How is it "easy to make money"?

[Anonymous]

What is this other poster talking about? My husband and I have been living barely making a livable wage since graduating college in 2010. We are not homeowners and hardly have 300k saved for retirement.

No one wants to hire us for well paid jobs.

What is this alternative world people speak of?

[Anonymous]

Once you have a bit of money, compound interest is your best friend. Hence why investing a dollar at 20 is better than investing at 40.

[Anonymous]

Figure out what job that you want and pays well, and find out what you need to do it. I.e., go to law school if you want to be a lawyer. Med school if you want to be a doctor, etc.

[Anonymous]

I never made money working, but I was willing to buy individual stocks/crypto with any left over money. Not only has it paid off, but I have learned so much being in the market.
Now I don't understand how others are not in the market as it has never been easier and cheaper to buy stocks.
There are more people shopping on Amazon and owning iPhones than buying up apple and amazon stock. Unreal.
You got to be in it to learn. Even if you lose some, which I doubt, you will learn something.
My kids have investment accounts. They will grow up thinking all have them and work is optional.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I never made money working, but I was willing to buy individual stocks/crypto with any left over money. Not only has it paid off, but I have learned so much being in the market.
Now I don't understand how others are not in the market as it has never been easier and cheaper to buy stocks.
There are more people shopping on Amazon and owning iPhones than buying up apple and amazon stock. Unreal.
You got to be in it to learn. Even if you lose some, which I doubt, you will learn something.
My kids have investment accounts. They will grow up thinking all have them and work is optional.

You are gambling during the largest bull market in history. Of course it seems easy.

We invested 30% every year and we were flat with the lost decade. So it’s as if we started saving in 2012, despite a decade of effort.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I never made money working, but I was willing to buy individual stocks/crypto with any left over money. Not only has it paid off, but I have learned so much being in the market.
Now I don't understand how others are not in the market as it has never been easier and cheaper to buy stocks.
There are more people shopping on Amazon and owning iPhones than buying up apple and amazon stock. Unreal.
You got to be in it to learn. Even if you lose some, which I doubt, you will learn something.
My kids have investment accounts. They will grow up thinking all have them and work is optional.

You are gambling during the largest bull market in history. Of course it seems easy.

We invested 30% every year and we were flat with the lost decade. So it’s as if we started saving in 2012, despite a decade of effort.

That's incorrect. You bought shares at super low prices from 2000-2010, which have now skyrocketed in value. You made tons of money from 2000-2010, you just didn't realize it at the time.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Once you have a bit of money, compound interest is your best friend. Hence why investing a dollar at 20 is better than investing at 40.

Compounding is the correct answer. More than 99% of Warren Buffett's wealth was accumulated after the age of 50.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:What is this other poster talking about? My husband and I have been living barely making a livable wage since graduating college in 2010. We are not homeowners and hardly have 300k saved for retirement.

No one wants to hire us for well paid jobs.

What is this alternative world people speak of?

You have 30 years before you turn 65. Conservatively, your $300k can double every 10 years - which means you are on track to having $2.4 million at 65 without adding any more. That is not insignificant. That is excellent.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I never made money working, but I was willing to buy individual stocks/crypto with any left over money. Not only has it paid off, but I have learned so much being in the market.
Now I don't understand how others are not in the market as it has never been easier and cheaper to buy stocks.
There are more people shopping on Amazon and owning iPhones than buying up apple and amazon stock. Unreal.
You got to be in it to learn. Even if you lose some, which I doubt, you will learn something.
My kids have investment accounts. They will grow up thinking all have them and work is optional.

You are gambling during the largest bull market in history. Of course it seems easy.

We invested 30% every year and we were flat with the lost decade. So it’s as if we started saving in 2012, despite a decade of effort.

That's incorrect. You bought shares at super low prices from 2000-2010, which have now skyrocketed in value. You made tons of money from 2000-2010, you just didn't realize it at the time.

+1

[Anonymous]

I made a lot of money starting pretty early on. The key was that I was willing to take a risk and start a business. Most people are afraid to take a calculated risk. The second thing that helped a lot was that I did it fairly young which meant that I was accustomed to living on very little so I didn’t stress about having enough (it also helped that DH had what we at the time considered a very high paying job)

I then kept taking calculated risks with the profits. I was making what felt like insane amounts of money. It’s not that we lived cheaply but we lived significantly below our means. So when our friends were all making $150k and thought we were showy and making $300k we were actually not being showy and making $1M. And it just kept going that way.

Eventually, I was making truly ridiculous amounts of money. Like $4-5M per year with no obvious end in sight to the growth.

To make it even more crazy, I can get a loan from a bank for insane amounts of money way easier than most people can get a loan for normal amounts. Literally I just pick up the phone and ask one of my business bankers (I predominantly bank with 4 commercial banks) for whatever I need and send them an email. No formal applications. No documentation review outside the deal and that is relatively minimal. Just yesterday I asked on of my bankers for $6M on an $8M shopping center I want to buy. But for the appraisal and environmental review it will be preliminarily approved this coming week. The key, I can put down $2M. I have access to that much money in so many different places the bank won’t even ask where it’s coming from. And because I can put down $2M, lending me $6M is easy. My expected return on the $2M. It will be about $320k per year cash flow plus principal pay down. 16% cash on cash and over 20% overall rate of return.

