Recommended Books
February 28, 2005
Art of the Start, The : The Time-Tested, Battle-Hardened Guide for Anyone Starting Anything
This book by Guy Kawasaki is a great book for anyone starting a business. It is written more for people with ideas for starting something new rather than someone setting out to start their own laundary-mat business.
The Millionaire Next Door
This book gives you an idea as to exactly who are the real millionaires in the United States, how they got their and advice for how you can get there to.
Rich Dad Poor Dad Classics - 3 Copy Boxed Set
These are the books that really started me thinking about investing and doing something about it. If you have no investments, don’t know how you are going to retire, up to your neck in debt, I recommend you start here with these books.
Trump: How to Get Rich
This book is a great light read. Trump doesn’t offer any specifics, but he does provide some interesting, humorous stories on how he deals with people.
Multiple Streams of Internet Income
This book by real-estate guru Robert Allen has some great advice for people who interested in making money on the internet. There are 1000s of books now on the subject, so this book is a good starting place for both people starting out and peole who are already operating web businesses. I find myself referring back to it often when I am trying to think of ways to improve my web-sites.
Real Estate Agents
February 28, 2005
I didn’t hear back from a real estate agent all weekend after I submitted my offer to a property then I get an email this morning saying, “sorry we were having email troubles”. I remember calling an agent the other week after waiting forever for a reply, and while I was on the phone she says, “someone just put your email on my desk”. I couldn’t help chuckling. For someone working in IT, it is hard not laugh at offices where someone prints out emails and passes them aroung the office.
Anyway, the agent says, “we have to hurry as now there are multiple offers”. I couldn’t believe what I was hearing. I have faxed through the signed contract this evening. It sounded more like a bluff for me to hurry up and sign, and/or to increase my offer. I suppose I will have to wait until tomorrow to know if the agent was bluffing or telling the truth.
I really love this quote from Donald Trump:
“I dont do it for the money. I’ve got enough, much more than I’ll ever need. I do it to do it. Deals are my art form. Other people paint beautifully on canvas or write wonderful poetry. I like making deals, preferably big deals. That’s how I get my kicks”.
I can say I will ever be in his league but it’s something to aspire to.
Settlement is this week and I didn’t hear back from my agent and solicitor after requesting confirmation on a couple of details. I will have to get up early tomorrow to give them a call. My banker in Australia on the other hand has been fantastic with replying to my emails. If you can create a personal relationship with someone it helps so much and you are less likely going to be hunting around for a better service provider.
Trackback has already brought in one new reader. It has taken 2 months, finally I got my first people making comments. Go ahead tell me what you think! All positive and negative comments are appreciated.
There is a great article on how google got off the ground to its billion dollar IPO.
Another reader who saw my blog on Guy Kawasaki has written to him asking him to start a blog. If he actually does it, I will be able to think that it all started here. Sorry, just trying to boost my own ego.
Internet circles
February 26, 2005
This blog thing is really interesting. I am starting to get more email from readers. One reader has suggested I use Trackback which I have now added to the site. Thanks for the suggestion I will give it a try!
Another reader has asked how I am investing in New Zealand and Australia from Japan, so I thought I would write a little about this.
I bought my first IP when I was living in Australia. Actually I lived in the place for a year before I came to Japan. Since I bought the place to live in, the Australian government kindly gave me $7000 as a first home owner buyer’s grant. I painted the place and put up some new fixtures. I lived there for about a year before moving back to Japan. I bought it for $130K 4-5 years ago and now it is worth around $210K. I got the mortgage down to below $50K so I have plenty of equity for re-financing to make my first property purchase in New Zealand.
My property in New Zealand is actually 2 houses on one block. Settlement will be on the first week of March. Rental return is 13% in total, not including any capital gain. I paid AU$84K for the 2 houses. It’s in the country but I couldn’t believe how cheap it was. In Australia I saw a boat shed being auctioned for 80K+!
Looking for the place in NZ, I just called a number of agents in NZ in the morning before going to work (New Zealand is four hours behind Japan). I haven’t seen the place in person. I just got a lot of pictures from the agent and got a building inspection done to make sure the buildings are structurally sound.
