The Art of Turning Nissan Cars Into Wealth

Want to learn how to become a millionaire by driving a Nissan? Well, you’ve come to the right place! I’m going to share my story on how I used Nissans to reach a million-dollar net worth in my late 20s. It involved a lot of luck, a lot of effort, and a lot of risk. In retrospect, as a 46-year-old today, I wish I had taken even more risk.

You see, I believe all Financial Samurai readers will eventually become millionaires due to disciplined saving and savvy investing over time. If you keep reading and listening about personal finance, it’s hard not to keep moving in the right financial direction over time. In fact, the average American household is a millionaire based on the Federal Reserve’s latest data for 2022.

Now that I’m 46, in retrospect, I should have taken even more calculated risk. Taking more calculated risk is a key theme if you want to become a millionaire at a relatively young age. The second key theme to become a millionaire by age 30 is to own appreciating assets that work hard for you. Eventually, you will tire of the grind. When that time comes, you will hopefully have at least one million dollars in assets generating passive income.

Finally, if you really want to be a millionaire, you need to come up with a plan and follow it. When it comes to your finances, you can’t just wing it. You must be intentional.

Growing Up With Beaters and Water

Growing up in a middle-class household made me strong. My parents always drove beaters and frowned upon ordering anything other than water when we went out to eat. I knew my parents were not rich because their incomes were in the public domain as foreign service officers.

As a result, I made a conscious choice in high school not to attend one of the two private colleges that had accepted me. Instead, I went to William & Mary, which cost $2,890 – $3,200 a year in tuition from 1995-1999. I needed to save money.

We were by no means poor. We just pulled up to parties in a paint-less 1976 Nissan Datsun alongside Audis, Mercedes, and BMWs for the four years we lived in Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia between 1986-1990. It was very mortifying as a kid.

I knew nothing of expensive shoes because I had none. My wealthier friend gave me his old Air Jordans 4s that were two sizes too large. I couldn’t even afford a camera or a Nintendo game system. We led comfortable lives, but didn’t have more than we needed.

I was always curious about my wealthier friends. Many of their parents were business owners. So one day, I told my father I too wanted to be a businessman. By the time I was 13, I was hooked on every single episode of “The Lifestyles Of The Rich & Famous” narrated by Robin Leech. A million-dollar house and a $40,000 sports car? What a life, I thought to myself in the 8th grade. Might as well give it a go.

That’s when I started really hitting the books. If you want to become a millionaire by 30, you must adopt a strong money mindset. Know that there is money everywhere for the taking. You’ve got to believe you deserve to be rich.

The Path To A Million Dollars

Becoming a millionaire by 30 is becoming more common rather than the exception, thanks to inflation. After all, $3 million is the new $1 million today. There are so many standard ways to become a millionaire. If you don’t become a millionaire by 30, you will eventually get there with enough time.

If you work for 40 years and save and invest just 20% of your after-tax paycheck a year, there is no doubt in my mind you will amass at least one million dollars. Compounding is a powerful force. Maxing out your 401(k) for 30 years will also most likely lead to over $1 million as well. Historical stock and bond market returns plus company match are on your side.

We’ve got financial planners, personal finance blogs, television, best selling books, and even free financial tools to help you build and track your wealth. So many resources make building wealth much easier now than in the past.

The Advantages Of Youth

When we first graduate from high school or college, we have a tremendous amount of energy to show what we can do. After all, our education is complete. We’re hungry, motivated, and need to prove to others and to ourselves our worth. 60-90 hour work-weeks for at least a decade are no problem.

Unfortunately, so many of us piss away our youth. We buy new cars without following my 110th rule for car buying. Some of us get into expensive credit card debt. And a lot of us don’t listen to our elders and think the world owes us something. Forget it, folks. Nobody owes us anything. But we owe it to ourselves and to our parents who sacrificed all that time and money raising us to give life everything we’ve got.

Most of us won’t have children by the time we graduate from college. As a result, we can focus 100% of our efforts on generating wealth by developing our careers or our businesses. Compare that to middle-aged adults with two children, a mortgage, and aging parents to take care of. We are like finicky Ferraris on a starting line, ready to blow away our older model competitors.

Take advantage of your youth. Children cost money and drain your energy. Grind as hard as you can before having them.

