Goal-Setting

[AmericanPride]

I don't know much about personal finances. I know how to manage money, but not how to exploit it for everything it's worth. Thus, I consequently find it difficult to establish goals in regards to my money. I know a general end-state that I want: true financial independence. But what goals have to be established to get there from here?

Where do I start?

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americanpride2 said:

I don't know much about personal finances. I know how to manage money, but not how to exploit it for everything it's worth. Thus, I consequently find it difficult to establish goals in regards to my money. I know a general end-state that I want: true financial independence. But what goals have to be established to get there from here?

Where do I start?

Ok, I will give you some sample goals and you can choose from them. How about that?

First of all, if you want true financial independence you are setting the ULTIMATE "APPROPRIATE" GOAL.

I think that's OUTSTANDING and you should NEVER, EVER, lose sight of that ultimate goal. There will be gazillions of short and medium term goals that you will set and achieve before you get to that one.

To me, that goal means build a system that will not ONLY pay all your bills for you throughout YOUR lifetime, but the system you build now will continue to grow after your death and take care of your progeny.

You will develop a system, based on "teachable" principles, that you will TEACH to your progeny. They will see it work for themselves. They will hopefully GROW UP in that system and it's all they will know. That way they won't have to UNLEARN a bunch of crap and success will be much easier for THEM. They will learn the IMPORTANCE of these ideas and pass them down to their progeny as well.

This whole thing is about SO MUCH MORE than just YOU and satisfying your desires for immediate material gratification. Your system will do that in SPADES as time goes on.

Knowledge is MUCH more important and valuable than money. With money, you have an instantly and rapidly depleting resource. With KNOWLEDGE, you have the ability to create any amount of wealth.

Secondly, I am setting up my brand new Pioneer 60-inch plasma TV right now (which I didn't have to pay for with after-tax dollars gained by prostituting myself) and I will give your some ideas about goals a little later.

Consume those books. Eventually you will want to own them so you can reread them as time goes on. However, for now, the library copy is fine.

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OK AP...

My TV is up and running (it's fucking awesome) and I have some time to help you with goals.

I am not an expert at goals. That's why I suggested reading a book on setting goals.

However, this is what I do and it works for me....


First of all, you need many goals (short term, medium term and long term). Your long-term goal is financial independence, but how much money will that take?

If you are single and currently care-free, I'd suggest that goal be something like DOUBLE your current W-2 income (or what it will be DAY-ONE on the job after graduation).

I quit when my passive income was DOUBLE what I was making as an airline pilot. It's about that time you will find it harder and harder to go back to work.

So, whatever your income is, write down a number equal to DOUBLE that as your first long-term goal. As you reach these numbers, you will amend your goals (set them much higher).


Short term goals are things I need to do TODAY (or this week, or this month).

Intermediate term goals are things you want to get done this year.

So, you can have daily goals, weekly goals, monthly goals, quarterly goals, yearly, three-year, five year and so on.

The idea is to decide where you want to go and map out a stair-step, building block approach where you can see yourself REALISTICALLY devouring an entire elephant by eating one bite at a time.

That's how it's done. You start walking in the right direction and you don't veer off course. Eventually you can end up in China if you want.

You need these goals IN WRITING and IN FRONT OF YOU every single GD day. You need to CONSTANTLY remind yourself of where you are going and how you are going to get there.

There will be many decision points along the way. EVERY SINGLE TIME you reach a decision point, you need to have your goals FRESH in your mind.

I have seen investors that had a goal of creating a $5000 per month cash-flow for themselves start making capital gain type investments.

There is NO WAY they will ever reach their cash-flow goal if they keep making decisions like that. That's why having WRITTEN GOALS is so important. You have to write them down and refer to them often.

Secondly, I would think your immediate (daily goals) at this point are going to have to do with school and reading on this topic. You may want to have the goal of putting NO LESS than 10 hours per week into this endeavor (reading, researching, playing a game I am going to introduce you to, etc).

10 hours is OK, but don't spend less than 5. Your future is worth an hour and change each day.

So, your number one goal is to make some goals and make a commitment to putting time into your financial education. You need to be committed to changing the way you think and reminding yourself that you need to remain receptive to new ideas.

The next goal (say a monthly goal) might be to read at least two of the books on my list - twice each.

By the end of this year, you will want to have read everything I tell you to read - and really understand it.

Then, next year, you want to - BEFORE THE END OF THE SUMMER '08 - own at least ONE CASH-FLOWING DEAL. There is no reason you couldn't do it MUCH faster than that, but I don't want to stress you out with time pressure.

