Thread: What's your morning like?

Every morning I get my coffee and small breakfast then read. I read the WSJ, then some investment newsletters, then various financial websites, then world news. Usually I also read a book during the day. I spend on average 3 hours per day reading.

In order to be a good investor and to offer my clients value, I feel that I must be very well informed about what is going on in the world.

Originally Posted by Irish

How does a millionaire start his/her day? What time do you get up? What do you read/watch? What do you do first thing that makes you feel wealthy or well off when you wake up?

What steps should somebody who is broke and trying to swerve into the fast lane take in order to feel and act like a millionaire every morning?

I think what you'll find is that everybody starts their day differently! No one way is the right way - you should tailor your day to what works for your personality to help you move forward!

Now, with that disclaimer out of the way, I'll speak from my point of view (and mine only). I wake up later in the day. I get/need at least 8-9 hours of sleep a night. I spend time gaming, jogging with the wife, walking the mutt, browsing the interwebz, and going for lunch or dinner with friends. Investments, for me, do not require much active management; monitoring is good enough (or maybe it isn't, but that's what I'm doing).

I read business/financial news, but having said that I don't use any of the information I read. I read this stuff for entertainment only! Again, I'm only speaking for myself. For me, the financial media has no purpose but to keep me entertained for the time that I spend on it.

The only things that I read that are actually useful for building my wealth are the financial statements of public companies. I quickly browse the markets to see if there's anything cheap (99% usually not, but 1% maybe).

I also scan the Phoenix, AZ MLS to see if there is a short sale that I can tie up with an offer. All this takes a few minutes. Obviously there are no financial statements associated with Phoenix real estate aside from pro forma (Seller fiction), but it's a fairly easy transition from reading the statements of companies and then those of RE; especially if I've learned to allocate 50% of my rent revenue for expenses.

Keep in mind, however, that I spent years reading about how to read and interpret financial statements so much of my knowledge is front-end loaded. I've done my heavy lifting early in my life so I don't do much of it now. My brain works on auto-pilot. I can find a good investment (for me), by quickly looking over a couple sheets of info without actively taking notes or running detailed calculations.

Sometimes I bump into concepts that I want to learn and I devote a few hours on it. Again, my practice and history of reading and interpreting financial statements makes the extra learning a bit easier. An example is when I decided to cram some option knowledge into my head. After reading about it for a few hours, I tailored it to my investing style by using only those techniques that fit with my personality. If I didn't have my background, learning about stock options would have been a rougher ride.

I know I'm biased, but a good use of your time is to spend the time traveling to school reading a book on how to read and interpret financial statements. At first, all the stuff is not going to make any sense. Just keep plugging away and soon things will start clearing up. That's what I did when I was commuting to school. It took years, but I wasn't doing anything else on the bus anyway.

Good luck and godspeed!

Rickson9,

What books would you recommend to a novice at such things?

Originally Posted by archon

Rickson9,

What books would you recommend to a novice at such things?

I'm not sure of course, but I believe one of the books Rickson may recommend would be this one:

http://www.amazon.com/Intelligent-In.../dp/0060155477


I'm sure there are others like perhaps the Warren Buffett way but Rickson, am I right on the Graham book or do you subscribe to a different philosophy?

Originally Posted by topherea

I'm not sure of course, but I believe one of the books Rickson may recommend would be this one:

http://www.amazon.com/Intelligent-In.../dp/0060155477


I'm sure there are others like perhaps the Warren Buffett way but Rickson, am I right on the Graham book or do you subscribe to a different philosophy?

Hi topherea! That's a great book! However, having said that, I'm not sure that it is suitable for a novice.

Personally I would start with "One Up On Wall Street" and "Beating The Street" by Peter Lynch. It's not math heavy, but it has a few numbers in there. After that, "The Warren Buffett Way" by Robert Hagstrom and "Bufffettology" by Mary Buffett continues along the same path with a bit more math, but nothing overwhelming.

Once you finish those four you may try the Graham stuff and see how it goes.

In addition, you can do a Google search on "reading financial statements" and find a lot of really good sources of free information.

I hope this helped! Good luck!

Originally Posted by Rickson9

Hi topherea! That's a great book! However, having said that, I'm not sure that it is suitable for a novice.

Personally I would start with "One Up On Wall Street" and "Beating The Street" by Peter Lynch. It's not math heavy, but it has a few numbers in there. After that, "The Warren Buffett Way" by Robert Hagstrom and "Bufffettology" by Mary Buffett continues along the same path with a bit more math, but nothing overwhelming.

Once you finish those four you may try the Graham stuff and see how it goes.

In addition, you can do a Google search on "reading financial statements" and find a lot of really good sources of free information.

I hope this helped! Good luck!

Yup. The Warren Buffett Way was one of the first ones I read too a loooong time ago! As was the Peter Lynch book. Good stuff.

Archon, and anyone else who may be interested, if you'd like to see an actual financial statement as well as search other companies google has a pretty decent site for this:

http://www.google.com/finance?q=NASDAQ:ARUN&fstype=ii

(I used the stock ARUN (Aruba Networks) because it's a solid growth company in an emerging market.... been watching it since last year when it was around 7. Today it hit a new 52 week high of 20.44 and just went black last quarter. It's running a little hot too for one without a P/E or div but it is under substantial accumulation by institutions and I believe is also in the top ten of the IBD 100)

I wake up around 6:30, and start taking calls from about than until 7:30-8 when I head out to one of the job sites, or start meetings. Once the subs are moving I usually have a couple of hours before lunch to do business stuff.

My typical work day is 6:30-7, 6 days a week, with a few hours on Sunday. Although lately its been running a bit longer than that, I'm very much looking forward to heading down to one of the winter houses in FL in a few months.

I don't drink coffee or eat breakfast, and I don't have time to read anything until after dinner. Usually its a quick scan of the headlines, and MLS.

wake up 6:30am, get ready for work.
biggest breakfast possible to go go go. Pack a lunch if I can so I don't have to mess around at work.
Might have to Skype the UK before showering.

Go to work.

Work work work

Near the end of the day.. Australians are wide awake, so skype with them a bit. Come home and ignore e-mails. Try to plan the next day.

--
I try very hard not to waste too much time reading the news/sports/etc. It all has no impact on my life and is a HUGE time sink.

I don't take a lunch break, and try to only take a small break by doing a new task.
(If I am feeling run down by 2pm, I will go upstairs to my office and sign some checks or do some light paperwork... after 30 minutes of that, I'm ready for action again).


It's not glamorous, and I'm trying to balance a healthy life with great ambition and the desire to work hard all the time. Not easy that balance!