'GET RICH, STAY RICH, PASS IT ON'. BY Catherine S. Mcbreen and George H. Walper, Jr

This is a well researched book on how to chart a path to wealth. The writers have conducted a quantitative research with thousands of real millionaires. Based on solid facts their findings present a clear-cut path to wealth that has worked again and again and can work for you. they considered names like Carnegie, Du Pont and Rockfeller these families understood how to get rich, stay rich and pass it on. This book tracks real stories of regular people and shows you how nearly anyone can duplicate these strategies to create perpetual wealth.

According to the writers you can create your own prescription for your own version of perpetual wealth. In the introductory part of this book the writers plainly lets us to know that there are only two definitive ways to create the kind of wealth that can be bequeathed to multiple generations:

-OWN INCOME PRODUCING REAL ESTATE: in addition to your primary residence, it is thus an asset that earns money for you today and that can be passed down to your heirs as part of your legacy.

-PRACTICE CONTINUALLY INNOVATIVE ENTREPRENEURSHIP: being involved in or investing and reinvesting in a company, product or service that represents a whole new way to make money.

According to the writers doing both is a surefire way to get rich, stay rich, and pass on your riches to future generations. It sounds simple, and in a way it is: involve yourself continually in innovative enterprises, and become an owner of income-producing real estate. Do this and you open the door to getting rich, staying rich, and passing it on to your children, grandchildren, and beyond.

It is well noted that vast majority of the great fortunes made through history can be traced back to a single entrepreneurial individual with vision and imagination, and the confidence to put them to work. But qualities that create a fortune are not the sorts of things one can pass on to children or grandchildren (other than what is passed on in their genetic code). That is why having great wealth is no guarantee of being able to pass it on.  According to the writers, for you to become one of the mega wealthy, you must take steps to ensure your investment income eventually exceeds your salary.

The all essence of this book is showing us how to get rich and stay rich- and enjoy being rich today. The theory formulated in this book is based on the single straightforward goal of wealth longevity and it sets out two paths to that goal.

The first path is stability- ensuring a steady stream of income despite the vagaries of the economy and the potential volatility of the financial markets. That’s the definition of real estate. Whatever happens to the economy, people need places to live and work. One way or the other, rents gets paid to you.

The second path is renewal –or continually adding to the income stream by identifying fresh income sources, primarily through on going re investment in innovative enterprises. Each time you do so, you are adding a new way to generate money. It’s essential to take both paths, not just one or the other.

A continually innovative enterprise is one that either offers a product or service that breaks new ground or changes a traditional product service so much that it becomes virtually new. Ideally the enterprise continues to reinvent either the product or service itself, the means of delivering the product or service, or the means of managing the enterprise. The result is that the enterprise maintains its edge in its market or industry, or simply in its inherent purpose. What is required is the ability consistently to escape from tradition and from hide bound notions of what ‘worked in the past’ in other to reach out to new ideas, new processes, and new market in a meaningful way.

Investing in a continually innovative enterprise means putting down stakes in something- not a bond or a financial instrument, but a product or service- that is representative of the future. According to the writers , ‘investing’ is a matter of degree.

How do we define ‘investing’ when it comes when it comes to continually innovative enterprises? The answer depends on the degree of your personal involvement. At the highest and riskiest level of personal involvement, you would essentially quit your current job and focus full time on the innovative enterprise. At the lowest level of personal involvement, you might invest in a limited partnership, private equity plan, or venture capital program in which the actual management of the enterprise- possibly even the choice of the enterprise to invest in- is beyond your reach and outside your control

GETTING STATED IN REAL ESTATE

STEP l. How much do you have to invest

STEP 2. Can you get financing?

STEP 3. Start looking with objective eyes

STEP 4. Found a property? Ask some caution question.

STEP 5. Figure out the economics

INVESTING IN THE CONTINUALLY INNOVATIVE ENTERPRISE

STEP l. Search out opportunities

STEP 2. Do the due diligence

STEP 3. Do a business plan

STEP4. Double –check everything with professional help.

STEP 5. Approach potential investors

The writers concluded by letting us into the world of the millionaires, their habits and lifestyle.

-HARDWORK: certainly, working hard is something in our hands, and virtually  all the wealthy across all wealth segments and age differences (97 percent) agree that  it is hard work that got them rich in the first  place, is keeping them rich  and is the reason they have wealth to pass on to their heirs.

-THEY ARE COMMITTED TO SAVINGS: Whatever their annual income , the rich are committed to saving and investing their money.

-HEDGING AGAINST RETIREMENT AND HEALTH CONCERNS: The retirement years of the perpetually wealthy are routinely funded by the investments they have made through out their life. The wealthy also have concerns about their health, the health of their spouses, and certainly the health of aging parents.

-THEY ARE NEITHER EXTRAVAGANT NOR ASCETIC: one of the surprising secrets of those wealthy enough to pass wealth on is the moderate way in which they live.

-GIVING WELL, LIVING WELL: among a preponderance of wealthy households, great importance is attached to charitable giving.

This is fabulous book. Do you really think this is a book worth your time?