What’s The One Thing Rich People Buy That Poor People Don’t

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What’s The One Thing Rich People Buy That Poor People Don’t

What’s the one thing that rich people buy that the poor and middle class don’t? You see it on Instagram. You see it on Facebook. Sometimes you see it on YouTube. You see the rich people, they have these nice watches. They drive the Lamborghini, the Ferrari or the Bentley. They stay in luxurious hotels. They have huge houses and all these things that they buy. That’s what people see in rich people. That’s what they have. That’s not what got them there. What did they buy? One thing that rich people buy is assets that the poor and middle class don’t. What are assets? I’m talking about income-producing assets, assets that appreciate, that would make them money. For example, it could be a piece of real estate. It could be an apartment building. It could be a company. It could be stock. Any assets, investments that would put money in their pocket versus poor and middle class, what do they buy? They buy liabilities. If you’ve studied a little bit about Robert Kiyosaki’s Rich Dad Poor Dad, you know the definition of assets. Assets are things that put money in your pocket. Most middle classes buy liabilities such as their home, their primary residence that they think is an asset, which is not. Assets are supposed to make your money while you sleep versus liabilities. It takes away money from you while you asleep.

If you look at the poor or middle class, if you look at their financial statements, very often they have very little or no assets, zero assets. They have a lot of liabilities like their home, their call and all that stuff but they have very little assets. Rich people will buy assets first. The assets buy our luxuries versus the other way around. I’ll give you a perfect example. Instead of saying to yourself, “I can’t afford that. It’s too expensive,” the rich people, that’s not how we think. That’s a very low level, poor person mentality, “I can’t afford it.” Rich people ask questions, not only, “How can I afford it?” but “How can I make this make me money?” Instead of thinking let’s say for this car, I could have bought this Bentley anytime, but I waited for a period of time because I set a goal and say, “Instead of buying a liability, I need to buy the asset first.” I need to buy an asset that will throw off enough cashflow that I know that would cover my monthly payment of my Bentley. Instead of me just buying a Bentley, which I have to pay from my own pocket, I said, “Let me go through a step. Let me buy the asset.” Buy the asset first and when the asset throws enough cashflow, it pays for my luxuries. Even though I might change this car when I no longer drive it or when I sell it or whatever it is, I still have the asset that’s working for me. That’s the difference.

One Thing Rich People Buy: Rich people don’t just think of return on investment; also think in terms of ROTI, return on time invested.

Rich people buy nice things. The difference is we don’t want to use our own money. We buy the assets first. We invest first. We buy the investments first, then we buy liabilities. The definition of rich people, the rich is very simple. Rich people are entrepreneurs who invest. If you’re a business owner, instead of buying stuff from your business, make the money from your business first and then you put it into investments. If you’ve watched my Wealth Triangle video, you know I talk about the three stages. High-income skills and then I talked about your scalable business. I talked about high return investments. Rich people are entrepreneurs who invest. That’s the one thing that rich people buy that the poor and middle class do not. Let me give you one more tip. There’s one thing that we also buy that the poor and middle class do not. Rich people buy time, poor people sell time. You think about people who are struggling financially or employees, they sell their time. They get paid based on time. How many hours I get, how many hours I work, how much do I get paid per hour or how much do I get paid per month or biweekly? That’s how most people think. Rich people don’t do that. We buy time. We buy time because time is the one thing that you cannot replace.

This second that you read this blog, that second is gone. That minute you read this blog, that minute is gone. You can’t replace it. I can’t replace it. The customer is replaceable. Money is replaceable. Time is not. I cannot create or manufacture more time. I can always make more money if I have the time. If I run out of time, I cannot do that. That’s why the time for rich people is our most valuable commodity. That’s why I hate it when people waste my time. It’s worse than stealing from me. It’s worse than stealing money from me because I can always make it back. The minute that I waste, I cannot get it back. If I used the time wisely, I could use it to make a lot of money. We buy talents. We buy people. We buy people that could help us. We buy people that could save us time. Let me share a story. One time I was visiting a pretty successful CEO. The company is probably doing $20 million to $30 million a year. I visited his office. I went to his office and I couldn’t believe it. The minute I got there, he was mowing the lawns in front of his office. I was like, “What was that?” Right there it tells me, “My God, this CEO does not value his time.” The two hours he spent mowing the lawns, he could not have found better things to do. He could not have found better ways to invest his time. He couldn’t find a better way to utilize his talents. He’s mowing the lawn, it makes no sense.