I also joined the mailing list of the few bird-spotters who advertise. I am in fairly regular contact with one guy and will probably buy one property with him soon. He charges NZ$2000 a property. This is fairly cheap and considering he usually negotiates the price of the property down, I think it’s worth the money and definitely tax deductible.
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February 26, 2005
Haloscan commenting and trackback have been added to this blog.
Internet Money
February 26, 2005
Some people have emailed me asking how they can make money on the Internet. I am still learning myself and still a long way from giving up my day job. However, I still make a little bit of money which I can use to pay for accounting and legal expenses for my property investments.
I just came across this web-site workboxers.com which has a lot of good information and ideas which I will try implementing myself.
Podcasting
February 26, 2005
Just found this site www.podcastalley.com which looks pretty interesting. It is supposed to be the next big internet revolution. Since I just go an i-pod it looks worth taking a look at.
I got the domain
February 26, 2005
It took a while for me to think of a name for my blog. I started it in November last year and only did one post for the year. It wasn’t until I came back from Australia last year that I was full of motivation to start new projects and have been trying to update it daily.
I was a bit disappointed to find that the domain had already been taken by another company. However, I did a search on the web on “retireyoungandwealthy” the other day and it come up on a list of expired domains. It had expired on the 14th of February. So I bought it for the princely sum of $7.95 from GoDaddy. I use them quite a bit and they provide a great service.
So now you can type: www.retireyoungandwealthy.com to get to my blog.
Domains can be a good investment especially if you can build up some good back links.
Problogger
February 24, 2005
Found this interesting site, Problogger: www.problogger.net if anyone is interested in trying to make money or trying to promote their blog.
Motivation
February 24, 2005
The hardest thing about keeping up a blog sometimes is motivation. Sometimes you feel like you are writing for nothing, but occasionally you get an email from someone asking you a question or looking for advice. It’s great to know someone out there is reading this. I happily respond to all queries even if I am busy.
Just writing down my thoughts has been able to keep my saving and investing plans on track. If anyone is reading this and is just trying to save money by putting it in the bank, I think you are probably wasting your time. I have tried to do this many times, as I have always seemed to spend the money saved, usually on some unnecessary item.
Of course you still need to save, but you need to save for a deposit on a house or for shares in an IPO, or put it towards starting a new business. You need to save with a real goal in mind. I have found that once I decided to purchase another investment property I really had to watch my money so I would have enough to pay for legal fees, accounting fee, loan fees etc. It’s a big difference than just paying your ordinary bills and expenses.
The settlement is for the first week of March and I will own the place outright. I actually get to keep the title! Since the value of house in Australia has appreciated, I was able to refinance that.
Even with all the expenses being paid for I will have another AU$20K in cash. I was going to wait until settlement was over before I put in a new offer, but with the ever decreasing number of cash flow positive properties available, I think I will start looking now. Actually I will be calling an agent tomorrow. Now that I (almost) have my first property in NZ, I should now be able to organize a home loan there.
Interest rates are a little higher in New Zealand but with income from two properties, I should be able to pay off the principle a little and save for another deposit. My loan in Australia is of course higher now and I will have about a $300 a month short-fall from my Australian property and repayments on the re-financed loan, but I should be able to (or plan to) keep up the repayments without sending money from New Zealand to Australia, or Japan if I can keep making some money from my web-sites.
I wish I could put down my goals and people often ask me what my goals are, but it doesn’t really seem beneficial to make a goal like “10 properties in a year” or a “million dollars in property”. My goal is to just to keep going as I am for now, and to stay motivated.
If my business is successful at all and able to generate any income at all, I would like to start investing back in Australia at some stage. I started reading about property in the US, but it seems pretty difficult.
Loan Contract
February 22, 2005
I have now paid my deposit for my property in New Zealand, so the contract is now un-conditional. There’s no going back! Not that I am worried, but making out a new loan is always a worry. My portfolio should still be cash flow positive but there is always a bit of extra risk, especially since I had almost paid off my first loan.
The Australian property market seems to be picking up a bit from last years slight drop. I thought it was interesting to read that Australia has the 4th highest home ownership rate in the world at 71% behind Ireland, Spain and Italy. In Germany ownership is only 42%. With that kind of rental market it could be worth looking into.
My new web-site is currently being translated into Japanese. I have registered a domain for the site and researching how other companies are offering the same service and where I might want to start advertising my site.
