Notes: The Millionaire Fastlane by MJ DeMarco

gs454236@gmail.com (Basil Labib) — Sat, 03 Jul 2021 21:02:21 +0530

Are you able to successfully leverage the opportunities at your disposal? That is the question that this book tries to answer and provides advice backed by the author’s own experiences. The book is written in a comfortable conversational style, including way too many metaphors and analogies.

The author, himself, has a remarkable lifestyle: starting a tech company during the dot-com bubble, growing it, selling it and so on. Below I have aggregated few core ideas from the book. Enjoy!

My highlights

Beliefs

Beliefs are powerful mechanisms that drive action, whether true or not.

What is wealth?

“Wealth is the ability to fully experience life” — Henry David Thoreau
Wealth is the state when each unit of money that you own earns more than its worth without you doing anything. (mine)
Wealth is composed of fitness (health), family (relationships) and, freedom (choice).

Luck on demand & Accountability

Luck is the residue of process.
“Responsibility is the price of greatness” - Winston Churchill
Responsibility is acknowledging your flaws. Accountability is modifying your ways to eliminate them.

Skills & Education

To trade time is to trade life.
Confined set of skills makes you expendable if demands for them becomes obsolete.
“The only thing that interferes with my learning is my education” — A. Einstein

build a machine for yourself.
Impact millions
Maximum control and leverage.
Wealth = Units sold * Unit profit + Asset value
Appreciable assets - businesses, brands, cashflows, notes, IPs, licenses, patents, inventions and real estates.
Passive income - earning income while not working
Start with $5m at 25, and let it compound. Wanna skip the first 30 years.
Become a producer first and a consumer second.
Business structures - C corp, S corp, LLC (Limited Liability Corporation)

Life choices

Poor choices are the leading cause of poverty.
Decisions made early in life are most impactful and irreversible.
Be willingly to accept your flaws.
“Ridicule is the tribute paid to the genius by the mediocrities” — Oscar Wilde
Create “free time” - time not spend working or recharging from work.
Pledge to never stop learning. Not from books but by engagement.
The acquisition and application of knowledge will make you rich.
Are you interested or committed?
Take intelligent risks.
Big dreams, materialistic or altrusic non-profit foundations, cost money.

Rules of thumb for business

- Need - “What’s in it for me?”
- Control - Over the variables
- Entry - barrier for competition, monopoly, license etc
- Scale - Units sold and Unit profit
- Time - business detached from your time
Live below your means with the intent to expand your means
Financial literacy - I mean, obviously

Entrepreneurship 101

The owner of an idea is not he who imagines it, but he who executes it.
Listen to people’s complains. Customers are foremost.
Look big to impress customers and intimidate competitors.
When supply exceeds demand, prices must drop, suddenly, the product becomes commoditized. Avoid such industries entirely.
Differentiation. Force innovation.
Be copied, never copy. (mine)

Partners:

Accountants and attorneys (among others) must be top-notch
Verify first, trust later
Spectacular product features cannot overcome poor services.

Branding

Build a brand. Rise above the noise.

Discipline & Focus

“…No life grows great until it is focused, dedicated, disciplined.” — Harry E. Fosdick
When you segregate your effort among assets, you build weak assets.

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