Finance Book

This is the third book in the Rich Dad’s series Robert Kiyosaki wrote after the hugely popular Rich Dad Poor Dad. Robert casual style of narration makes it both enjoyable and easy to digest the close to 400 pages book. I took about six weeks to complete the book.

This book focuses a great deal on the B-I side of the quadrant as well as the B-I Triangle. To become rich, we have to be both an investor and a business owner. To be a really great investor is to become an ultimate investor. A person who invests from the inside of the company, who takes the company public and sell the shares to outside investor. Robert also explained all the components of his B-I triangle, which Rich Dad taught him, to build a strong business dedicating one chapter for each component. If any of the component of the business is weak, the business will be in trouble and fail.

Although Robert gives very clear explanation to every concept, you still find his explanation open-ended, requiring you to figure out what is best for your own financial future. I have learnt many lessons from this book and summarized here below:

The various investor controls needed Different level of investor e.g. accredited, sophisticated. Increase finanancial intelligence. The need to have 3 financial plans. One to be secure, one to be comfortable, one to be rich. Understand financial statements. The 90/10 rule of money. The tax benefits enjoyed by a business owner compared to an employee and self-employed. The difference between saving and investing. See the flip side of the coin for any investment. Living in the information age versus industrail age. What it takes and how fast to be a billionaire in the information age. and much more… I like to recommend this book to those of you who wants to be a better business owner and investor. It would be better if you had read the first two books “Rich Dad Poor Dad” and “Rich Dad’s cash flow quadrant” as it builds on the fundamentals of the two earlier books.

By: Raymond Heng

If I’d never read ‘Rich Dad, Poor Dad’ by Robert Kiyosaki, my outlook on life would be so different. I’d still believe that job I have should go to support my lifestyle, and that any budgeting I do should be for the purchase of my next toy, like a jet-ski or a motorbike. No way, not me, not now… here’s why.

I’d never been much of a finance or business oriented person – I was always more interested in history. But what I know now wasn’t really taught in schools anyway. Schools teach kids to be workers – it’s blunt but it’s absolutely true. The school system is not designed to make us all comfortably well off. It’s designed to benefit rich industrialists. Having a job is not freedom, it’s not certainty, it most likely won’t make you wealthy, and odds are it won’t help you fulfill your dreams for the future.

These sort of ideas are promoted by Robert Kiyosaki in ‘Rich Dad, Poor Dad’, and they really speak to me. He tells the story of having been brought up with two father figures giving him conflicting advice. The two also came from different backgrounds, and were going different places. The examples used in the book illustrate Kiyosaki’s points perfectly. It’s such a well written, well rounded text, it should be mandatory reading in all schools.

Kiyosaki turns concepts of finance and assets upside down. Let me give you an example. Kiyosaki believes- and I do too now that I’ve read his explanation – that the house you live in is not an asset, it’s a liability. The conventional thought is that your home is something that features large on the assets column, but Kiyosaki disagrees. This is because of the amount of money you pay for it.

Let’s say for example that your home is worth $300,000. Your mortgage on the home… well what you pay per week will change depending on your financial institution. But over a 30 year loan term you’ll end up paying almost $600,000 for your $300,000 home. And that doesn’t even take rates, maintenance, repairs and other ongoing costs into account.

There are legitimate ways to make that gloom and doom scenario much brighter – and they’re legal.

Similarly with the stock market: the general consensus is that you need serious cash outlay to be a big player on the stock market – well let me tell you now that’s just not true. You’re not looking in the right place, and I’m not talking hot stock tips here. There are tried and true ways of making ongoing income from the stock market that don’t involve outlaying large amounts of money.

That’s all legal too – and practically anyone can do it.

The thing that astounds me about Robert Kiyosaki’s book is that the ideas and concepts are explained so plainly, and the most complex of notions is clearly laid out for interested persons or all levels of investment knowledge to be able to understand. The ideas he espouses are easily transferable to the real world you live in. Don’t waste another minute of your life. This book is right up there with Napoleon Hill’s “Think and Grow Rich”.

By: Erik Rosenzweig

In Robert Kiyosaki’s book, Rich Dad Poor Dad, he clearly points out that anybody can become rich. Nevertheless, he cautions that it’s more difficult for the children of the poor and middle classes because they have been taught incorrect information. For example, their parents have told them, “go to school and get good grades so you can go to college and get a steady job with good benefits.” These people have been taught to think, “I can’t afford it” instead of (as the rich do) asking, “How can I afford it?” There is absolutely nothing that you cannot afford. When you honestly desire something you’ll figure out how to obtain it.

One barrier that stands in the way of individuals accomplishing this goal is fear of failure. You will fail sometimes but you have to turn it into a great opportunity by learning something from it and moving on. There is not one rich person who has not failed, but, the trick is: when they fall down they immediately stand up again, learn from it, and their great desire to attain their goals only grows larger.

A great example of this principle is the Battle of the Alamo. This was a complete failure for the Texans. They lost many soldiers. In spite of this, or rather, because they understood the secret of turning a failure into a success, they used the Alamo to stir up the Texans to victory. Even today, more than 150 years later, Texans still talk about the Alamo with pride. And they LOST! Successful people are not afraid of losing. They understand that losing is a part of the process

What we have to understand is that your life is going to be difficult, unstable, and full of failure whether we are rich or poor. You cannot avoid that. Might as well utilize the opportunities life throws at you and run with them. Do not fight against these opportunities! You can be stable and poor/middle class or take a risk and become wealthy. You make the choice.

So what do you do about it? How do you start? Start acquiring some income producing assets. An income producing asset is:

1. A business that does not require you to be there.

2. Stocks

3. Mutual Funds

4. Real estate

5. Notes (IOU’s)

6. Royalties from music, scripts, patents, etc.

7. Anything else that has value, creates income, & has a market.

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By: Elise Marie Fisher