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Sell your dollars, sell your dollars, sell your dollars...
Commodities, precious metals, and conservative foreign stocks. The latter have been beaten down largely because of hedge funds having to meet margin calls on their worthless subprime paper. These foreign stocks should pay high dividends, at least 6% and up to 12% and denominated in currencies like Swiss francs, Canadien dollars, Australian dollars, NZ kiwi dollars, etc.
That's on the personal investment end. On the entrepenurial front:
Stay away from residential real estate like the plague for the next 10 years except for a principal residence if you intend to live there for many years, ESPECIALLY the suburban market. Consider investing in manufacturing when the time is right. Get involved in the purchase or partial ownership of a factory making things people need. As China stops shipping stuff to us and completely de-pegs their currency, we'll be desperate for entrepeneurial folks like yourself to establish our newer modernized manufacturing infrastructure that just a couple of years ago people thought we evolved from. Do NOT run a non-exportable service based industry. As a country, we'll be too poor to afford these luxuries. Your business has to make things people around the world want. The exception to the service based industry remark made earlier is to run something like a resort area that caters to richer foreigners such as Chinese, Saudi, Japanese and Germans. Aspen ski resort, High-end resort on Miami beach, niche high-end Vegas casino, places like this.
Assets such as residential real estate, used cars, RVs, boats, etc will fall precipitously in the near future relative to gold (real terms). So, when your personal investments are ready to be cashed in, you'll be replicating a similar experience to many Europeans/Asians who are now coming here due to our cheaper currency. Do NOT run a car, boat, and especially a RV dealership.
Thanks, good post. Manufacturing and Distributiion are 2 of my proposed ventures.
Quote:
Originally Posted by ViewFromThePeak
Sell your dollars, sell your dollars, sell your dollars...
Commodities, precious metals, and conservative foreign stocks. The latter have been beaten down largely because of hedge funds having to meet margin calls on their worthless subprime paper. These foreign stocks should pay high dividends, at least 6% and up to 12% and denominated in currencies like Swiss francs, Canadien dollars, Australian dollars, NZ kiwi dollars, etc.
That's on the personal investment end. On the entrepenurial front:
Stay away from residential real estate like the plague for the next 10 years except for a principal residence if you intend to live there for many years, ESPECIALLY the suburban market. Consider investing in manufacturing when the time is right. Get involved in the purchase or partial ownership of a factory making things people need. As China stops shipping stuff to us and completely de-pegs their currency, we'll be desperate for entrepeneurial folks like yourself to establish our newer modernized manufacturing infrastructure that just a couple of years ago people thought we evolved from. Do NOT run a non-exportable service based industry. As a country, we'll be too poor to afford these luxuries. Your business has to make things people around the world want. The exception to the service based industry remark made earlier is to run something like a resort area that caters to richer foreigners such as Chinese, Saudi, Japanese and Germans. Aspen ski resort, High-end resort on Miami beach, niche high-end Vegas casino, places like this.
Assets such as residential real estate, used cars, RVs, boats, etc will fall precipitously in the near future relative to gold (real terms). So, when your personal investments are ready to be cashed in, you'll be replicating a similar experience to many Europeans/Asians who are now coming here due to our cheaper currency. Do NOT run a car, boat, and especially a RV dealership.
...
Stay away from residential real estate like the plague for the next 10 years except for a principal residence if you intend to live there for many years,
I disagree.
Investing using other folk's money is smart.
Residential Rental Real Estate is one of the smartest investments going.
You buy with zero down.
You pay the monthly payments from rental income.
Your Net Worth goes up.
You are fully tax sheltered, and you never pay income taxes again.
1.) You have to know what your game is and what it isn't. Some people spread themselves too thin, trying to be an expert in everything, or over extending themselves.
2.) Value your time. I knew a small business owner (did maybe a few million in revenue) that said, he wouldn't even waste 15 minutes arguing with employees over something. It's a waste of time.
3.) There are alot of great books in all subjects that few people have read.
I think Amazon's a great tool. You get unbiased reviews, you can see what other people have learned or have taken away. You can get introduced to other books or authors. I would leverage off of all that time and expertise.
4.) Seperate get rich quick from something legitimate.
"Get rich quick" is all the same. Vague, broad generalized statements. Easy. Only takes __ hours a day. No training necessary. Anything like that.
More legitimate books (i.e. Millionaire Next Door) are just the opposite. Specific instead of generalized. Discplined vs "easy". May take a long time vs only 3 hours a day.
5.) The further away you get from the standard on tv, the better you'll do financially. If you were only educated from tv, you wouldn't have much. If something isn't mentioned on tv, that means you should probably learn more about it (i.e. the dollar going down, foreigners coming here because of our cheaper currency, etc).
6.) Track some people that you think are really successful. You won't learn much from one snapshot of Jeff Bezos or Bill Gates. Follow new interviews. Dig around to get the real story.
7.) Also realize that foreigners come to this country all the time. With little in their pocket, few contacts. Not knowing English or broken english, and alot of them do very well. We don't always "see" the same opportunities that others see.
Thanks, good post. Manufacturing and Distributiion are 2 of my proposed ventures.
Thanks for the kudos.
Just be careful about what talking heads from various organizations have to tell you about their particular flavor of investment. When it comes to Realtors touting a depreciating consumer good such as residential real estate, or the CNBC talking head recommending financial stocks, while at the same time their banking clients are trying to dump their shares.
