Money Tips Daily If You Want To Be Wealthy Model Wealthy People

Welcome to Money Tips Daily. This is Money Kelly bringing you money tips to help save and make you more money!

The late Jim Rohn used to say that your income will be around the average of your close friends and where you will be in five years, will be determined by the books you read and the people you hang out with.

Brian Tracy expressed the same point more directly when he said “you can’t fly with Eagles when you’re scratching around with Turkeys”!

In other words, whether you like it or not, the people you spend the most time with have a profound effect on your behaviour, attitude and future success. Sooner or later, you will take on the characteristics of those around you. If you’re going to absorb the character and habits of anyone, you might as well make it someone successful.

Model Wealthy People

If you want to be wealthy, model wealthy people. If you want to be successful, model successful people and if you want to be a failure...fill in the blank.

How do you model the behaviour and habits of the rich and successful?

In my forthcoming book, Yes, Money Can Buy You Happiness, I talk about the “Millionaire Next Door” and the research carried out on the average wealthy people of America. In the groundbreaking book, The Millionaire Next Door: The surprising Secrets of America’s Wealthy, authors William D. Darko and Thomas J. Stanley, carried out extensive research to discover the real habits and traits of the typical American millionaire.

The results might surprise you. The average millionaire is not a sports star, celebrity or movie star.

A typical millionaire has worked hard to build up a business or career, is married to their childhood sweetheart, drives a modest car, is frugal with money, has saved between 10-20% of their income over a 20-30 year period and amassed a fortune in excess of $1 million.

They do not lead rock star lifestyles spending hundreds of dollars on fine wines and exclusive brands to impress their friends, or splash out on fancy new foreign cars every year and eat out in expensive restaurants every night.

They do, however, take the time to manage their money and investments, work hard on their business, spend time with their family and friends, go to church, synagogue or temple, and enjoy simple pleasures such as walking. Some would describe themselves as a “cheap date”!

An extreme example of this is seen in the lifestyle of the billionaire Warren Buffett who drives a simple American car, lives in the same house in his home town of Omaha he bought 40 years ago and eats in modest restaurants or grabs a Big Mac on the way to work. Unlike, most of his fellow billionaires he does not lead the flamboyant lifestyle enjoyed by the super rich and keeps his feet firmly on the ground.  

Contrary to popular belief, the average millionaire and multi-millionaire leads a fairly ordinary lifestyle. You probably wouldn’t even guess they were wealthy.

You can start modelling the habits of the ‘millionaire next door’ right now by following the 7 S Steps to Success:

1.      Stop spending indiscriminately and stick to a budget buying the things you need and can afford without going into debt.

2.      Spend wisely on quality, not luxury, things that last.

3.      Save 10-20% of your income or start on a smaller percentage.

4.      Save and Invest wisely and spend time looking after your investments.

5.      Start investing in yourself through education and development in your career or in your own business.

6.      Start leading a simple and stable home life 

7.      Spend time with the people that matter to you.

Action.  Follow this powerful technique used by successful people and athletes.

Look at where you are today and think about your habits and your actions that got you there. Now close your eyes and go forward in time. Visualise where you want to be in 1, 2 or 5 years time. What is your life like? Where do you live and who are you with? What are you doing in your life? Now look back from that point. What habits and actions got you to your ideal lifestyle? Follow this path and write down your goals and plans. Use a vision board and repeat the process every day.

Listen to this blog on my podcast:

https://anchor.fm/charles-kelly/episodes/18118c4?at=2721345

See also: 

How to Make Money Online Without a Website or Inventing Your Own Product

2 Tips to Save and Make You Money

Money Tips Daily - How to SLASH Your Tax Bill Legally

Hello and welcome to Money Tips Daily, this is Money Kelly bringing you money tips to help save and make you more money!

Mitigate Your Tax Liability, Legally!

If you are listening to this in real time, today is the 21st of February and for many of us in the UK the end of the tax or fiscal year on 5 April is fast approaching. Other countries may vary but the principle is the same, use every available legal tax saving method to reduce and mitigate the amount of tax you pay.

Here in the UK, the next few weeks will present your last opportunity to use up your tax free allowances in savings schemes like ISA and Pensions.

There are different types of ISA’s and pensions, and the right choice for you will depend on your own particular financial circumstances. You should seek financial advice from an independent financial advisor, as there are other tax saving investment schemes which require specialist advice.

The amount you can put into these schemes varies from year to year and what the Chancellor decides in the budget. In general, the maximum thresholds usually increase because the government wants to encourage us to save.

For the 2017/18 tax year, you can invest up to £20,000 into a Cash ISA or a Stocks and Shares ISA.

