15 Things You Buy That Make You Richer
Poor people think that spending money makes you poor, but that's not a universal truth. When the average person spends money, they do get poorer; but smart and successful people have figured out ways to spend money and get richer because of it. By the end of this video, you'll have a list of 15 things you can buy that will make you richer, and the way you think about your spending will change, benefiting you for the rest of your life. Let's do this!
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Number one: a useful education. You know what they say, first you learn, then you remove the "L". The main problem with most of the education out there is that it's not conducive to either wealth or happiness. They need you to be productive and educated enough to secure a job, so they can later chain you down with a continuous cycle of debt. Useful education is the antidote to the educational inflation the world is experiencing right now. Everyone is highly educated, but a tiny minority has actual skills that are valuable. The world needs more electricians and engineers, not more influencers.
Number two: time-saving purchases. Anything that truly saves you time is a solid purchase. If you're young and asking yourself, "What should I invest in right now?" here's the answer you're looking for: if you've got some money to invest, move to a new rental place with a higher rent but closer to work. Here's the reasoning behind it: if you move 30 minutes closer to work, you can justify paying up to 50% more in rent. Thirty minutes on your way in, plus 30 minutes on your way back, that’s an hour per day, 5 hours per week. Assuming you don't go to work on the weekends, that's 20 hours per month, 240 hours a year. If you assume you work 8 hours a day, 240 divided by 8 is 30 extra workdays that you're saving up to do with as you please in a whole year. Here, spend that time on things that make you happy, inspired, or rich.
Number three: your environment. We're very much like plants in the growth department. If your environment is toxic, you won't be able to blossom. If a flower doesn't bloom, you don't blame the seed, you blame the soil. Invest in everything you touch or experience: the bed you sleep in, the pillow and the bed linens, comfortable shoes, a warm home, and a decent view. Invest in what you eat, what you drink, and what you consume. All of that will shape your tomorrow. Upgrade your environment because your environment upgrades you.
Number four: country club memberships. Country clubs, or membership clubs, are not about the spa or the golf course. These establishments are places to network. The high fees are there to keep the mediocre out, so you're surrounded by successful people. Most people see these as extravagant expenses because they don't provide an immediate ROI; instead, they become extremely valuable in the long run. You spend roughly 4 hours on the course in a game of golf. This is perfect for developing those connections and getting to know one another while still maintaining some level of fitness. That's why rich people golf so much.
Number five: online courses. Education is moving online and it's the right kind of education—the kind that you can apply immediately. A wonderful online course is so valuable, it's like you're stealing from the teacher or something. A bad online course? Well, that's the teacher stealing from you. Tip: scout out for wonderful online courses. A few dollar investment will completely change your life, and if they don't, well, a good online course comes with a no-questions-asked money-back guarantee. High-level online education has never been available until now. No matter where you are in the world, you can find an expert to hold your hand and walk you through the actionable side of things that interest you. That’s why we've created our educational company, Alux.org. The ultimate skill that one can absorb is learning how to learn. Once you master it, the entire world becomes your playground since you can flip a switch and acquire any other skill you want. We've got an actionable course specifically on this called Learning Mastery, which is available for purchase today at alux.com. Learn even more! So, if you use the promo code "alexper", you'll get 25% off at checkout. Since the world is evolving so fast, learning how to learn is the ultimate competitive advantage.
Number six: debt repayment. Debt is the closest thing the modern world has to slavery. Debt makes poor people poorer and rich people richer. Ninety-nine percent of the population can't tell the difference between good debt and bad debt. This is why we call the rich the 1%. The longer you hold on to debt, the more interest you're paying. Here's a subtle but important difference between the rich and the poor: poor people go to the bank to ask for money. When you're rich, the bank calls you to offer you money at a discounted rate. You can't be free unless you're debt-free, so buy back your freedom by paying off your debt.
