As the saying goes, “the early bird catches the worm”, one of the things that I learned in the journey towards financial freedom is to start early to retire early. The earlier we started saving money, the earlier we started our financial education, the earlier we started to invest, we can be guaranteed that we can also retire earlier.

Why not? Retiring early is one of the best options of a lot of people. Who wants to work for the rest of their lives? Who wants to be bothered by lots of worries in their work? And who wants to encounter a lot of stress that their health will be put into danger?

Personally, I would like to retire in the age of 40s. Recently, I wrote an article about the four quarters of life and how to win the game of money. No one wants to retire at the age of 60s because they cannot really enjoy the fruits of their labor. At that age, a lot of health problems will begin to manifest. Definitely, their savings will just be used for medicines to treat these health problems brought about by old age. As they have said, “in our youth, we spend our health to gain our wealth” but “as we get older, we spend our wealth to gain our health”.

What are the things that we should start early to retire early?

Learn how to save properly. The earlier we started saving, the larger our savings can be over time. Just imagine if you regularly save your income, it will accumulate over time. With the power of compound interest, our savings can be enough to lead us to the next step.

Learn how to invest properly. When you already have enough savings that already covers your emergency fund, then assess yourself to the next level on where can you invest your extra savings to earn more income for you. Learn how to invest in the stock market, in the real estate, in mutual funds and trust funds, and in other investment options where you can park your extra cash.

Build Passive Income. The secret of retiring early lies on building a stream of passive incomes. The earlier you started building passive income, the higher your chances to retire early. Look for opportunities along the way that will let your money work hard for you. This what makes rich gets richer.

Focus on that goal. Read some articles on self motivation. Surround yourself with people with the right midset and with the same goals as yours and together you will walk the way towards a common goal helping each other in every step and in every challenge that you will encounter along the way. I believe in the saying, “tell me who you’re friends are and I’ll tell you who you are”. Determination and focus is the key to become successful.

Play the cashflow game. Play the cashflow game by Robert Kiyosaki. It’s one way of increasing your financial intelligence. Test your skills against other competitors to get out of the rat race earlier. It’s definitely a fun and learning game.

Finally, you can read on Singapore’s Youngest Millionaire Adam Khoo in his Million Dollar Interview. Let’s learn from a very successful person who became a millionaire at a very young age of 26 and now a multi-millionaire.

So let’s start early to retire early! It’s now or never. We must choose the right choice.

Start Early to Retire Early

To most Americans today, Federal Reserve is just a name on the dollar bill. They have no idea of what the central bank does to the economy, or to their own economic lives; of how and why it was founded and operates; or of the sound money and banking that could end the statism, inflation, and business cycles that the Fed generates.

Dedicated to Murray N. Rothbard, steeped in American history and Austrian economics, and featuring Ron Paul, Joseph Salerno, Hans Hoppe, and Lew Rockwell, this extraordinary 42 mins film is the clearest, most compelling explanation ever offered of the Fed, and why curbing it must be our first priority.

 

Credit:
Money, Banking and the Federal Reserves

By Todd Babiak, The Edmonton Journal

In the run-up to the last federal election, Stephen Harper was attacked by his opponents and critics for telling the truth — or what he saw as the truth.

As the stock market plummeted, he said, “I think there’s probably some great buying opportunities emerging in the stock market as a consequence of all this panic.”

Sophisticated political strategists recognized a way to demonstrate, poignantly, that Harper spends most of his time with rich people. The vast majority of Canadians are not rich, and most modern intelligence suggests that vast majorities — not elite minorities — decide the outcome of elections.

In fact, most of us are not only not rich: We’re a paycheque or two away from a financial crisis and all the desperation and humiliation that entails. If we have children, the fear of not paying those bills at the end of the month is magnified. In the midst of a recession that economists compare to the Great Depression, we lose sleep thinking about our families in grey-scale clothing, charcoal-faced and anemic, riding boxcars and begging the owners of car dealerships and rental properties for gruel and coffee. This “fear and ignorance” around money is the guiding theme of Rich Dad, Poor Dad, an anecdotal financial guidebook by Robert Kiyosaki, first published in 2000, that has since sold millions of copies around the world.

Kiyosaki recommends financial literacy, which few of us get from the education system. He recommends thinking about our assets in a new way and setting up personal financial corporations. Poor people, at best, study hard, find good jobs, and work diligently until they retire. They work for their money. Rich people acquire assets, usually with someone else’s money, and allow that money to work for them.

If simply reading Rich Dad, Poor Dad ensured financial fabulousness, we would be surrounded by millions of millionaires. Enter Darren Weeks, the “Canadian Rich Dad,” a boy who grew up in middle-class Hazeldean and now lives in St. Albert.

He started buying mutual funds in Grade 6. By Grade 9, he knew they were a ripoff. Weeks says he started buying properties in university and now owns scores of them. When he read Rich Dad, Poor Dad, in 2001, he immediately flew down to Phoenix to meet Kiyosaki. They struck an agreement so that Weeks would be the northern point-man for Rich Dad concerns, Canadianizing the wisdom in Kiyosaki’s books.

This week, Weeks has appeared in conference rooms across Greater Edmonton, pitching the Rich Dad philosophy and, of course, offering a financial opportunity for would-be investors. “He who raises the most money,” says Weeks, “wins.”

