Enough is never enough - are you a Middle-Class Millionaire?
Motivation, Entrepreneur September 2nd, 2008 
Image Source: THIS IS NOT ENOUGH Courtesy Of: psd
While enjoying my labor day long weekend at resort in Tucson, AZ, I saw the Untold Wealth Serial TV show on CNBC. I felt that I am one of them - the middle class millionaire. The poor people in the millionaire club.
Enough is never enough!
If you have not seen the untold wealth videos, you should take a look at them. It’s very interesting and very motivational to me. According to the report, there are more than 9 million millionaires in the USA. 49,000 U.S. households have a net worth between $50 million and $500 million. However, many of them don’t feel rich at all.
In the Middle-Class Millionaires video, a millionaire, who has 10 million dollar net worth asset, don’t feel secure and rich at all. She has to work 12 hours a day in order to stay rich. That is very interesting. Even more interesting is that many billionaires keeps buying new toys and invest more business in order to keep their life style and to avoid feeling poor. They are already very rich.
Money is not what they are going after.
It’s very easy for them to say so. With billion dollars in their bank account, living cost is no longer a concern. It’s the challenge that moves them forward. The challenges they are going after are to achieve bigger goals. The end result will bring them more money. Those challenges are not something that money can buy. However, they have so much money that make the challenges smaller.
There is also one funny fact why middle class millionaire don’t feel rich at all? Many people thought millionaire are living in the heaven and have a very nice apartment on the top of the building facing New York Central Park. Now those millionaire are no longer able to afford the apartment. Those are taken by the billionaire. So the middle class millionaire felt broke.
There are also many millionaire clubs require to have $100K application fee and $25K monthly membership fee to stay in the club for luxury travel. This does not include the cost of traveling, private jet and private resorts, etc. So if you are millionaire, do you feel rich enough to be a millionaire? I guess not!
One common character that millionaire and billionaire have are this. They are not worry about how much they spent to buy things. They are focusing on achieving the bigger goals that will bring them more money.
What have I learned?
I should focus on the challenge and achieve them. If money is not my concern at the moment, I should take that as my strength, advantage over other competition and reach my goal as soon as I can.
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16 Responses to “Enough is never enough - are you a Middle-Class Millionaire?”
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September 3rd, 2008 at 9:37 am
“To have a tranquil mind, a clean, calm,conscientious purpose, a few true friends, good health, a happy home, a sufficient amount saved to guarantee against any embarrassment from want, means that you are wealthy.”
–Fred Van Amburgh
Very few millionaires and billionaires have these! If you can have these and still be a millionaire plus, you would have really succeeded in life.
I wish you all the success in your quest of happiness.
September 3rd, 2008 at 9:43 am
@Rummuser:
I am indeed very happy at the moment in my life. I am just not feeling secure enough. There are a lot of thing I want to do. You are right. Not many rich people are actually happier than they were before.
It’s like taking drug. Once you were there, you will never want to go back.
I think changing out life style is the worst thing we done to our life. 
September 3rd, 2008 at 10:50 am
Perhaps it depends upon whether or not you let having money change you. For some people, struggling to make their mortgage payment, they would be happy to have enough money to live comfortably in their own home. But, if that situation changes, and they are able to pay off their mortgage and live comfortably in their own home, will they be satisfied with that, or will they begin to look for new things to spend money on? Like maybe they now want a bigger house, then they buy one, and end up back at square one, struggling to pay a mortgage on an even bigger house (or maybe the same size house in a better neighborhood). If people spend money foolishly when they are poor, can we expect that they would be any less foolish when they have more money to spend?
Think of the people that, when they get a windfall, instead of using it to pay off debt, they will go on a shopping spree. That’s why lottery winners so often end up back into problems not too long after winning!
Millionaires that you usually read about are the visible millionaires. It’s the quiet, or invisible, millionaires you don’t often hear about. They’re the ones that accumulate wealth by spending money wisely, saving money and living comfortably, and not with the goal of putting up appearances. I think that these kinds of millionaires are the ones to emulate, not the ones more interested in some sort of millionaire showmanship.
September 3rd, 2008 at 3:38 pm
very inspirational post Terence! I know what you mean about not feeling secure enough, yet feeling rich in the other areas of life
I am far from being a millionaire still, but I´ll get there anyway :D:D
Good to be back again!
September 4th, 2008 at 12:43 am
@DCR:
It’ all about cash flow. No matter how much money you have, you will run out of luck if you spend money foolishly. The middle-class millionaires I refer to are those who spend money wisely. I mean those who knows how to keep the money flow. It’s very important to watch your cash flow. However, they still don’t feel rich enough.
