Increase Your Financial IQ Book Review – Part 1: Making More Money

The book starts by asking the fundamental question:

“Does money make you rich?”

Take a moment to answer that question.

Do you think money will make you rich?  Do you think winning millions of dollars from lottery will make you rich?  How about having a high-paying job from a lucrative profession like doctors, or lawyers, or IT professionals?  Does having a lot of money make you rich?

Many people have heard stories how instant millionaires lost their millions after a few years. Or how someone who was once rich and famous had his house foreclosed.  Or how a high-paying manager begged for his job back because he can no longer afford the lifestyle that he once had.

If not money, what then makes you rich?  According to Robert Kiyosaki,

“…it is not real-estate, stocks, mutual funds, businesses, or money that make you rich.  It is information, knowledge, wisdom, and know-how, a.k.a. financial intelligence, that makes one wealthy.”

What is Financial Intelligence?

Robert Kiyosaki describes Financial intelligence as that part of our mental intelligence we use to solve our financial problems. Financial IQ, on the other hand, is the measure of that intelligence.

What money problems do you have?  Are you having the problem of “not having enough money”? Are you

using your credit card whenever you’re short on money? constantly worrying about the rising cost of living? paying more in taxes after an increase in income? afraid of emergencies? receiving bad financial advice? waiting for the next paycheck to pay for last month’s rent?

While the rich do not have these problems, they too have their own money problems – “too much money”.  Some of these are

needing to keep their money safe and invested not knowing whether people like them or their money looking for smarter financial advisors raising spoiled kids worrying about estate and inheritance planning looking for ways to “legally” avoid paying excessive government taxes

Which problems would you rather have?

The 5 basic Financial IQs

According to Robert Kiyosaki, you need to learn the 5 basic Financial IQs to solve your money problems.  These are:

Financial IQ #1: Making more money Financial IQ #2: Protecting your money Financial IQ #3: Budgeting your money Financial IQ #4: Leveraging your money Financial IQ #5: Improving your financial information

Financial IQ #1: Making more money

How do you make more money?  The key according to Robert Kiyosaki is to “solve problems”.  People will gladly pay you money if you solve their problems.  I know I’ll be more than happy to pay you money if you can fix my broken LCD TV at a reasonable price. Would you gladly pay your doctor if they solve your ailing stomach? Would you pay your financial advisor if they can make you more money than what you pay them?  Or how about paying your “star” employees “millions” whenever they bring you “billions” in income?

Solve people’s problems and make more money.  As the famous quote from Zig Ziglar says

You can have everything in life you want, if you will just help enough other people get what they want.

Which problems do you want to solve?

Which problems do you want to solve?

Do you want to solve the problem of “hunger” by providing quality meals at an affordable price.  That’s what a lot of food businesses are doing.  Or do you want to solve the problem of “not having enough time to eat”.  That’s what the fast and “instant” food delivery businesses are trying to solve.

What are you naturally good at? Perhaps you can use any of your skills to solve other people’s problems.

Are you good in math?  Be a great financial analyst or an accountant and help people and businesses solve their financial or tax problems.

Do you like speaking to people?  Become a powerful speaker.  Share your message by leveraging your highly sought after skill of public speaking.  Inspire people to take action and solve their problem of a dull and boring life.

Do you love making great movies?  Learn to be a great director or a movie producer.  People will pay you to entertain them because you are solving their problem of “not having fun”.”

Solving problems is a process

The key according to Robert Kiyosaki is realizing the fact that problems will never go away.  After you solve a problem, another problem will come up.  Only in this process of solving problems one after the other will you gain financial intelligence.

You have to go through the process of solving whatever money problems you are facing right now.  Don’t run from it.  Face it head on.  Use your mind to think of ways on how to solve your money problem.  As Robert Kiyosaki’s Rich Dad says,

“You can quit when you win, but never quite because you’re losing.“

The reason instant millionaires end up poor after winning the lottery is because they want only the money but not the process of learning how to build their wealth.  This is the same thing as people wanting to get paid more than the value they are providing.  Their greed is making decisions for them.  Some people even claim that “greed” has caused the current financial crisis that we are in right now.

The other side of the coin is also dangerous – fear.  Don’t let fear hold you back.  Enjoy the process of learning.  Feel the fear and face it head on. This is the same reason why employees would rather gladly receive the small steady paycheck than take a chance at building their own fortune.  Take a leap.  Live out your dreams.  As Hellen Keller says,

“Life is either a daring adventure or nothing.”

Rich Money Habits Review Notes:

What I liked about the book is that it offers other (unconventional) ways to think about money. The book is not about financial advise, so it does not discuss any “how to” details on investing in real-estate or businesses. There are a lot of strong comments about the book so it is NOT for everyone.  My hope is that after reading the rest of the book review in the coming weeks, you’ll pick up a thing or two to help you with your money problems.