But most people are afraid to take the risk so it never happens for them. I should also point out that I spent a ridiculous amount of time working for the first 20 years. Easily 80 hours per week in the beginning and definitely 60 hours per week in years 11-20. But financially it paid off.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:What is this other poster talking about? My husband and I have been living barely making a livable wage since graduating college in 2010. We are not homeowners and hardly have 300k saved for retirement.

No one wants to hire us for well paid jobs.

What is this alternative world people speak of?

It's easy for veey smart people.

[Anonymous]

DH and I are 43 and 41. We contributed $57K to our two 401ks last year (including employer match). Sounds pretty okay, right? But that is nothing compared to the compounding growth we achieved. Our overall retirement portfolio increased by $1.7M between January 2023 and December 2023 and only $57,000 of that was contributions – the remaining $1,652,000 was all growth.

We make more money in the stock market in a single week than we earn from our jobs over the course of an entire month.

It’s all about making sacrifices early in life, people. We chose to buy used cars in cash (no loans), clean our own home, mow our own yard, and live well within our means while others were living extravagantly on borrowed dollars. Do this for the first 10-20 years after graduating and the next 50-60 years are as easy as pie. Or…blow it all up front and spend the latter half of your life clipping coupons, shopping at Costco, begging for senior discounts, and driving to Rehoboth Beach for vacations instead of flying first class to Bora Bora or Seychelles. Pathetic.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:DH and I are 43 and 41. We contributed $57K to our two 401ks last year (including employer match). Sounds pretty okay, right? But that is nothing compared to the compounding growth we achieved. Our overall retirement portfolio increased by $1.7M between January 2023 and December 2023 and only $57,000 of that was contributions – the remaining $1,652,000 was all growth.

We make more money in the stock market in a single week than we earn from our jobs over the course of an entire month.

It’s all about making sacrifices early in life, people. We chose to buy used cars in cash (no loans), clean our own home, mow our own yard, and live well within our means while others were living extravagantly on borrowed dollars. Do this for the first 10-20 years after graduating and the next 50-60 years are as easy as pie. Or…blow it all up front and spend the latter half of your life clipping coupons, shopping at Costco, begging for senior discounts, and driving to Rehoboth Beach for vacations instead of flying first class to Bora Bora or Seychelles. Pathetic.

Those last two sentences were mean. All that money and zero empathy. Life is too short to have such a narrow view of what’s important.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:What is this other poster talking about? My husband and I have been living barely making a livable wage since graduating college in 2010. We are not homeowners and hardly have 300k saved for retirement.

No one wants to hire us for well paid jobs.

What is this alternative world people speak of?

You’re actually on track. I’m 45 but saw my retirement accounts really take off in the last few years. I think for you right now would be to use your money for appreciating assets, not depreciating ones (like cars) or expensive “experiences.” Then when yo get a promotion or raise, don’t adjust let your lifestyle creep (easier said than done).

That original poster was probably over 55.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I made a lot of money starting pretty early on. The key was that I was willing to take a risk and start a business. Most people are afraid to take a calculated risk. The second thing that helped a lot was that I did it fairly young which meant that I was accustomed to living on very little so I didn’t stress about having enough (it also helped that DH had what we at the time considered a very high paying job)

I then kept taking calculated risks with the profits. I was making what felt like insane amounts of money. It’s not that we lived cheaply but we lived significantly below our means. So when our friends were all making $150k and thought we were showy and making $300k we were actually not being showy and making $1M. And it just kept going that way.

Eventually, I was making truly ridiculous amounts of money. Like $4-5M per year with no obvious end in sight to the growth.

To make it even more crazy, I can get a loan from a bank for insane amounts of money way easier than most people can get a loan for normal amounts. Literally I just pick up the phone and ask one of my business bankers (I predominantly bank with 4 commercial banks) for whatever I need and send them an email. No formal applications. No documentation review outside the deal and that is relatively minimal. Just yesterday I asked on of my bankers for $6M on an $8M shopping center I want to buy. But for the appraisal and environmental review it will be preliminarily approved this coming week. The key, I can put down $2M. I have access to that much money in so many different places the bank won’t even ask where it’s coming from. And because I can put down $2M, lending me $6M is easy. My expected return on the $2M. It will be about $320k per year cash flow plus principal pay down. 16% cash on cash and over 20% overall rate of return.

But most people are afraid to take the risk so it never happens for them. I should also point out that I spent a ridiculous amount of time working for the first 20 years. Easily 80 hours per week in the beginning and definitely 60 hours per week in years 11-20. But financially it paid off.

May I ask what type of business you me first one that took off was? Thanks.