Rich Dad Poor Dad is a starting point for anyone looking to gain control of their financial future

The problem with 
“secure” investments
is that they are often 
sanitized, that is,
made so safe that the 
gains are less.
Beaverton, Oregon. The owners lived in Germany, had no idea what 
the place was worth, and again, just 
wanted to get out of it. I offered 
$275,000 for a $450,000 building. They 
agreed to $300,000. I bought it and held 
it for two years. Utilizing the same 
1031-exchange process, we sold the 
building for $495,000 and bought a 
30-unit apartment building in Phoenix, 
Arizona. We had moved to Phoenix by then to get out of the rain, and 
needed to sell anyway. Like the former Oregon market, the real estate 
market in Phoenix was depressed. The price of the 30-unit apartment 
building in Phoenix was $875,000, with $225,000 down. The cash 
flow from the 30 units was a little over $5,000 a month.
The Arizona market began moving up and, a few years later, a 
Colorado investor offered us $1.2 million for the property.
The point of this example is how a small amount can grow into 
a large amount. Again, it is a matter of understanding financial 
statements, investment strategies, a sense of the market, and the laws. 
If people are not versed in these subjects, then obviously they must 
follow standard dogma, which is to play it safe, diversify, and only 
invest in secure investments. The problem with “secure” investments is 
that they are often sanitized, that is, made so safe that the gains are less.

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Chapter Five: Lesson 5
108
Most large brokerage houses will not touch speculative transactions 
in order to protect themselves and their clients. And that is a wise policy. 
The really hot deals are not offered to people who are novices. Often, 
the best deals that make the rich even richer are reserved for those who 
understand the game. It is technically illegal to offer speculative deals to 
someone who is considered not sophisticated, but of course it happens. 
The more sophisticated I get, the more opportunities come my way. 
Another case for developing your financial intelligence over a 
lifetime is simply that more opportunities are presented to you. And 
the greater your financial intelligence, the easier it is to tell whether 
a deal is good. It’s your intelligence that can spot a bad deal, or make 
a bad deal good. The more I learn—and there is a lot to learn—the 
more money I make simply because I gain experience and wisdom as 
the years go on. I have friends who are playing it safe, working hard at 
their profession, and failing to gain financial wisdom, which does take 
time to develop.
My overall philosophy is to plant seeds inside my asset column 
That is my formula. I start small and plant seeds. Some grow; some 
don’t. Inside our real estate corporation, we have property worth several 
million dollars. It is our own REIT, or real estate investment trust.
The point I’m making is that most of those millions started out 
as little $5,000 to $10,000 investments. All of those down payments 
were fortunate to catch a fast-rising market and increase tax-free. We 
traded in and out several times over a number of years.
We also own a stock portfolio, surrounded by a corporation that 
Kim and I call our “personal mutual fund.” We have friends who deal 
specifically with investors like us who have extra money each month 
to invest. We buy high-risk, speculative private companies that are 
just about to go public on a stock exchange in the United States or 
Canada. An example of how fast gains can be made are 100,000 shares 
purchased for 25 cents each before the company goes public. Six 
months later, the company is listed, and the 100,000 shares now are 
worth $2 each. If the company is well managed, the price keeps going 
up, and the stock may go to $20 or more per share. There are years 
when our $25,000 has gone to a million in less than a year.

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Rich Dad Poor Dad
109
It is not gambling if you know what you’re doing. It is gambling 
if you’re just throwing money into a deal and praying. The idea in 
anything is to use your technical knowledge, wisdom, and love of 
the game to cut the odds down, to lower the risk. Of course, there is 
always risk. It is financial intelligence that improves the odds. Thus, 
what is risky for one person is less risky to someone else. That is the 
primary reason I constantly encourage people to invest more in their 
financial education than in stocks, real estate, or other markets. The 
smarter you are, the better chance you have of beating the odds.
The stock plays I personally invested in were extremely high-risk for 
most people and absolutely not recommended. I have been playing that 
game since 1979 and have paid more than my share in dues. But if you 
will reread why investments such as these are high-risk for most people, 
you may be able to set your life up differently, so that the ability to take 
$25,000 and turn it into $1 million in a year is low-risk for you.
As stated earlier, nothing I have written is a recommendation. It is 
only used as an example of what is simple and possible. What I do is 
small potatoes in the grand scheme of things. Yet for the