When I talked to him, I was giving him a hard time. Rich people don’t think of return on investment. That’s one of the words that you got to learn, ROI, the thing in terms of return on investment, your assets, your liability, but we also think in terms of return on time invested, ROTI. I invest this time doing this thing, what’s my return? I know if I spend two hours watching the movie, that movie doesn’t then cost me $20, $30, $40. That movie cost me thousands of dollars, if not tens of thousands of dollars. Not that I don’t watch movies, I love watching movies. I know also holistically that is not a $40 thing. That costs me tens of thousands of dollars. Then I’d asked myself, “Is the escape, is that an experience worth that money?” I look at that and said, “It is.” If I’m taking time off and spending with my family that hour costs me money, but I’m willing to spend that very consciously versus people who have no concept. Very consciously, I know that I’m investing my time that’s worth X amount of dollars. I’m not trying to make money from this hour or two hours, I am spending with them. I am investing in that time. When you think of that way, you’ll be more present. That’s why every time I watch a movie rarely, I’d say a movie is so bad. No, it’s okay. At least I can justify a little bit mentally this movie just cost me $20,000. It’s pretty good. It’s $20,000 of my time. That’s what it is. You’ve got to think of it that way. How you value your time.

That’s what rich people do. Rich people buy time. If you don’t value your time, you’re not going to be successful. You have to value your time. Bill Gates has his appointment booking, the six-minute increment in his calendar. That’s a billionaire. My mentor has his in fifteen-minute increment. I have my thing, sometimes 30, sometimes fifteen-minute increment. How do you manage your time? How do you invest your time, your most valuable investment that you have? That’s what rich people buy. The one thing that they buy that the poor and middle class don’t. Don’t look at just what they have, the fancy car. Maybe when you had no money, you’ve been struggling for so long. You have been working hard for so long and suddenly when you make a little bit of money, the odd image that you have about rich people, all the nice things, the nice car and all the things that they have. Then suddenly you make a little bit of money and you say, “I’ve waited 30 years for this. I want that life,” and you go spend the money. You think by spending that money that makes you rich, that makes you poor. That doesn’t make you rich. You only see the surface, the result and the outcome. You don’t look at the process. Look at how they got rich. They buy the assets first. Before they buy their fancy watch, they buy the investment. The investment makes them money, then they buy their fancy watch but you don’t want to do that. Suddenly you make a little bit of money because you’re so insecure, you’ve got a big ego.

You want to show the world, you want to show your family that you made it, which you haven’t. You want to look rich versus be rich. You go buy that watch, you wear that watch and you thought you made it. Everybody thought you made it. You did not make it. You made yourself poorer. That’s not what makes you rich. If you can have the self-discipline, the self-control and say, “I’m going to buy the assets first.” Once you buy our assets, you can buy all the luxury you want. Your assets pay for it. It’s okay. Buy the nice things that you want. It doesn’t cost you because your investments are providing for you. Investments are feeding you. It’s making you money. That’s the difference. Think about that. Don’t just look and say, “I want the nice things.” The nice thing is a result. That’s the next step. First, you got to build a portfolio. I didn’t have nice things for the first ten years of my life. It’s only now I’ve like, “After all these years.” I didn’t have the Bentley overnight. I was driving a Mazda for a number of years. Then Audi, not that the Audi is a bad car. It’s okay, but it was not a Bentley. For a number of years, only now that I am enjoying life. They’ll look at where you are now, but they don’t look at where you came from. Until next time.

Important Links:

• Rich Dad Poor Dad
• Wealth Triangle