There ya go - 7 steps to becoming rich.
All great directions. To you youngsters, time is your greatest asset. Stat investing EARLY, so you can take advantage of the power of compounding interest, and REGULARLY, so you can take advantage of dollar cost averaging, and to get into a SAVING mentality.
For those who like to eat out instead of at home, the food and drink budget is one area that you can take control of to make a HUGE difference in how much you keep.
Some families I know eat out at least five times per week, then wonder why they are broke all the time while bringing in over $150,000/yr.
When you eat out, you are paying many middle men (owners, cooks, waitresses, busboys, grub hub, door dash, delivery guy), for your sustenance experience, all of whom add unnecessary cost. Then there’s tips. Over the course of a year, that’s a huge amount of potential savings.
Drinking alcohol when eating out adds another large percentage portion to the bill. If you find you must drink with meals, buy your alcohol before hand and try BYOB restaurants.
I’m not saying that going out once in a while for a treat isn’t wonderful, just that if you buy your own food and prepare it at home you will save a large amount of money.
Thanks all. I am already on Ramsey Step 6. However, I have a lot of mouths to feed based on my income alone. I may be doing okay, will never be rich.
Perhaps these tips will help others that read them.
Can’t hurt to give them a try. You may never be filthy rich but you may make it to comfortably soiled wealthy.
Do these even exist anymore in places that have decent paying jobs? The cost of housing has been dramatically outpacing the rise in wages for decades.
My wife and I who both have above average income jobs could barely afford to buy a home at the bottom of the inter bubble market crash back in 2012. Our income has gone up more than most since then but there is no way we could afford to buy a home anywhere near here at current prices. Even the dumps that need a ton of work are out of our price range now if we wanted any money left over to put towards college funds or retirement. Even renting a home in the area at current prices would leave us very little extra cash to invest in anything.
Our debt inflated bubble economy is making it just about impossible for the typical American to keep their heads above water no matter how hard they work and save. It used to be that it took one full time wage earner to comfortably support a family. Now it usually takes two full time wage earners to provide the same level of support. And they often have to move away from extended family support systems to find decent jobs which makes raising a family even more expensive.
Your list used to be a solid path to getting ahead. But for the majority of people these days it is a necessary path just to barely squeak by.
Yeah, and it’s gotten much worse. It’s ridiculous.
Do the best you can, do all the other stuff, and you’ll be on the right trajectory.
The Total Money Makeover by Dave Ramsey.
Everyone should read this book.
I know I am late to the rodeo, but dead-on right. I guess he is one of those envious of others for living within their means and living a good life. I am not jealous of the “wealthy”, many worked hard to get to where they are. I, too, used most of those methods. Now I am debt-free for a long time, and retired early. I know some unfortunately fall on hard times, but most that I know in difficult financial straits were self-imposed.