Kimberly Palmer wrote an excellent piece for US News (and, reprinted by Yahoo News!) called 10 Secrets of Millionaires’ Money Management and the first cab off the rank is 7million7years!

I’ll let you click on the link to read the article in its entirety.

In the meantime, I thought that I should share with you my response to Kimberly’s contribution request which said:

I’m writing a story on “secrets of millionaires” and would love to include some of your thoughts — could you please share two to three of the strategies that worked for you, perhaps things you’ve written about on your blog before?

Hmmm …

Two or three strategies that could be counted as a ‘secret’ to becoming a millionaire?

The strategies are easy (Kimberly included one of mine in her finished piece), but there’s nothing ‘secret’ about making money and/or amassing serious wealth, as my eventual response to Kimberly showed:

Here we go:

1. The Number One secret of being a millionaire is not an obvious one, but it’s the absolute key: you need to know your Number i.e. how much is enough FOR YOU.

For most Gen-X and Gen-Y’ers, retiring with a couple of million when they are 65 won’t be anywhere near enough to maintain even an average lifestyle because that little pup called inflation is constantly nipping at your heels as you try to run towards building your own retirement nest-egg. You need to be aiming for a MINIMUM of $3 million+ in 5 to 10 years to even be considered a ‘bare bones millionaire’ these days.

2. The second secret is also counter-intuitive but equally powerful: when you get to your Number STOP and live your Life, you deserve it.

For example, if you have a business and somebody offers you enough money to meet your needs for the rest of your life, then – as long as the offer values the business reasonably – TAKE IT. Don’t get greedier 😉 by rejecting the offer looking for more. And, don’t be tempted to start again – lighting doesn’t often strike twice and who knows when the next recession (or other disaster affecting your business e.g. fire, departure of a number of key employees, etc.) will hit?

3. The final secret is to learn the lessons of money early and stick to them.

For example, know how much capital to have invested in your own home, in your cars and in your other possessions, learn how much you can safely borrow, learn how to live within your means, and learn how to delay gratification; these are the habits that you need to maintain on the way up, so that you can keep your millions when you get there. If lotto winners can spend their winnings in just 5 years and end up broke and athletes and celebrities such as MC Hammer, Elton John, and Evander Holyfield can spend their huge fortunes, your paltry few millions can easily disappear much faster than it arrived.

See? This is pretty much it … the rest is just “filler” 😉

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