Just think foreigners. They are your customers now. This is no time for rah rah nationalism or to feel sorry for our indebted citizens. For now, think outside what used to be thought of as safe and leveragable. When all is said and done, the free money and leverage coming from the government will go into what is best for our country. That used to be residential real estate. We now have enough housing units that no one will be homeless when it all gets sorted out. Soon it will be time for the free money to flow into things like rebuilding factories, which will be much more vital to our national security than putting families in houses.
One thing is for sure. It sure ain't as easy today as it was yesterday. Like the old Animals song went and Eric Burdon sang: Its a hard world to get a break in, all the good things have been taken.
You can dream up all kinds of ideas for a new business but the fact of the matter is thousands of others already have thought of it first, and tried, and most failed.
Another thing is for sure, you will never get rich working for some slob at the expense of your own time and pride. When I was just 17 I was working for schleps for $2.50/hr pumping gas. Then I got this job at Hertz cleaning cars that paid $8/hr....this was back in the early 70s, that was great money.
Then one day I saw this very unusual thing taking place. There was a man coming in to refinish tires with this crazy machine so they looked brand new. He was grinding and putting on white walls to the tires. He was also applying raised white letters like the ones on tires you buy advertising the brand, only he was doing personalized lettering like your name or some saying. I was fasinated and the fact that he charged $4/tire amazed me. The guy was making $300 a day back in 1975 or so. The one I remember the best was he did lettering on all 4 tires that said: "Gas grass or ass, no one rides free". He charged $30 for it and completed it in 30 minutes.
So I watched and questioned him for months. Finally one day he asked me if I wanted to buy his business for $5000 and that included 5 big car dealer accounts. I begged borrowed and stole to get the money. I was hooked. I could work 3-4 days and go fishing the other 3. I value and treasure my freedom more then anything.
I kept that business for 13 years while adding other things like pin stripping and windshield repair. I sold the business for 4 times what I paid for it with the 20 or so good will accounts. I never looked back. Today I still feel the same. I would rather hold out a hat on the street corner then work for some slob for minimum wage while he makes millions at the expense of my time and pride.
Dont get me wrong. That attitude dont make me wealthy. But that attitude allows me to be a human and not a robot.
Good luck to ya man. It's a big world out there and all the good things have indeed been taken but things will fall into place for you if you are patient and keep a keen eye.
why would a business that good only sell for 15 times what he could make in one day?
Great post. Well said. If you can recommend of few good books, I'd appreciate it.
Quote:
Originally Posted by John23
A few points...
1.) You have to know what your game is and what it isn't. Some people spread themselves too thin, trying to be an expert in everything, or over extending themselves.
2.) Value your time. I knew a small business owner (did maybe a few million in revenue) that said, he wouldn't even waste 15 minutes arguing with employees over something. It's a waste of time.
3.) There are alot of great books in all subjects that few people have read.
I think Amazon's a great tool. You get unbiased reviews, you can see what other people have learned or have taken away. You can get introduced to other books or authors. I would leverage off of all that time and expertise.
4.) Seperate get rich quick from something legitimate.
"Get rich quick" is all the same. Vague, broad generalized statements. Easy. Only takes __ hours a day. No training necessary. Anything like that.
More legitimate books (i.e. Millionaire Next Door) are just the opposite. Specific instead of generalized. Discplined vs "easy". May take a long time vs only 3 hours a day.
5.) The further away you get from the standard on tv, the better you'll do financially. If you were only educated from tv, you wouldn't have much. If something isn't mentioned on tv, that means you should probably learn more about it (i.e. the dollar going down, foreigners coming here because of our cheaper currency, etc).
6.) Track some people that you think are really successful. You won't learn much from one snapshot of Jeff Bezos or Bill Gates. Follow new interviews. Dig around to get the real story.
7.) Also realize that foreigners come to this country all the time. With little in their pocket, few contacts. Not knowing English or broken english, and alot of them do very well. We don't always "see" the same opportunities that others see.
always possible but just keep in mind that 80% of businesses fail within the first year. So the odds are greatly AGAINST you. Good luck none the less.
True. But you really have to examine WHY business fails. It's not as if all businesses are begun on an equal footing in the first place.
1. Not capitalized in the first place. It takes any business roughly 3 years to get to a break even point. The ones that make profits after year one are the exception (Unless you count something like a home-based biz). So you better have the money on hand to get through those three years of negative cash flow.
2. Not marketed worth a crap. I'm in marketing, and I can't tell you how many start up business come to me, hat in hand, to do their marketing. Here's the mistake they make: The figure out all their businesses expenses down to the last paper clip, but they never find out what it's going to take to adequately market their product, service, or store. Seriously, I had one person approach me after he had opened his 30,000 sf furniture store, desperately needing advertising because he had no customers. I asked him what his budget was. It was $500 to market an entire business in a city with 500,000 people. For $500, you might as well spend the money on bumper stickers.
3. No clear differentiator in the marketplace. It's not enough to open up a restaurant or introduce a new product to the market. You have to give a compelling reason WHY customers should buy it. After all, you're asking people to change an established buying pattern to spend money with you. Therefore you need to have a clear cut advantage, be it with price, performance, or service--an advantage that the customers can readily grasp and apply to their own personal needs. After all, why do we need yet another coffee shop?
4. A single-minded attention to brand. Do yourself a favor and read Ries & Trout's 20 Immutable Laws of Marketing. A great, great, simple primer on all the mistakes to avoid when marketing your business.
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