The cash ISA is similar to a bank account which pays interest, but unlike a normal account, there is no tax deduction as long as your money stays within the tax-free ISA “wrapper”. Many savers do not realise that the interest in their savings is taxed.

When I worked in the bank many years ago, some customers would have hundreds of thousands of pounds tied up in accounts which not only paid a low interest rates, but were also taxed.

By simply moving their money into ISA’s they could avoid taxes forever on their savings and earn more money on their savings, as interest rates were higher in the ISA accounts. Remember that banks have a habit of churning accounts and reducing the interest rate on those accounts making them effectively obsolete.

Unfortunately, many of them would say “no, I’m happy where it is” and refuse to move their money!

If you had invested the maximum allowable amount each year into ISA’s or similar accounts since they were introduced you would now have over £1,000,000 in a tax free wrapper.

The Stocks and Shares ISA allows you to invest in shares or funds which invest in the stock market on your behalf. These funds can go up or down and obviously carry more risk than a cash ISA. If you already own shares, it makes sense to shelter them in an ISA wrapper to avoid tax on dividends and CGT or capital gains tax.

Companies like Hargreaves Lansdown offer this ISA service and has a good online platform.

You can invest in an ISA by making regular monthly contributions or a single lump sum each year.

Check out the best deals online (e.g. at moneysavingexperts.co.uk or similar comparison sites) and now is the time to start shopping around rather than leaving it until the last minute and risk losing out.

In addition to the ISA allowance, all UK basic rate tax payers can now earn up to £1000 a year in interest without paying tax on it. With base lending rates standing at .5% as I write, you’d need quite a lot of money on deposit to earn £1000 of interest on your savings. Assuming a savings rate of .25%, you would have to have £400,000 on deposit in order to earn £1000 in interest.

Pensions are more complex and the right plan for you will depend on your circumstances, for instance, your tax status, age and whether you are employed, self employed or a company director.

Bonus tip. Get into the habit of saving a percentage of your income no matter how small to start with. The sooner you start saving the better, as compound interest (interest on interest) will work in your favour. Albert Einstein described compound interest as one of the greatest forces on Earth.

Acton. See an independent financial adviser and do your own research online. If you are self employed, talk to your accountant before the end of the tax year not after when it might be too late to claim allowances against your profits.

See also: 

How to Make Money Online Without a Website or Inventing Your Own Product

2 Tips to Save and Make You Money

3 Simple Steps To Improve Your Credit Rating

Welcome to Money Tips Daily.

3 Simple Steps to Build Up and Improve Your Credit Rating.

We've looked at how to check your credit rating, but what to you do if you want to improve or build up your rating or if you have discovered that you have adverse credit registered against you?

There are different strategies for people who have a bad credit history, for instance if you have a County Court Judgment (CCJ) of a Default registered against you, and those who have virtually no credit rating at all.

For those of you who want to build or rebuild your rating, here are three simple steps:

1.      Get a credit card if you can or apply for ‘rebuild your credit’ credit card if you already have a poor credit history. Search for card providers which offer credit to people with an adverse credit history. The interest rate could be as high as 40% so make sure you pay them off quickly.

2.      Pay off your card balance in full each month. This shows a record of handling your finances and you will usually find that card companies will offer to increase your limit. Also, drawing cash on your card is not only expensive, but also demonstrates poor money management skills.

3.      Register yourself on the voters list, assuming you are eligible to vote, or write to the credit referencing agencies with proof of address so they can note your residence. This will show lenders that you are registered at a UK address. Lenders also like to see stability, so the more addresses you’ve had in a short period of time, the stable you are going to look to lenders. This can also apply to how long you have held your current account with your bank, so don’t go switching your account every six months just to get a free offer!

If you have a CCJ or a Default you should take steps to mitigate the pain. For instance, you can apply to have CCJ’s ‘set aside’ if it was registered in your absence or at a previous address. 

You can also ask credit referencing agencies to add a note to your file where there are mitigating circumstances, e.g. “the goods we ordered never arrived so we refused to pay to £50 bill”. With hindsight, it would have been better to pay the bill and dispute it after to avoid wrecking your credit history for six years.

The golden rule is never ignore a court or bailiff letter, debt recovery notice, default or pre-action notice or any letters relating to debts, no matter how painful they are to read. Sitting there looking at a pile of unopened red letters is only going to make matters worse.

As mentioned yesterday, avoid being late with payments and use direct debits to pay bills and card payments.

See also: 

How To Check Your Credit Rating

How to Make Money Online Without a Website or Inventing Your Own Product