Rich Is A Religion Intro

From the Rich Is A Religion audiobook, read by Mark Stevens

Rich Is A Religion is a breakthrough book:

The one you must read BEFORE you set off on any investment methodology or personal financial plan. And the one you must use to test the validity and the effectiveness of the financial route you are on now. 

That is because Rich Is A Religion challenges the assumptions upon which most financial planning is based. It provides a clear and straightforward philosophy and methodology for: 

•  Making more money than you ever thought possible in your life.
•  Protecting that money for your entire life regardless of prevailing economic conditions.
•  Living the kind of life you want to live: doing what you want to do, enjoying your days, having personal independence-- all fueled and protected by a financial bedrock you build and no one and nothing can take from you.

Rich Is a Religion explores-- in personal stories with affluent people, multi millionaires and billionaires the author has known and worked with--the mindset that leads to a wealthy life. The Rich get rich and stay rich because of a set of unique behaviors and strategies revealed in this book:

•  You don't simply count money, you think about it.  Specifically, how to truly make it work for you.
•  Money is not simply currency. To live the religion of the rich, you must treat money as the currency of life.
•  The rich have a secret they do not share but the author, a member of this fraternity, reveals it for the first time. 
•  To truly have wealth and the independence that goes with it, you must learn to make make money while you sleep.
•  Keeping up with the Joneses is a futile exercise that does nothing but sap your wealth and your personal joy. Far better is to keep up with the Buffett's (Warren and his wife have billions and yet live in the same home they purchased in the 1950's for $31,000 - because they are quite happy there and have  no need to impress anyone.) check in book year of purchase and price of house. It's in the book.
• Recognize that the giant brokerage firms that seek to gain control of your accounts are simply marketing machines that profit for themselves but fail the vast majority of Americans. The homeowners caught in the disaster of the sub-prime fiasco. The millions of baby boomers who cannot afford to retire.

Stevens, a multimillionaire himself, describes his journey to the religion of the rich. The epiphany he gained as a 17 year old left with $84 and no assets when his father died suddenly at 40 and the son had to support his sister and mother. It was then, in the climb from poverty to wealth- in his encounters with such friends and clients as John Hay Whitney, Carl Icahn, Bill Hayes, former Treasury Secretary Bill Simon, Saul Steinberg - that Stevens learned  the secrets of the fraternity and brings them to you in this essential read at a critical period in our nation. Our economy. Your lives.

1.  People's homes aren't upside down. Their lives and their finances are.

2.  Millions of baby boomers planned their whole lives to retire and now can't afford to.

3.  They need jobs and the jobs are disappearing.

4.   The financial investment plans sold by the people who brought you the sub-prime movie, don't work. Except for the      ovie-makers. The ones, that is, who don't wind up behind bars.

5.  Social Security is an endangered species.

6.  The key to getting rich is making money while you sleep. Hardly anyone does.

7.  We are a nation of show offs. It's time to give up keeping up with the Joneses and try keeping up with the Buffetts (Warren lives in a home he paid $ 31,000 for.)

8. We live ten degrees or more above our means when the trick is to live one degree below.

9. We work harder and harder and enjoy what we have less.

The truly wealthy don't make money by working themselves to exhaustion.

That's what they ask you to do while they keep the secret to making real money under wraps.

Specifically, they have the knowledge of How To Make Money While You Are Sleeping.

At first blush, it seems like an oxymoron: you can't make money while you're sleeping. You have to be working to do that.

Well, not true. In fact, it is the polar opposite of the truth. And once you begin the process, once you go down the road to making money while you sleep, once you challenge conventional wisdom and prove to yourself that it can be done, you will never go back to the one dimensional view of life that says you have to be toiling away at something to make money.

That will be the past. Allow me to introduce you to the future. To your future.

3 Ways To Make Money While You Are Sleeping

1.Create an investment portfolio, at least part of which is guaranteed to make money.

Such as Treasury bills. As long as you hold them to maturity, they do not lose value, see guaranteed to generate interest while you are sleeping and are backed by the full faith and credit of the US government.

It is not considered sophisticated to have a portfolio built exclusively on guaranteed instruments because their upside potential is limited. But, and this "but" is so important to the religion of the rich, they have no risk of loss. And a guarantee to turn your zzzzs into $$$$. In fact, if everyone invested their money in T bills, it would be the first time no one lost money investing. And everyone made money sleeping.

How much do you need to start? If all you have is $1,000 start there and keep adding to it.

2. One of the ways to add to it is to reduce the amount of money you spend while you are sleeping. Yes, SPEND while you are fast asleep.

How do you spend money while you are sleeping? Interest payments on credit card balances. Cable TV premium packages you pay for but barely use. Monthly telephone plans that exceed your usage. The notion that you need a cell phone and a blackberry. That berry keeps ticking away fees while you sleep.
Rid yourself of the phone or the berry.

3. Augment you primary job with a business of your own.

You can start by turning your core skill or a hobby into an enterprise that offers products or services on the Internet. One of my clients sells her family's country kitchen recipes on line. Another offers a daily series of tips on interior design. While they are in dreamland, their websites light up with orders. And funds are wired right into their accounts.

You can also buy a franchise or a small business in town and hire a manager to run it for you. One of my relatives bought a local strip mall with 24 hour a day shops. The merchants pay him rent and a percentage of sales.
Another case of the zzzzs turning into $$$$$

·          Look into the mirror:  Do YOU practice the religion?

·          CONFESSIONS (how people didn't practice the religion and what happened)

·          VOWS (how people are practicing the religion and it is going well) - celebrity??

PRODUCTS

·          Daily Devotion (this will be a login for members to track their progress...as you scroll a mouse over this there will be an explanation as to what exactly it provides the customer)

·          The Convocation (a network for people who want to connect...same network as for Make Money When you are Sleeping.