When Is The Right Time To Be Rich?

When I was waiting for my SPM exam result, I had a conversation with my retired father. He revealed something that I will never forget for as long as I live. Putting a hand on my shoulder, he began saying, “I struggled throughout my life to earn just enough to raise you up. I don’t have a degree.

I don’t know about music although I like listening to Teresa Teng. What I hope for you is to get a professional degree and find a stable job. So you can earn comfortably to support your family. Although I don’t make much money, I saved enough for your tertiary education. ” What really broke my heart was when he revealed that he wished he could have done more.

Sounds like a poor dad, but he really is a hardworking man and I respect him a lot. The circumstances he faced during his time is totally different from what we are facing now.

Anyway, I took his advice. I completed my degree in engineering. But that’s pretty much all. I realized that the advice my father gave me was to study hard, work hard, save hard and hopefully have some money when I am old in the future. This is like following his footsteps.

The difference is only the environment, the process is the same. You will go through the whole cycle and hopefully you have enough money at the end of the day when retirement arrives.

To summarize this piece of advice – it is to get rich slow. And the problem is that getting old is certain. But getting rich is not.

Getting rich slowly is getting rich old

When I went back for a school reunion event, I met several great teachers who had retired. After decades of hard work and producing many successful students, most of them are now drawing pension. I talked to a teacher who is now living comfortably, with a fixed income stream from pension fund that is going to last for his lifetime. He told that he has no money worry, but of course he is not rich though.

If you don’t have pension fund like a government servant, you would normally plan for your retirement by having an adequate nest egg. It might be a few million ringgits, that is going to provide enough for your 20-30 years of retirement period.

But often enough, we see a lot of people that’s enjoying their wealth in a wheelchair. When you grow old, you might have no health or youth to enjoy the wealth.

The worst case is when you neither have the health, nor the wealth to enjoy that ample retirement time.  

Is getting rich slow a good advice? It seems like a good one because many people are giving such similar advice including my dad, financial planners, your parents etc. Well this is the advice from people who are typically not rich.  To win the race, take a lesson from the turtle who went slow and steady.

Whether you agree or not, take a look at the next possibility.

Is getting rich young possible?

I can see lots of people who hit it big and who’ve worked hard to become a success in their twenties. Take Mark Zuckerberg and Elon Musk, for example. Facebook and PayPal are now household names for us all because of these two inspirational people. Believe it or not, once they were like you and me, but they were different from us because they took a chance and fought hard to turn their ideas into reality.

I think this is more desirable. You want to get rich young. You want to drive that sports car when you can still handle the acceleration, not when your heart and blood pressure couldn’t take it. You want to see the world when you still have the agility and strength, not when you have to bring a box full of medicines along. You want to make a lot of money and enjoy spending it when you still have youth.

It’s definitely not impossible to get rich young. You just have to reinvent your retirement to include your youth. For the past decade, things had moved so fast that the possibility is becoming higher everyday. It is easier to start a business. It is easier to raise capital. It is faster to reach the people at the other side of the globe!

The answer to getting rich young is ENTREPRENEURSHIP. While some people merely dream about the glamour of being their own boss, entrepreneurs take charge to complete their goals with massive actions! They see challenges as opportunities. They study their competitors to determine the extra mile they need to take in order to do better. They understand every great result is the end product of efforts. They understand that every mistake and failure are one step closer to success.

What they set to achieve is not about the massive amount of monetary reward, but to enjoy entrepreneurship as a unique lifestyle.  

Reinvent your retirement to include youth

So the bottom line is, the golden years are when you are still young but have money to spend. You don’t really have to wait 30-50 years to get rich slow and old. In this fast-pace world, a lot can happen in 5-10 years. If you include entrepreneurship as part of your lifestyle, you will start to see things changing in your life.

I have just shown you two routes to retirement. Why not planning for both. You can take the faster route of entrepreneurship and at the same time, prepare for the slow and steady route of wealth accumulation.

If you fail many times on the fast lane and run out of time, you will still have your stable route to fall back to.