What does it mean to build wealth? Is it by working hard or being smart? Or maximizing the things of value you possess to increase your personal hoard of assets? How can you build something that lasts for a lifetime? There are some businessmen who create assets that reap rewards throughout their lifetimes, while others toil day and night to make ends meet. There are many substantial variances in how different groups of people perceive wealth.
Explaining wealth
Accumulating things of value creates wealth. This valuable thing could be money, art, land, materials, or a system of production. People willingly trade it with labor, money, materials, and other things of value.
Essentially, finding things of value or adding value to a thing through labor builds wealth. However, it doesn’t necessarily mean that labor can produce wealth, especially if the thing’s value spoils quickly. To generate wealth, the product must sustain its worth for a period of time. Examples include property, software, art, machinery, and so on.
This is where demand and timing play crucial roles in determining the worth of things. The desirability of a thing is always dynamic, always changing across time. A car is a prime example of this.
When an automobile company releases a brand new car, they market the vehicle at a high price, but as it ages, its value decreases over time until it fades out of the market’s interest. But after decades, if the car manages to stand the test of time and is seen as a classic vehicle, its value increases again.
In retrospect, the amount of your wealth can increase or decrease; it can either be gained if a valuable thing becomes desirable or lost if it turns undesirable. When conditions are ripe, wealth can be utilized to produce additional wealth. For instance, since money is a thing of value, it can generate wealth by lending it to someone with added interest.
How to create wealth
“Spend less, earn more.” These are the words to live by when it comes to creating wealth. That means saving for future expenditures will be part of your game. The goal is not to store but rather to accumulate more to bolster your wealth.
First, you need to cut down on spending. If you can’t pay for something with cash, then just abstain from unnecessary purchases and adhere to your monthly budget.
Steer clear from debts. However, if you have some unpaid balances and you don’t know which ones to knock out first, employ the debt snowball method: List your debts from smallest to highest, make minimum payments for each, except for the smallest debt (you try and clear this fast), and repeat until everything’s settled.
You must be an employee at this point in your life. If so, just keep your spending steadily low while increasing your income by either becoming a top performer in your company or dribbling with a side income.
When you have enough wealth to invest, your first strategy is to use tax-advantaged accounts encouraged by the government for investing. Accounts like IRA, health savings account, and 401(k) allow you to minimize your taxes by putting the money into aspects that benefit you.
Then, you can go and choose different pathways to create wealth: invest in yourself, build a business, buy a rental property, purchase stocks, and other ideas. If you invest in yourself, let’s say getting a college degree, then you grow the value of your education, which converts to higher salary opportunities. A college education can be expensive, so try and gain specific skills (do this easily through online courses) that enable you to apply for promotions and take on more responsibilities.
Start a business
Build a venture that serves thousands, and you’ll earn thousands, as long as the value you provide is highly desirable.
Buy rental properties, and earn through rental payments; here you allow others to expand your wealth. Get hold of stocks, and they will return income through dividends.
But don’t just stop there, keep reinvesting the money you accumulate by expanding your business, securing more stocks, or adding one more to your rental properties. Understand market demands and create more things of value. You will get better at it as time passes.
To be good in business, you need to dominate the market. You need to truly understand what drives the market — the wants, needs, and fears of the target population — and how to deliver in such a way that your product or service is critically valued. This will not work if you keep on jumping markets — you need to stick to a single market for one or two decades to dominate it.
So start by cutting down on spending, and improving income levels through education and skills. Once that’s done, study a market well, and then start gradually investing in it. Over time, you will be able to build considerable wealth.
