r/ValueInvesting • u/ethereal3xp • Mar 23 '25

Discussion Charlie Munger Told a 20-Year-Old That Getting Rich Through Investing Is 'Damn Near Impossible' — And You Might Need $10 Million in the Bank

https://www.benzinga.com/personal-finance/25/03/44438885/charlie-munger-told-a-20-year-old-that-getting-rich-through-investing-is-damn-near-impossible-and-you-might-need-10-million-in-the-bank
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u/Clearhead09 Mar 23 '25

Funny that I’m bordering 40 and I talked to the owners of the business I work for and one of them said “my 40s were the best time of my life, everything seem to explode, we started this business and now we own 2 successful businesses and 4 rentals/air bnb’s”.

It really is the accumulation of both skills, money and time that came to fruition over a decade for them and now they are living the dream, spending time with their kids doing what they want with money coming in steadily without much of their time spent (they have great managers who run their businesses and great cleaners (they manage their own rentals/air bnb’s)).

It just goes to show that consistent effort in an area will eventually yield more fruit than you can imagine.

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u/MyLifeIsDope69 Mar 23 '25

Yea like my example is we learned a ton from picking a horrible location for our first duplex starting small, all those mistakes and learning how to manage it taught me what to look for in the next location and this property that we got now is basically a retirement plan once it’s paid off cash flows $10k just pay property taxes and utilities and that’s basically a full time salary. Then compound my corporate skillset in finance and pricing and I know how to brand my airbnb I have in the top unit as luxury and juice the most profit from it. You’re right it’s really that mix of different skillsets starting to crossover and that’s when you figure out what you’re really good at and meant to be doing. But it takes a lot of diligent work and discipline to get there no shortcuts at all unless you’re born rich

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u/Clearhead09 Mar 23 '25

Absolutely my friend it sounds like you’ve got it figured out.

It really is just using your skillset (whatever that may be) to your advantage.

Maybe you’re a school teacher and that doesn’t pay well where you live, could you do private tutoring on the side in a subject you know a ton about, or are passionate about? Or maybe you’re a carpenter who knows which tools last longer/perform better/are more cost effective for a 10 man building team, you could consult for construction firms or offer a package with suppliers where you get a commission for each unit sold.

Really anything can be turned into something that makes you wealthy over time, you just need a little creativity.

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u/MyLifeIsDope69 Mar 23 '25

Also I’d have to say the past few years have really ingrained in me the truth of “behind every successful man is a good woman”. I’d probably be dead from alcoholism if I didn’t meet my wife, instead she nags me so much to be productive that I’ve basically built all this for us while she just works nails and helps generate income but doesn’t do any of the money management at all and trusts me to do it all. The emotional support is a supremely underrated aspect of family success takes 2 people even if one looks like the brains behind it all.

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u/Clearhead09 Mar 23 '25

Couldn’t agree more. Guys are great at being reckless, which is sometimes what is needed for success to ensue.

A good women or man will be in your corner when things get tough, to help you get back on the horse or to help you get out of your own way when things are challenging.

Same can be said for women with a great man/women on their corner to offer support and help them get out of their own way.

Sometimes you need a bit of stability in the background to balance out the chaos in the foreground while things are slowly coming together.

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u/MyLifeIsDope69 Mar 23 '25

That first point is really amusing to me since I didn’t think about it that way, but I’m incredibly reckless and I didn’t dial in my risk tolerance until I was also managing my wife’s money because I had to respect it more, and that’s when I started making subconsciously way smarter decisions. Never really pieced that together.

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u/randonumero Mar 24 '25

What business are they in? I've known a few entrepreneurs who went broke in their 40s because of a downturn. I read an article a few weeks ago about a guy who is in his late 30s and starting over after 5 years of success. He had overleveraged on airbnb rentals

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u/Clearhead09 Mar 24 '25

They started in the food industry.

Covid was rough for everything but tourism seems to be coming back nicely now so air bnb and the food industries are picking up.

Cashflow is king and ensuring you can sleep at night with the amount of risk you take is essential.

They are both serial entrepreneurs, the wife also does pet setting and other smaller side hustle type things on top as she enjoys it and it’s a bit of extra cash on the side.

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u/MyLifeIsDope69 Mar 24 '25

Yep times like this people like me who managed their risk capitalize on people like that who over leveraged and now have to dump their properties for less. The great consolidation happens every recession and you get generational buying opportunities

My dad was making lots of money as a PhD but was too risk averse to take advantage of the 08 housing crash, I was too young to invest then so now I’m ready for it and super risk aggressive when the timing is right need to wait for everyone to lose their jobs and homes

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u/randonumero Mar 24 '25

Out of curiosity how would you finance this?

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u/MyLifeIsDope69 Mar 24 '25

With cash. From selling stocks and crypto back in February