The Courage To Take Risk

When we graduate with nothing, we have nothing to lose. Compare that with people with property, stocks, and other investments during economic downturns. They have everything to lose. With very little assets, we should be taking more risks. Now is the time to start a company, invest in that growth stock, take a new job opportunity, or move half way across the world on a hunch that good things might happen.

If we don’t take risks while we are young, we certainly aren’t going to take them when we are old. I had no idea I became a millionaire at age 28 until two years later when I did my first detailed net worth spreadsheet in 2007. It’s easier to achieve something when we don’t even realize what we’re doing.

I was too busy saving, investing, working, and trying not to blow my money on things that I didn’t need. I was one of those Super Motivated Boyfriends (SMBs) who were impossible to lock down. Like most people, I believed 30 is a big milestone. Ever since college, I told myself I was either going to make it, know that I was going to make it, or be an absolute failure by 30.

The fear of being a failure at 30 with no job, no woman, no savings, no investments, and no world experiences made me so motivated to not mess things up. I felt I needed to become a millionaire by 30 in big cities like New York and San Francisco. A painful two years of working 70 hour weeks right out of college with difficult bosses also got me into overdrive to figure out a way not to work forever. There was no fanfare when I discovered the seven-figure milestone had been achieved. Just the realization that time passes more quickly as we age. I had to make the most of my opportunities since nothing lasts forever.

The Power Of Compounding

Years later, I’ve continued to grow my net worth with a variety of passive and alternative active incomes. My family is a great motivator to keep on going. The last thing my wife and I want to do is go back to work while our children are still young.

If you’ve been reading my posts from how to save for retirement and how to properly invest for your future, there’s no magic behind wealth accumulation. Amassing wealth is about savings discipline, perseverance, luck, an X-Factor, and the belief that you too deserve to be wealthy. Eventually, you will have more than enough so that you’ll either retire or keep on playing for fun.

After leaving the work force for good at the age of 34 in 2012, I decided to keep on playing by building Financial Samurai into the best possible personal finance blog I could. When people tell me I’m lucky, I agree. As a result, I’ve tried to re-create my luck by writing 3-4X a week every year since 2009.

After 15 years of writing on Financial Samurai, I believe one important secret to wealth and success is grit. If you can demonstrate unwavering commitment with one thing for at least 10 years, I strongly believe you will succeed. Too many people quit way too soon or right before the going gets good. Stay committed. If I started this site in my early 20s, I would have become a millionaire by 30. If you are young, please take advantage of your youth.

My Millionaire Journey

To the best of my memory, here’s how I was able to amass a million dollars by age 28. Today my net worth is much larger thanks to continual investing, asset diversification, and building multiple passive income streams.

When I graduated from The College of William & Mary, the total amount of cash I had was roughly $4,000. I had saved some money from summer jobs, temping, and flipping burgers at McDonald’s for $4 an hour. I had just started a dream job in New York City at Goldman Sachs. It was go time. My base salary was $40,000, which at the time didn’t feel too great.

I lived in a studio with my buddy from high school for two years because we couldn’t afford something nicer. See Achieving Financial Independence On A Modest Income. As a result, I invested $3,000 in a dotcom stock called Vertical Integration Systems (VCSY). It turned into $200,000 within several months. Yes, it was incredibly lucky, but it also took some analysis and guts. I just wish I had more money to invest. The stock pulled back by around 25% at which time I sold everything for around $155,000 and stayed out of the bubbliscious stock market for the next year and a half due to a job change in 2001. VCSY ended up being worthless a couple years later.

$155,000 equals about $120,000 in after-tax proceeds. The trade is detailed in the post Don’t Stop Fortune Hunting. Net worth: $160,000.

After two years in NYC, I was recruited to join another firm in San Francisco. I only knew a couple people in San Francisco, but felt the promotion to Associate without having to go to business school and a 100% guaranteed raise to an $80,000 base salary + bonus was attractive enough to take a chance. I was coming from a top firm and had established some solid client relationships over the past two years.

The economy was still dicey due to the dotcom implosion and there was a big chance I would not make Associate after my third year at GS. It turns out my firm in NYC did indeed let go of many colleagues and only about 25% of the people I knew from my entering class were still there two years after I left. It was a little scary moving all the way cross country, but it wasn’t like I was moving to the middle of nowhere. This was San Francisco, one of the most beautiful cities in the world. Besides, San Francisco is six hours closer to Hawaii, one of my favorite places on Earth, so I figured, “What the hell?”

I saved 100% of each bonus, maxed out my 401(k), and saved a little more for my after-tax brokerage account. Net worth: $260,000.

