Financial Freedom: 5 Tips to Become Financially Independent | Financial Independence & Retirement Planning

 

Troy Sharpe: I’m going to teach you the five things you need to know to build more wealth, make better decisions, and run your life like a true CEO.

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Hi, I’m Troy Sharpe, CEO of Oak Harvest Financial Group, Certified Financial Planner professional, host of the Retirement Income Show, and author of the upcoming book, Core4. Everyone wants to be financially successful, but how do we do that? How do we build good habits that allows us to manage money, save efficiently, and make good decisions? As CEO of Oak Harvest Financial Group, it’s my responsibility where we spend money, what the profits are, and the people that we hire, and how the whole team and culture works together, so we can grow our firm and help more people get to retirement, plan their retirement, distribute money, reduce taxes. All of that has to be taken into consideration from the CEO standpoint. I’m responsible for it.

When I took those skills and traits that I’d learned as a CEO of the company into my personal life, I started to see personal financial success at a level that I’d never seen before. As CEO here, I know all of our numbers. Every single week, I get reports on my desk that say what’s going on from a financial standpoint, from a production standpoint. Last week, we had 35 total appointments at our firm. 11 of them were 1sts, 12 of them were 2nds, 5 of them were 3rd appointments, and we had 7 annual reviews. Last month, we brought in about $15 million of new assets.

We’re mid-June right now, we brought in about $7 million of new assets. We’re going to finish the first six months of this year at over $60 million of new assets coming into our firm. If I didn’t know those numbers, I wouldn’t know if we’re being successful, or if we’re failing, or if we’re growing, or if we’re shrinking. Knowing my numbers as a CEO is tremendously important to the intelligent allocation of money and resources, so we can grow and help more people. For you, how this is going to benefit you is, this is going to create more financial security for your family, more success, and more long-term wealth-building if you know these numbers.

The first thing you need to do is to know your numbers. What do I mean by that? First, know your after-tax income. After taxes and withholding, how much income are you taking home? Know that number. The second number you need to know is, what are your recurring monthly expenses? These are bills that you don’t have a choice in paying, they come in every single month and you have to pay them. I’m going to have a video all about knowing your numbers and how to do this, but make sure you know these numbers.

Number two is to pay yourself first. This is the most important habit that you can create. Building wealth is all about building good habit. Treat your savings account like a monthly bill that you must pay. When you pay yourself first and you create that good habit, you’re going to become accustomed to living on a little bit less money while building up savings. In another video, I’m going to explain how to do it, why it’s important, and how it’s going to improve your financial success for the future.

Number three, you want to get out of debt. This is very important. One of the worst things you can do is have credit card balances that carry forward because the compound interest video that I did talks about the benefits of compound interest when it works in your favor.

When you carry credit card debt, compound interest works against you. It’s one of the greatest wealth-destroying tools that people employ for themselves, and that is carrying credit card debt and paying these insanely exorbitant interest rates, 15, 18, 22, 24, 28% interest, you will never build wealth, you will never create security for your family if you’re carrying credit card debt. The interest rates will destroy your wealth. Get out of debts, number three.

Number four, start to invest your money. When you know your numbers, you pay yourself first, you get out of debt, now you can start to invest your money. Check out the video that I did, Stock Market for Beginners, to learn how to start to invest your money and start to build an education and accumulate knowledge to make good decisions. The number four thing, start to invest your money. You got to be the true CEO of your life.

Then the number five thing, once we have some of the financial things in order is, none of that matters unless you invest your time in your family, your friends, and also your community, giving back. We can get the financial house in order, but we’re not going to have true happiness as people, unless we take time to invest in our friends, our family, and our community. As the CEO of my company, we invest in a lot of people, but we also have to develop the culture and we have to make sure that everyone who works here, that they get along and they complement each other. No matter how much money we make or how big we grow, if we don’t do a good job taking care of our people, then I would consider that to be a failure.

In your life, to be the CEO of you, the people in your life are your friends, and your family, and your community. If you’re a bad mother or a bad father, I don’t care how much money you have, you’re a failure. If you don’t take care of the people in your life that mean the most to you, you’re not being a true leader, you’re not being the true CEO of you. Just as we invest in people and we try to build an amazing culture, that brings us happiness, that brings us success, same thing in your personal life; invest in your friends, invest time in your friends, invest in your family, and also invest time in your community to be a true leader and to be a true CEO of your life.

I’m Troy Sharpe. If you enjoyed this video, make sure to share it with a friend or family member, hit the Subscribe button down below. The little bell icon, make sure to hit that so you’re notified when we upload new videos, and stay tuned for more content, learn how to build wealth, make good decisions, and be the best CEO of your life.

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