Let’s begin with why you need more
money.
- You want to get out of debt
- You want no more money worries
- You want nice things
- You want to help your family and
others
- You don’t want to work every day
for the rest of your life
We all should agree with these
reasons for having more money.
What is keeping you from having
all the money that you need?
- The cost of living is too high
- You have too many bills to pay
- Your job doesn’t pay enough
- There’s nothing left over to
save and invest
If you agreed with these reasons why
you don’t have enough money, you have to
change your thinking right now. Really.
Do you want to get rich? Then follow
the plan presented in this book. But
first there are three important things
that you need to do right now:
- protect your current
investments, if any
- open a mutual fund account, and
begin contributing to it
- get your spending under control
- Protecting your current
investments
If you have a 401(k), 403(b), or 457
plan at work, instruct your benefits
department to move everything into a
mid-cap index fund (if offered),
otherwise split everything evenly
between an S&P 500 fund and whatever
type of mid-cap fund is offered. See
page 175 for a full discussion of
these plans.
If you currently own any mutual
funds, they have probably lost money
this past year. If they are not in
an IRA, sell them now and take a tax
deduction (let the IRS cover part of
your loss) and take all the money
and put it into a mid-cap index fund
(see page 165).
If you have a brokerage account,
either a full-service or online
account, sell all of your losers and
put the money into your winners.
Then tell your broker that you want
to place a “stop loss sell order” at
7% under the current price. See page
48 for more details.
- Open a mutual fund account
and begin contributing to it every
month
It doesn’t matter if you don’t have
any money, page 165 gives you some
great low-cost choices, some that
will even get you started with
$0.00!
See page 115 for everything anybody
ever wanted to know about mutual
funds.
- Get your spending under
control right now
If you don’t get serious about
this, you are not just throwing away
the extra money that you needlessly
spend, but the huge amount that this
money will grow to if properly
invested. This is the only way that
you will get out of debt and get rid
of your money worries, forever.
Since getting your spending under
control is so important, let’s jump
right into talking about smart
spending. This is where your
investing money will come from. The
extra money saved will provide you
with every dollar that you need to
become rich.
|
