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.”“I mean every word of it,” Bob said.“I don’t begrudge her a thing.When I left my marriage I was paying mortgages on two houses, alimony to my wife, three college tuitions—my wife and both my kids were in college—and child support for my son who was still living at home.“Then, in 1977, the brokerage house I was working with was put out of business and I had to start all over again.I was forty-three years old and pretty much broke, after I finished paying all my obligations.At one point, I even had to borrow money from my ex-wife to pay her alimony and child support! But she knew I would pay it back, with interest.”“And did you?”“You bet.I established myself with a new brokerage house and set up my own business all over again.I took three hundred dollars and rented three small rooms.The first month, I made ten thousand dollars, so I hired a part-time secretary and a couple of salesmen.The next month, I made another ten thousand dollars, so I put the secretary on full-time and hired a couple more salesmen.I trained all my own people.I kept expanding gradually like that, using the money I made to plow back into the business, hiring and training more people and renting more space.Over the years, I kept building, investing, hiring, and training, until finally I became one of the larger high-end tax planning and investment planning brokerage firms on the East Coast.”“That’s remarkable.How did you do it?”“Simple,” Bob answered.“I had no debt to service and I had the knowledge I needed.I never borrowed money to expand—I grew the business slowly and steadily, spending only what was coming in the door.And I’d spent sixteen to eighteen years getting the training and education I needed.I had picked up a master’s degree at Berkeley while I was still in the Air Force.I knew what I wanted to do when I retired, so I started preparing myself years in advance.“I had learned from some great people over the years.I recall, back in 1958, my first sales manager told me, ‘Bob, do you know why so many people want to get rich quick? Because they don’t know how to get rich slow.’ And that’s what I was really good at, helping my clients to get rich slow.I’m patient.I take the long view of investing.When my wife and I split up, we had some investments that were very aggressive and very risky.She didn’t want any part of them, so I got them in the divorce.Later on, they paid off very nicely.”“How do you know what investments to buy?”“My specialty is doing due diligence,” Bob replied.“I look at cash flow, profit potential, growth potential, and competitive businesses.I need to get my arms around a business and fully understand it before I’m willing to invest.If I can’t get my arms around it, I don’t buy into it.As a former colleague of mine used to say, ‘No deal is so good that you can’t walk away from it.’“Second, I look for investment opportunities that are small enough that the big guys don’t want to bother with them.In other words, I go where there isn’t a lot of competition.I call it my Puddle Theory: I make a nice living in small puddles where the big guys don’t want to swim.I always tell my clients, ‘Don’t get greedy.We can do quite well being medium-sized fish in small puddles—we don’t need to go out in the ocean with the sharks.’“Look, the best way to make money is to have a ‘widget’—you either make it or service it.Your widget is something that you know more about than anyone else.You’re the expert—you’re the go-to guy or gal when someone wants that particular widget.So my widget is being an expert in small puddle investments.“My third principle of success is making sure that every deal is win–win–win.I invest in deals so that my clients win, I win, and the business we invest in wins.“There are some people out there who are looking for how they can screw other people—they think win–lose.In my opinion, they deserve to lose.And if you look around today, with all the financial disasters all over the place, that’s what you’re seeing.In the fifty years I’ve been doing this, almost everyone who’s worked or invested with me has made money, and the handful of deals that went bad didn’t go bad because of anything I did.Nobody got burned.Every once in a while a deal doesn’t pay off, even though you did due diligence and made good decisions.That’s part of the game.But all of my clients—all of them—would tell you that I did my very best to make a fair return on their investments.”“Are you still running your brokerage business?”“Heavens, no!” Bob laughed.“I retired in 1985 at age fifty-one.I was a multimillionaire by then and wanted to relax and enjoy my money.I’m an avid sportsman and love to travel, ski, golf, and enjoy water sports.I remarried some years ago and my wife, Diane, and I have a wonderful life together here in Henderson, Nevada.We have a second home in Illinois, where her family lives, and we make time to enjoy kids, grandkids, and others.“I still handle my own investments, of course [ Pobierz całość w formacie PDF ]