The first two years in NYC, I lived in a studio with another guy. We put up one of those Chinese Paper Walls to add more privacy. I didn’t care. I was living in New York City, the most alive city in America! I’d rather spend money going out and partying rather than on an extra bedroom. When I moved to San Francisco, I spent even less on housing since NYC is about 30% more expensive. I found a two-bedroom, one-bathroom apartment at the edge of downtown for only $850 per person. I finally had my own room, yeah baby!

When you now make double what you were making a year ago, yet pay 25% less in rent, saving becomes very easy. I increased my after-tax, after 401(k) maximum contribution savings rate from 50% to 65%. Here’s a post I wrote later called Home Expense Guideline For Financial Independence. It highlights how I lived in NYC and SF to maximize disposable income. The post also gives recommendations on how much money you should spend on rent/buying in your journey as well. Net worth: $400,000.

60% of every paycheck and 100% of every year-end bonus after 401(k) contributions went into long-term CDs that yielded 5-6% at the time. The reason why I invested in CDs was due to a job change and not having time to manage my portfolio in 2001, 2002, and 2003. Furthermore, I was scared of another market implosion that would not only take down my investments, but also my bonus and potentially my job. My 401(k) was already 100% exposed to the stock market already.

Today my net worth is highlight diversified across real estate, crowdfunding, real estate bonds, stocks, private equity, and business equity.

Riding The Real Estate Wave

A day after my 26th birthday, I decided that it was time to grow up and buy my own place. I was renting a $1,600/month one-bedroom apartment in San Francisco and wanted a nicer apartment. At the same time, I didn’t want to spend more than $2,000 a month on rent because the return on rent is always zero.

I became very disillusioned with having a large chunk of money in the bank and started wondering, “What is the point of working more since I had more than I could ever have imagined?” At age 26, I was already thinking of retiring in Hawaii. Given my waning motivation to work as hard anymore, I decided to buy a two-bedroom, two-bathroom condo in a nice area of SF and live it up a little.

The combination of 5-6% compounded returns in savings over four years, a growing 401(k), growing after-tax investment account, and another year of saving a larger bonus really helped. You don’t have to be a great investor to become a millionaire. You just have to be a good-enough investor with the proper discipline and risk exposure. Net worth: $550,000.

After putting down a 25% downpayment ($140,000) for a $580,500 condo, my motivation to work skyrocketed because of a drained cash account. I prayed the housing market wouldn’t implode like the stock market did years earlier. A year before my condo purchase, I did a silly thing and bought a $78,000 Mercedes G Wagon G500. The truck was sweet, and I thought it was a great deal since it was selling for $150,000 the year before. But this small dealership in Santa Fe, New Mexico curiously owned the US import rights. I drove the truck for a year and had to sell it for a $20,000 loss because it wouldn’t fit in my condo garage due to the height. What an idiot! But I felt buying the condo was the responsible thing to do.

I traded way down to a seven-year-old Honda Civic worth $8,000 instead. I was growing up, but still had the thirst for nice cars. The $435,000 mortgage put a fire under my ass to work harder and be the best performer I could be. At the age of 27, I was promoted to Vice President, a title that is normally bestowed on business school graduates three to four years out of school at the age of 32-33. From there, my income took another large jump up to $120,000 + a larger potential bonus. I became one of the youngest VP promotes in my office. Debt provided an unexpected side benefit for my career.

From 2003 to 2005, my condo also appreciated to around $815,000, a 40% jump. Unfortunately, this increase was unsustainable as we all know. In fact, one of the biggest downsides to paying off your mortgage is the loss of motivation. I felt this way in 2015 once this condo’s mortgage was paid off. However, once my son was born in 2017, the motivation to make money increased again. Net worth: $800,000.

At 28, I decided to finally buy a single-family house in San Francisco for $1,520,000. Believe it or not, 720 sq ft for a house on the north end of San Francisco was pretty good because many homes were selling for $900/sq ft at the time. I was sick of having neighbors above and below me. I wanted a yard, a deck, reprieve from the HOA meetings, and to be king of my own castle.

The bad thing about my house was that it was on a busy street next to the busiest street in the entire city. After I moved into my single-family house, I turned my condo into a rental, but finally sold it in 2017 for 30X annual gross rent because I no longer had time to be a landlord after my boy was born. My rental property equity was around $350,000, plus around $