Fortune Builders Insiders Workshop

            

            This weekend I attended a Fortune Builders event that was hosted by Cole A. Hatter. I am a Real Estate investor enthusiast and I learned so much in this 3-day seminar because Cole is truly an interesting speaker. He focused on financial education as the foundation of any business and I wish I learned that back when I was in high school and saved myself years of struggle. I was one of the youngest attendees and I guess it is better to learn late than never.

            The doors opened at 9 am at the Embassy Suites in Tampa on Friday morning and a gentleman named Dan walked across the stage and welcomed 250 local residents who are eager to learn about the business, and then he introduced Cole and we all clapped and cheered for him as he made his way to the center of the convention hall.

            Within the first few minutes of Cole’s introduction, I felt like I was in the right place. I am usually gullible and I have fallen for many events that upsell products and services but I still take risks every once in a while if I feel the knowledge is worth the time and money. When Cole speaks he sets the right tone through his posture, his body language and mostly through his confidence. 

He created a friendly and comedic presence with his voice and his pace. He certainly worked the stage creating real life examples of what my future could hold. The man knows what he’s talking about and through his tone I could immediately tell that Cole Hatter is a very successful investor, or at least in the same financial freedom position I aspire to be.

            From my previous experience listening to such lectures and attending such seminars, I knew when I signed up that they will upsell a service and it is an unbelievably identical pattern that all businesses follow when they want to sell us a product, which in this case costs way beyond my means. Good thing, because with Cole’s enthusiasm, I would’ve definitely signed up. Nobel Laureate economist, John Harsanyi said that, “apart from economic payoffs, social status seems to be the most important incentive and motivating force of social behavior.” Cole looks like he either achieved a high social status or he believes he did.

            Though I could not afford their resourceful product and I have a long ladder to climb, Cole’s energy inspired me to come back the next day and the following day. A total of 27 hours of education condensed in 3 days reflects Cole Hatter’s credibility as a speaker because the man’s energy level remained constant throughout the entire seminar, while I was struggling to sit straight in my chair. I found out on Day 2 that I could not possibly qualify to continue the valuable education I wanted, and this happens frequently; however, as tempting as it was to leave and enjoy the rest of my weekend, Cole inspired me to grow my imagination and believe in myself. He taught me how to shift my mindset to think like an entrepreneur and I challenged myself to remain positive. His attitude was an eye-opener to emphasize the importance of bringing something to life. I never knew the importance of energy until I saw the outcomes of it: My mind was blown.

            I look forward to put in action all the valuable information I learned, and execute my ideas to grow my business the same way Cole built his. He paved the starting point and directed me to a retirement plan I needed to see. 

How to Invest Now?

How to invest now?

As an entrepreneur, I am always looking for ways to invest. There are so many places to look into such as stocks, mutual funds and bonds, and even more complicated types of securities and investing strategies like gold and real estate.  As much as I love real estate, this alternative investment at the start of my investing career is too high-risk for me, and its high-reward securities are much more speculative than plain old stocks and bonds. I will not deny the opportunities for big profits, but they require some specialized knowledge.

Experts and professionals generally agree that new investors should focus on building a financial foundation before gambling. And the first place to look is our savings account, and I don’t even have enough money to invest in real estate. Fortunately, I found a business article that guides new investors with some extra cash as low as $1,000. First, they recommend that we have three to six months of our salary saved up for unexpected hardship because a safety net is very important. And after we’ve covered ourselves with a rainy day fund, we can invest that money, put it to work, and make it grow.

The article provides five simple ways to get started:

1-                    We should start contributing to our 401(k) and make good use of it because it is a big reward for saving, considering it is something we should be doing anyway. For the typical investor, putting cash in a diversified mutual fund offered via the 401(k) and allowing it to grow steadily over many years is a powerful way to save and plan for retirement.

2-                    For people like me who are a bit more impatient and don’t want to wait until my 60s to access investment profits, the article suggests I consider opening up a taxable investing account and buying an index fund with my $1,000. An index fund is “a pool of investments aligned to a major stock market benchmark like the S&P 500 or the Nasdaq-100. And as such, these funds are extremely transparent because the list of stocks in the portfolio is fixed, and because of their immense popularity their providers can charge extremely low management fees and still turn a profit.”

3-                    The undeniable truth is that the rate you get from a typical checking account at major banks is at just 0.03%, adding up to just 30 cents a year on $1,000. There is a trade-off with risk and reward and for people who don’t like the notion of stock market volatility, an insured savings account is almost as good as cash, but is clearly not going to make you a millionaire.

4-                    A common problem is credit card bills. Paying down your debt and putting $1,000 toward those obligations is a smart idea because the more principal you can pay off up front, the less interest you’re paying on the remaining balance each month.

5-                    Last but not least, invest in yourself. It is important to note that your time is worth something, but $1,000 can go a long way for people willing to seize a new opportunity. Building your own business could be the most profitable investment of all.

http://www.usatoday.com/story/money/personalfinance/2015/05/23/invest-401k-cd/27195015/