Number seven: books. Books allow you to live more lives than just your own. Books are one of the most underrated asymmetric investments that anyone can make. A book costs like 15 bucks. Ten books can literally change your life for the better. That's $150 in books! Yet people would rather watch "The Circle" on Netflix than grow as a human being. If you're simply not a reader, we recommend audiobooks. Maybe you simply don't have $15 right now, so here's what we're going to do: go to alux.com/slf/freebook and sign up. If this is the first time you do it, you can pick one audiobook for free thanks to our friends at Audible, who are kind enough to support our community. We recommend "Die With Zero" by Bill Perkins, "Tuesdays with Morrie" by Mitch Albom, or "Antifragile" by Nassim Taleb.
Number eight: business events. Business events are a more diverse version of country clubs. People from all around the world come together to look for motivation, knowledge, and business contacts. It's basically a reason to interact with other people, plus it gives you some access to the most influential people in your industry. Going to business events is what allowed us to connect with people like Gary Vaynerchuk, Jordan Peterson, Gabor Maté, David Sinclair, Mark Manson, Adam Grant, and most of your favorite thought leaders today. Now, here's the catch: we don't buy the VIP ticket for the front row seat because you've probably heard these speakers share similar stuff online. We get the VIP ticket because it grants you access to the private party after the event. That's where business is done, and where true networking is possible; and where most of the business deals actually come together. You're only a handful of people and it only takes two or three of these events to build a foundation of contacts that can introduce you to everyone else. If you're going to a business event, get the ticket that gets you access to the private dinner or after party. It's the biggest bang for buck.
Number nine: better accountants. Here's the thing: okay, if there's one direct service that can earn its keep, it's accountants or tax advisors. If you're in the US, a good accountant might cost two or three times as much as a mediocre one, but it could save you 10 to 100 times the money. Accountants are the magicians of the financial world, and it helps to know a spell or two. Remember, you're under no obligation to pay more taxes than the bare minimum of what you're legally required to. If you want to contribute more, do it directly because the government seems to be a poor middleman.
Number ten: coaching sessions. Now, coaching sessions are when you pay someone to help you figure things out because, well, they've done it themselves. A good performance coach increases your performance, and performance directly alters the bottom line. You can expect to pay $500 per 1-hour session or around $5,000 per month to have access to an executive coach. Some of them talk more than they actually help, but there are a few out there who know what they're doing and can save you years and millions of dollars in trial and error. Coaches and mentors play a crucial role in every entrepreneur's journey once they decide to take their growth seriously. But most just can't afford it. Instead of paying $5,000 a month to have access to a single executive coach, go to alux.com/slapp right now because we pay the ridiculous fees of these coaches on your behalf, put them into a studio, and give you access to the same kind of information they would teach you personally, but for a fraction of the cost. That's what the Alux app is. You're getting millions of dollars worth of value—millions that we spend out of our own pocket building this so that we can level the playing field. Here’s the crucial part: once you cross the $1 million mark, send us an email. We're on a mission to create 1,000 new millionaires, and we want you to be the next. Our app is not free, nor should it be cheap, but if you're in the early days and you can't afford the full subscription, download the app and then come back and scan this QR code on screen right now to get 25% off the yearly plan. It's our way of helping you to build that initial momentum, so scan the QR code and invest in yourself for once.
Number eleven: great birthday gifts. The best gifts in life are the ones that make a difference. They're thoughtfully chosen; there's effort and time going into the selection, and they're tailored to the person that's giving the gift. Do not underestimate the importance of gifts. Humans don't realize just how few birthdays we actually have in our lives, just how few moments we get to spend surrounded by everyone that we care about. A great gift? You'll remember that for the rest of your life. So, don't cheap out on gifts. Okay? You are not the gift. If you really love them, give them something they'll remember.