I don't care how small of a deal it is, you want to experience the feeling of cash coming in without your ongoing efforts.

Once you get a single cash-flowing deal under your belt the next one will be SO MUCH EASIER.

I can see you doing two more in the fall of '08.

At any rate, a 5-year goal might be to have no less than $5000/month in cash-flow coming in from this effort. I did it in much less time than that.


Try setting up a goal system like that and see how it works.

[AmericanPride]

Alright thanks. I'll hit the books and do some research.

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AP, here is something else you might want to do.

Go to www.richdad.com and then to "Community" and "Discussion Forums" section.

Then, go to First Time Real Estate Investors you can do a search on my moniker "Bounce."

I made a post there entitled "How long does it take to make $100K in real estate?"

I haven't checked it lately, but the last time I did it had well over 60,000 hits.

I made that post after speaking at a financial seminar in Las Vegas that we put on for the Richdad junkies.

It explains how I got started.

There are all kinds of great questions and answers on that forum.

You should put yourself on that guy's mailing list.

It's HIS information that showed me the way.

His book, "Rich Dad, Poor Dad" is quite literally what pointed the way for me.

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AP, don't you live in Denver (or thereabouts)?

There are all kinds of GREAT things going on there for education.

Go to www.legalwiz.com


The guy who runs that site (Bill Bronchick) lives in Denver and puts out all kinds of GREAT information.

He is (was) a Real Estate lawyer and offers all kinds of free RE forms and other free advice.

[AmericanPride]

Thanks for all the info. I'll be sure to get back to you with more questions when the time comes.

[jfree]

Well I looked, and the local library doesn't have these books so I had to order them, it'll be awhile before I can ask any questions. My dad does have a copy of "The Millionaire Next Door" that I bought him several years ago, now if he can only find it....

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jfree said:

Well I looked, and the local library doesn't have these books so I had to order them, it'll be awhile before I can ask any questions. My dad does have a copy of "The Millionaire Next Door" that I bought him several years ago, now if he can only find it....

I read that book. (about ten years ago)

It was pretty good. It explained a lot and hopefully, after reading it, you will see that being a millionaire is not really an insurmountable task. A shit load of people have done it and continue to do it every single day.

With your business, you may already have done it.

There are a few problems I have with some of the things he said.

After you read it, let me know and we can talk about those ideas.

[AmericanPride]

They didn't have the books at my school library either... but you can find the text on-line using Google Books.

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americanpride2 said:

They didn't have the books at my school library either... but you can find the text on-line using Google Books.

AP, YOU HAVE NO EARTHLY CLUE how riveting and germane your post is.

They do NOT have these books at your school?

Jesus Christ! Is it any wonder kids graduate with NO FINANCIAL INTELLIGENCE whatsoever.

I'd bet there is a copy of "Heather has two mommies" and "Why My Mommy is a Democrat" in your library.

There is NO financial education taught at our schools. The teachers, while being referred to as "experts" by people like Falcon, have no earthly idea how to live outside academia. They're not "experts" at ANYTHING that's relevant to anything.

Their idea of financial success is to raise tuition prices, have their grad students write some BS text book for them that they claim they authored and then force their students to buy the fucker (at outrageous prices) and regurgitate the crap they put in it.

Our kids graduate with no "usable" financial knowledge whatsoever.

The information you guys need isn't even in the fucking library!

Jesus Christ man, this is BS!

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americanpride2 said:

They didn't have the books at my school library either... but you can find the text on-line using Google Books.

AP, I checked google books. All I found was a "limited review." There were a few pages of the book, but not the whole thing.

Did you find the entire text?

The limited review of the book carefully left OUT 90% of the real meat of the book Rich Dad, Poor Dad.

You need to read the whole thing. The limited review was a taste of it, but the most of the "real lessons" weren't in it.

[AmericanPride]

I thought it ironic my school doesn't have the books... since it has one of the nationally ranked business schools in the country. Anyway, you're right about the Google Books search... I didn't look through the whole thing and thus didn't realize it was only a "preview". Barnes and Noble will be my last adventure before I just order it online.

[bounce]

americanpride2 said:

I thought it ironic my school doesn't have the books... since it has one of the nationally ranked business schools in the country. Anyway, you're right about the Google Books search... I didn't look through the whole thing and thus didn't realize it was only a "preview". Barnes and Noble will be my last adventure before I just order it online.

Can you buy a book in "e" form from Amazon?

Someone told me you could, but I have never heard of it before.

[AmericanPride]

I found all three books in five minutes at Barnes and Noble. I'll start with the Richest Man in Babylon today.