Of course, this is not the best time in world economic history to raise money. Credit markets are tight and we’re all a bit haunted by Bernard Madoff, the cultural heir of Charles Ponzi. Every day, I receive between five and 10 e-mails from strangers, offering risk-free get-rich-quick schemes, usually with a number of misspelled words. There was a tentative air in Conference Room 6 of the Fantasyland Ballroom on Tuesday, Budget Day, as Weeks prepared to address a crowd of approximately 100 people.

Like Kiyosaki, Weeks uses the mild shock tactic of insult. Mere minutes into his presentation, I felt like an idiot for having a job, for investing in mutual funds, for not leveraging the equity in my house, for not wearing a tie, for not carrying a business card that identified me as an investor or a businessman, for my banking habits, for working hard and — mea culpa — for knowing precisely nothing about money. I also felt a little guilty for having read Rich Dad, Poor Dad and for condemning myself to a life of poor-daddery anyway (sorry, kids, so sorry). It was a stirring, educational and profoundly unsettling three hours that felt like an hour-and-a-half, tops. Afterward, I spoke to Weeks, a much calmer figure when he isn’t on stage. “I do that same presentation 100 times a year,” he said, “and I love it every time. Is there risk in what I’m saying to these people? Of course there is. Anything can fail. But I do, sincerely, want every person who comes to my presentations to become rich. It’s very fulfilling for me.”

There was a long lineup of attendees at the back of the conference room, signing up for opportunities to invest in Fast Track Capital, a real estate investment firm Weeks and his partners have set up. It was a delicious prospect, to stop paying enormous management fees for mutual funds that consistently lose money, and to invest in something that seemed, well, perfect.

One bearded gentleman, a skeptic, complained in the back of the room that it had to be a sham. One of Weeks’s employees quietly subdued him and the man walked away, fuming. Another attendee wandered about in a suit, beaming.

“I’ve been following Darren’s career for at least four years,” said Larry Yakiwczuk, a derivatives trader who runs what he calls “a small online business.” He is actually one of the largest eBay retailers in Canada. “For people who don’t know much, investing with Darren is a great idea. The only reason I wouldn’t do it is I wouldn’t like to take a pay cut.”

Yakiwczuk and Weeks suggested the best possible route to financial literacy is to take a rich person for lunch. “The recession,” he said, “I love it! For people who know what they’re doing, it’s a phenomenal opportunity.”

I asked Yakiwczuk when he might be available for lunch. Indian? Greek? Italian?

tbabiak@thejournal.canwest.com

Excerpt from:
Financial advice, with a few insults, could lead to a better bottom line

Defining Investing Education

Principled investing is a misnomer these days. As facts say, most investors today wish that they want to learn more about investing. Therefore, common financial literacy is not so common after all. The need for people to be educated in a dynamic system should be taken into account. Thankfully more and more people are finding online education advantageous in improving their investing education.

Investing education is an abstract idea for most people. This is because that they value investment as a way to save money with the expectation that their finances should advance. Yet what they don’t see is that there are methods where investing can become an instinctive exercise to achieve financial freedom. This entails developing the perspective to find investing opportunities where most people find nothing. A quick refresher on investing education will teach students to change the way they look at different investment opportunities, risks, and rewards.

Investing education is also important in having a better read of today’s financial situation. As an analogy, anyone can enjoy a delicious cheese cake. But only informed people can dissect what is the real value of the cheesecake according to its taste and other characteristics that the uninformed eye cannot see. Therefore this education is a form of shaping and training that makes a student notice what he does not see in his first look.

Importance of Online Education

Online learning is in the center of the purposeful information marketplace today. Students of distance learning are seen to be highly motivated individuals who are able to adjust to the dynamics of different training materials and mediums that will allow them have a unique view of what education and training is all about. This dwells more on the practical and quantitative goals. This is evident in continuing internet based learning where the student is updated with the latest trends according to his field.

With the latest trends brought by the internet, online investing education is a practical side track to one’s personal development. Just imagine any full-time worker seeking to increase his finances to ultimate financial freedom. While he is severely tied to his career, he can scotch over some time to invest in his personal training. Web based learning then becomes an efficient method to acquire such knowledge because of its flexible and mobile advantages. Time saving and personal management is in itself a practical application of the objectives of online education and 21st century education.

Mindset Development through Investment Education

A positive impact that is not readily observable is the relationship of investing education and developing a millionaire’s mindset. Smart investors are able to find ways to generate income without much work. The thought that runs through a millionaire’s head invokes an encouraging level of attraction that will allow money to come to an individual. Investments should not be a methodical tool but a rational decision led by an instinctive millionaire’s mindset.

Everyone can become a smart investor through constant investing education. As you will learn smart investors completely do the opposite things and would rather be out leading. Leaders in the investment game are usually the risk takes that leave the average investor guessing. Planning ahead and thinking three steps ahead is one of the leading principles of investor education.

Investing education through online learning will teach you not only the methods of becoming a smart investor, but the mindset shift that will give you the instinct to be a smart investor and a wealth creator. The bottom of it all is that it should not be about the rules of the game. Instead, smart investors look at these rules smile at it and go the other direction; such a nugget of knowledge from 21st century educators.

About the Author: Robert Taylor (http://wealthcreationeducation.com) is a free-lance writer, journalist and educator. He is passionate about investing education to achieve success and financial freedom. He believes that everyone should get a wealth education to succeed in the 21st century. 

Read more here:
Principles Of Investing Education