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It's called hard work, choices and sacrifice. The trick is to sacrifice yourself early and resist materialism and expenses at an early age.
I left home at 18 years old and joined the Armed Forces. I took the fairly typical path until I turned 27: spent more than I made, pissed my $$$ away on useless shit, racked up credit card debt, etc.
Then, something clicked in my brain, and I made a conscientious decision to change my ways.
My wife and I moved in to the smallest and crappiest apartments we could find, I paid off all debt and started accumulating cash. I then started investing....first you build a portfolio to $10k, that took a while... then you get to $100k. At $100k things become much easier and your money starts to work more efficiently.
You need to be constantly resisting the urge to splurge on useless crap: car loans, credit card debt, etc.
Once you have enough $$$, you can start buying stuff with straight up cash. I haven't financed anything other than a mortgage in about a decade. I actually have three separate credit cards but I pay them off every month and collect points and cash back with them. Cashback cards are the best. My cash back card pays me $1500 a year. I I use it for all my bill payments and then pay it off immediately, so it's a credit card that is literally making me $$$.
At certain point as well, your salary/income from work starts to become less important to your actual wealth. This is crucial because income earned from labour is super tax inefficient. The Govt takes a big piece of your pie so you need to create other wealth generating assets that allow you to keep as much for yourself as possible.
There are a tonne of opportunities out there. I left the CAF with 17 years of service and took a transfer value. I invested every single $ in accounts I manage myself because I figured I could do it better than the nanny state and I was absolutely right.
A very simple rule in investing is the Rule of 72:
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The S&P 500 long-term average is 10-12% annually. 72/10= 7.2 years to double in value.
I also found a career that nobody else is really doing that happens to pay incredibly well. It's a tough environment and is not for the soft but the cheques never bounce and I'm making fantastic money.
That brings me to my next point:
If everyone else is trying to do it, it's probably not a good idea and not going to lead to long-term success. I went to a few SCAN seminars and joined a few Veteran groups and I generally discarded most of what I was told. Things like "Coding for Vets", etc, isn't what's going to help you get ahead in this Country.
I treat money like a game now. I always loved strategy games and $$$ works exactly the same and the same concepts can be applied to dealing with $$$.
This is how you get rich in this Country.
Step 1: Convince your shopaholic and investing illiterate spouse to be frugal and save money.
Step 2: Find a new spouse.