No matter how much money you have or make, you have to keep your cash flow positive. When you reach that point, you start feeling rich. When you are getting richer by keeping your incoming cash flow, you start changing your life style. You eat healthier, you spend $$ doing exercise at fitness center, you buy a safer luxury car, you enjoy luxury travel and move to a bigger house. You realize that you want more! You look up to those people who are richer than you and realized that you are basically have nothing. You set a new goal to live the way they live. You feel poor as middle-class millionaire.
I don’t know if I describe it clearly or not. My point is that your money is never enough for you to live better. It’s not about making more money. It’s about how you can achieve a greater challenge to live better. Your achievement is not from your money at all. It’s from the satisfaction of your life style and to own the things that only 0.01% of the people in the world own.
@Mirjam:
The first step to feel rich is to keep your cash flow. If you have extra money saved in your bank account everyday, you start feeling richer everyday. It doesn’t mean that you have to spend less in order to save more. It means that you have to change your spending behavior wisely. Making money and saving money is equally important.
The second step is to have your money working for you. Use money to make money. It’s the most difficult steps though.
Anyway, thank you two for stopping by!
September 4th, 2008 at 11:28 am
Terence,
people never get enough
I really wonder about the insecurity of the rich people. What’s the benefit of being rich, then?
Thanks for the great post!
September 4th, 2008 at 12:36 pm
I agree - It’s all about cash flow. Robert Kiyosaki (of the ‘Rich Dad Poor Dad’ book series) makes the distinction that not everything that is called an asset is really an asset. The example he uses is that a house is generally considered an asset but since it takes away from our cash flow (through mortgage payments, property tax, maintenance, etc.) it is more of a liability. If you are a millionaire and have many of these ‘assets’ eating in to your cash flow there won’t be a lot of disposable cash at the end of the month, which I could see easily leading to feeling insecure. As you mention in your article, imagine having to pay 25K/month for a club membership! That’s one expense I could easily live without.
September 4th, 2008 at 12:47 pm
@Noobpreneur:
Thank you for stopping by. Let’s assume that all the rich people are really good at their cash flow. We are not talking about the people who just has sudden fortune. We are talking about those rich people who work really hard and get lucky to make fortune. We are talking about those people who are good at managing money wisely.
They know they are rich. They just don’t feel rich enough. The fear is that they don’t have enough money to do things that most of us don’t even dream of. For example, the girl in the video, who has 10 million dollars in her bank account. She met other rich people and ask them how they spend their money. The answer she got is to buy a private jet. Yup! It will be nice to have a private jet that can take you to anywhere you want. However, she will be broke if she buy the private jet. She doesn’t have enough money to enjoy the life style with a private jet. She is very poor in the rich society. She is still richer than most of people on earth though.
What’s the benefit of being rich?
Well. We all know that money is not everything. It’s up to you to spend your money wisely. Money do not make you a better person! Money produce hate within families. Money break your friendship when it gets ugly. Money creates crime when people are so desperate about it.
Money means a lot to those who have it and use it wisely. And money means nothing if you don’t have it.
September 4th, 2008 at 1:00 pm
@Aaron:
Great thanks for the good example. For many rich people, spending 25K/month may be a way to make 250K/month. Without staying in the club, you get no chance to stay in the game. A good balance between the risk of investment and static income of your paycheck or bank account interest is one way to generate cash flow and to make rich people richer.
September 4th, 2008 at 6:01 pm
Hey Terence - very nice post! I must say, I am a VERY long way away from being a millionaire but I am quite happy.
And at the end of the day I think that is more important…
September 6th, 2008 at 2:21 am
Terence,
“Money change your life style - your life style is never the same. It will be really hard to go back.” - pretty darn right!
IMO, it’s all about financial education - Suppose you make $500 a month and spend all that $500. Without proper financial education, should you make $50,000 a month, you will likely to spend that $50,000…
What makes a person rich is his/her financial education.
My 2 cents
September 7th, 2008 at 8:01 am
@Mark:
Happiness is the first thing we all need. Without being happy, money will drag us down.
@Noobpreneur:
You are right! Rich people knows how to make money work for them.
September 8th, 2008 at 11:01 am
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September 25th, 2008 at 4:55 am
I am by no means wealthy, but I don’t believe money will increase my happiness, If I did see money as a goal it would only be because its a comparable metric.
October 10th, 2008 at 8:12 am
I personally think that we are bottomed out now. Many people are thinking of investing their money now. Hopefully the hysteria will be over soon.
http://www.mcintyremedia.com/
October 10th, 2008 at 12:48 pm
@Brett:
The bad time means to most of the people is a good time to other people. People are making good money at the bad time. Pick the right niche will put you ahead of others. Thank you for stopping by!