Number twelve: travel. You know they say travel is one of the only things you can spend money on that makes you richer, and that quote was actually the inspiration for this entire piece. We read it and thought, "Challenge accepted." We bet that we could find plenty of other smart purchases, and so we did. Travel does indeed build a different kind of wealth. It creates memories, and memories pay what we call a memory dividend. Travel early in your life when travel doesn't require that much money to begin with, and before comfort has spoiled you. If you're in your early 20s, spend that money you make on travel because it's the best ROI you'll get. Contrary to most of our long-term advice, don't try to save money when you're really young because statistically, your income will skyrocket in your 30s and 40s. So, sacrificing your 20s just to save a little bit of cash that gets chewed up by inflation anyway just isn't a great strategy. The sooner you travel, the more time you'll have to bank those memory dividends as you grow older. Your memory bank becomes a lot more important than your actual bank, and some travel might only be available to you for a limited time. Okay, so that clock is ticking.
Number thirteen: another apartment. You want to hear a controversial idea? Don't spend your earned income. Work hard, buy any kind of asset you can afford, and spend the money that asset makes you instead. You get rich when you buy things that make you money or increase in value over time. You don't have to be a genius to get rich in real estate. Buy a studio, a condo, or a house and rent it out every month. That piece of property will make you money. That apartment might not allow you to live the life of your dreams, but it will pay for your utilities forever, so there's one less thing to worry about. We call that expense arbitrage. You make a list of all the expenses in your life, and then you buy assets that will pay off those expenses on your behalf. So as long as you don't dramatically improve your lifestyle, at some point you'll have more than enough money coming in from your assets to cover all of your life's expenses. That is when you're free.
Number fourteen: equity in other people's businesses. Buying minority stakes, 20 to 40%, of profitable businesses is a cheat code to life. You don't buy it entirely because that would mean you have to run the entire business and take care of everyone on the team. But by buying a minority stake, the business now has more than enough money to support its rapid growth. Use your knowledge and connections to open doors for them so that their growth will be exponential, and then take a step back. Let them do the cooking. Not only will the company pay off dividends, but you get to hang out with a great team, and if you want to build cool things with them, well, get to work. Partnerships are an essential part of growth, so find yours.
Number fifteen: time with your kid. Now, we've said this before and we'll say it again: sometimes more money is just too expensive. Some of the best things in life are not for sale. It's easy to postpone things, thinking you'll do them later, but sometimes later never comes. By the time you finally make up your mind, it might be too late. A pro tip is to have kids when you're almost ready—think 60 to 70% ready. Lots of people who have kids late end up regretting that choice because the gap grows larger. If you can hire an assistant or an executive to free up a couple of hours per week, use those hours to spend time with your kids. Children are a unique opportunity to relive your own childhood, this time with money, resources, and a little bit of wisdom.
We know this list could have even been longer, so we're passing this off to you at this point: what are some things that you can buy that will actually make you richer? Let us know in the comments. We can't wait to see what you come up with.
And did you know that fewer than 20% of the people watching our videos watch until the very end? Well, for those of you who are still around, we've got a secret bonus: rich versus wealthy, because there's a difference between being rich and being wealthy. Rich is when you earn a lot of money by working; wealthy is when you earn money in your sleep. You know you're wealthy when, if you stopped working today, your fortune would still go up tomorrow. That's one of the most important distinctions out there. You want to be wealthy, not rich. You get rich by making aggressive moves forward: when you learn, when you invest, when you reinvest profits—all of them are forward moving actions that will help you to earn more. But life is a two-way street, so every once in a while, make some defensive moves. Take some chips off the table to secure your position.
Let's say you've got a business that makes $1 million a year. You can reinvest it in the business and get 30% more next year and 30% compounded the year after. But if history has taught us anything, it's that you never know how things might change. So sure, reinvest some of that money to grow the business, but park some of that value in an uncorrelated market—think the S&P 500, ETFs, real estate, whatever floats your boat. Just don't literally buy a boat, okay? Because those are terrible purchases. You can consider yourself truly wealthy once your passive income matches or exceeds your active lifestyle.
So if you've learned this difference and have made it your priority to build wealth in your life, write the word "wealth" in the comments. That way, we know who the 20% of you are who are still watching. We'll do our best to thank as many of you as possible. Thank you for spending some time with us today and subscribing to our channel—that was really cool of you. The best of our videos are in this playlist, so pick your next watch carefully. We'll see you back here tomorrow or later today in the app. Until then, take care, my friend.