return on assets will need to be.

By When? Through a business? through investments? What kind of business? What kind of investments?

If X is $100,000 and you choose real estate you'll need about $1 million in assets at 10% return to generate $100,000 annually. If you are going to run a business you'll need approximately $500,000 in assets and the ability to generate about a 20% return on assets.

Personally I like real estate. I invest in single family homes at the 3 BR/2BA entry level in the market. I can easily rent these to families who pay rent on time, handle much of the simple maintenance, and tend to stay in the same house for multiple years. In addition to modest cash flow, they are easy to leverage, when I find a bargain I get walk-in equity and the properties also appreciate. (Building an asset base by buying assets at a discount is much better than paying retail with after tax earnings from a job).

That being said, all of the advice above is good. Keep your job. You'll need w2 income to live on and whatever vehicle you choose your job income makes you financable.

Save your money. I'm sorry when I was young I did not save my money. I really didn't think it was worth it for a 3-6% return. Don't settle for that. 10% is pretty easy to obtain with real estate. I've had returns of anywhere from -20% to about 80% with my real estate investments. (Yes I have lost money too, so you must be prepared to take on some risk). Had I started investing in Real Estate when I was younger, I would easily be a "full time investor" by now.

Do what you love. Making money is hard work. Especially if you want to earn passive income. You'll be doing a lot of it, so you'd better enjoy it.

Avoid bad debts. Buying a new car on credit is not "Leveraging an Asset". Save your credit for buying things that put net cash in your pocket.

Find a Mentor. There are good ones out there. They can help you avoid the mistakes they made along the way and can pass on the knowledge they've gained.

Keep a great attitude. No matter what you think you're right.

Whatever vehicle you choose make sure that delivering a quality product or service to your customer is more important to you than making money. Wealth is simply a byproduct of providing great value to customers.

best of luck.

 

[howman]

JPM,

I sent you a PM. Please check your inbox.

Thanks.

 

[tim99]

I never said anything about not working hard nor did I say I was looking for a "get rich quick" scheme. I think some of you are reading this wrong and/or have a preconceived notion about the phrase "passive income".

But the answers you got here are typical. I am shocked at music forums where a person asks how to play jazz or how to become a full time employed musician, and the first answers are always "there are no shortcuts." Well, HELLO, the orignial poster never said they were looking for a shortcut. In fact, in my opinion, if a person is asking to increase their income, learn jazz, become a full time musician, they already know that there will at least be a period of a few years where they will be working there rear off more than the typical person.

Last year, the boss/owner/president of the company I was working for hired a business coach from a company named Action International. I do not work for them and this is not spam or an ad, it is just the facts. Anyway, his coach was coaching him on how to remain the owner of that company, but to reduce his time working FOR the company, so that he could either pursue his other interests, or...start another company. The book Rich Dad, Poor Dad talks about this.

Most of my friends who are "self employed" do not own a business that they could sell or that they could "manage" with minimum input.

One of the music stores that I go to, and the cleaners that I do my shirts at, both have the owner of the company working for that company. Basically, they own the company they work for. Even though they have employees, you could argue that they own their jobs, not their businesses. However, the laundry guy and the music store guy have businesses that they could sell. So they are working on increasing the value of their business. If the business owns the land and the building it is using, even better.

I worked for a business where the land and the building was owned by the three guys who owned the company, and the business paid those guys rent, and after 15 years, those guys owned that land and that business. They slowly sold out and where set for life, before they where 60.

The Brusters near me is on a large plot of land between two shopping centers. The guy who owns it bought it for the future land value, and simply runs the ice cream store to pay for the land. And he owns the franschise for that area, so there is value in that. He plans to sell the land with an agreement that he will build a Brusters as a part of any future development.

Anyway...it is a crime that in america a young person who is looking for a way to create wealth that in turn creates a passive income is called lazy. It is a crime that our education system does not include business ownership as a part of a possible future for young people. Most kids who graduate from high school say that they want to do something that involves being an employee of some comany they do not have control of.

And "passive income" does not mean lazy, and it does not mean investment or interest from a large sum of cash.

Last. All my friends who are into real estate and small business ventures also have jobs. And they are looking for ANYTHING that will pay for its self. Read that again. Pay for itself. If you can buy an apartment building. Even a small four unit building. And the income from that venture will simply pay for itself, and your loan is for 15 years...BINGO...in 15 years you have income from that property, along with the increased value in that property.

Really last. Don't be the guy who mows the lawns, be the guy who goes door to door signing up customers, and hiring more guys who simply do the daily mowing. And then keep a sharp eye out for the guy who is going to take your place, so you can now leverage those existing customers you already have a relationship with to now be washing their cars. Then you again replace yourself and leverage those customers and provide home improvements.

These are just examples. And you may know all this.

One of the radio stations in my city has a daily talkshow by a guy named Dave Ramsey that is a real eye opener. His system is for being debt free, which in combination with investments that pay for themselves would create an early retirement.

 

[howman]

Tim,

A business that pays for itself. You hit the nail on the head. Don't work IN your business, work ON your business. This is exactly what Kiyosaki and Gerber teach.

Thanks so much for your post!

 

[tim99]

I am facinated with your experience with the "make 15,000 a month now" schemes. I play guitar, so I know that the "learn all the notes on the fretboard tonight" are just schemes. But I do not know enough about the "self employment" market to understand it. Every year there is a big "show" in my town where companies come to present "self employment" oppertunites. People go to shop for companies to go with. From what I can tell, these companies are basically looking for independent, maybe 1099 type of people, to be their sales force with no to minimum investment by the head company. And these people do not have much opportunity to increase their business to the point where they can hire enough people to pay for their salary.

I would imagine if this was my area of knowledge, I would have rules of thumb as to how many employees of what type and at what level or how much real estate would need to be accumulated to provide a specific yearly income.

 

[tim99]

Last post today. Honest. My brother-in-law runs branch banks.

We went to browse at the new PORCHE dealer down the street from him on christmas day to get out of the house for a little while because the golf course was closed.

And I asked him what people do to be able to buy these cars. He said that they usually own or run business. I thought about it and said, you mean that they are not working as what they have a degree in. He said yes. They may have gone to school to be a biologist, but they are not that now. They now own the company that sells the samples to schools for there lab experiments. They are not doing a job they got with a resume that shows a specific knowledge requirement for a specific salary. But he also said that they may have been a typical salary worker out of school for several years while they studied the business and looked for an opportunity, not to move up in that company, but to move out to own a competing or supplying business. I know a guy who left his brothers construction company as a purchase agent to start a business to provide material to his brother's company, and now has grown it to provide material to other companies as well.

Ok. This thread is now on a good track. Let's keep it going and stay away from those page one type comments.

 

[howman]

Thanks again Tim for your supportive posts.

Just so you know, I did not take any offense from any of the posts here. I raised the subject to get honest feedback from a diverse audience. I would prefer to hear everyone's opinion and not just opinions that match mine.

I am beginning to learn that most people have different perspectives throughout their life. Just because you think the world works a certain way now doesn't mean you wont change your mind later. I think back to the beliefs and values I held as a teenage and as a college student and I compare them to my beliefs and values now. Big difference.

So for the people who read my post and didn't like what I had to say, that's okay. It's is merely a case of perspective.