Here are my notes on Ramit Sethi’s I Will Teach You To Be Rich (trolling occasionally; take some statements with a pinch of sea salt and a splash of lemon juice). Soundtrack.

Money is a means, not an end. What do I want to do in my life — and how can money help with that?
- Have a money vision. Know very concretely what you are earning the next 10k for.
- Where you spend your time and money (e.g. on the Dark Side of the Moon), should be aligned with your priorities.
- Use money to make things. (cf Joe Berlin: renting out a space, creating community (!)) Be an instigator (Steve Pavlina)

systemz

Create a system so you can forget about it. Set up once, benefit forever.
Current account as e-mail inbox — receive income and redistribute (automatically) to the appropriate account. Automatic withdraws rather than sends.
- Set up automatic monthly transfers to your savings account, investment account and spending money.
- Have saving goals in your saving accounts — emergency fund (esp. for irregular income — 3× monthly expenses to buffer, × The Toyota Way), income tax (freelancers), vacation/retreat, other projects / pending purchases). Savings are about projects, short-, medium- or long-term.
- Keep ~1k€ in your current account as buffer.
Acquire the right habits today, for tomorrow. Build the right habits now so you already have them when you start growing money. Put aside even a small amount of money every month. (The future begins today. (Aperture Science))
Recurring bills on the same day. Call subscription companies and reschedule billing day. Simplifies your cash flow management (esp. with a monthly salary).
Systems make it easier to decline invites. “It’s not personal, it’s just my system” (× Essentialism, Clear Thinking, “Sorry, it’s not a priority.” “Sorry, I’m focussing on X at the moment.” “What else should I de-prioritize?”)

smart money

Conscious spending: cut costs on things you don’t love, spend extravagantly on things you love. (× Essentialism)
- Decide on what you don’t love, don’t care about, don’t mind — e.g. living in a shared flat, furniture, clothes, subscriptions, possessions, etc. Cut costs. Cancel subscriptions or sell items. (× The Life-Changing Magic of Tidying up) (× endowment effect (Essentialism))
- Decide on what you do love, care about, value — education, learning, experiences, art, etc.

Conscious Spending Plan: fixed costs (50-60%), investments (10%), savings (5-10%), guilt-free spending money (20-35%) — alternatively: “60% solution”: 60% fixed costs, 40% other (10% investments, 10% short-term savings, 10% long-term savings, 10% fun)
- Add 15% to your estimate of fixed costs (as safety buffer for occasional costs (× Clear Thinking (2x margin of safety).
- Windfalls, extra savings: save half, spend half.

cut & earn

There’s a limit ~~to your love~~ to how much you can cut; not to how much you can earn. (× remove to perfection (Creative Being); reduce priorities (Essentialism))
cut ~~caught merger~~
- Know your biggest expenses. Have visibility on where you spend money (and where you could cut costs.)
- Reduce spending incrementally (or increase them decrementally). Cutting 15€ from your eating out expenses each month (until reaching your cutting goal, chop chop) is more sustainable and prone to stay. Don’t quit cold turkey, but cut it in slices.
- Review all of your subscriptions. Start from scratch, then review each subscription one by one, decide if you want to keep them. (× zero-based budgeting (Essentialism))
- One-offs instead of subscriptions. À La Carte method (Cartman method): replace subscriptions with one-off purchases (e.g. bandcamp (like Songtradr did)).
- Budget Jones’s Diary
  - Limited credits (budgeting): set a monthly budget for certain leisure expenses, switch to cheap options after you’ve spent it. “I allow up to $300 for eating out and coffee each month and when I exhaust this, I turn to instant coffee and packing my lunch.”
  - Mid-month budgeting check + course-correct
earn
- Negotiate higher pay. Reach for the moon, shoot at the stars.
  - Top Performer method:
    - On joining, ask what it would take to be a top performer. Set a concrete goal. Agree that you will discuss salary again if you reach the goal. Commit to history by a follow-up mail.
    - Meticulously track your impact in your projects. (Ask someone experienced at work on what to track if at a loss.) Regularly update your boss on your progress. (Though: rigged metrics (Skin in the Game); × OKR)
    - A few months before the review, ask your boss if you’re on the right track.
    - Just before the review, ask for a colleague to put in a good word for you. Bribe as needed.
    - Role-play the negotiation with friends with negotiation experience who can give you feedback — videotape it (send it to your boss). Visualizations (× Psycho-Cybernetics). Know what to say in every eventuality. “Negotiation is 90% mindset and 10% tactics”
    - At the review: come with a print-out of the e-mail chain, evidence of your impact on the project and company, competitive salaries (Glassdoor, Wageindicator, (former) coworkers). Threaten to switch companies if needed. Re-negotiate salary. “You’re not asking your mum for lemonade, you’re a professional who’s asking to be compensated fairly.” (“Sir, I’m not asking you for lemonade…”)
  - Research the job posting & the company. Have relevant experience to show for every line of the job posting. Know about the company. Already mention ideas or a plan for improving the company.
    - Ask “What qualities make someone do an extraordinary job in this position?” then show that you have past experience doing that. Have a repertoire of accomplishments and aptitudes at your fingertips that you mention in responses to commonly asked questions. (Success stories at previous jobs — e.g. CM)
  - The best time to negotiate is when you start a new job. This is the time when you have the most leverage, and will be the baseline for future raises.
    - Ask people at the company (better: people no longer at the company) how much they get, or how much you can expect or how much you can negotiate.
  - Let the employer do the first offer. “What’s a fair number that we can both work from?”
  - Negotiating means you value yourself more than the average employee. (× Never Split the Difference)
  - When negotiating, demonstrate the value you are bringing to the company. (e.g. bringing own gear, no need for training, own costs (QLab), consistency/show control). Highlight how you’ll make your boss’s life easier, or how you’ll make them look good.
  - Don’t ask yes/no questions. Not “Can you do 55k?” but “How can we get to 55k?”.
  - Ask for lopsided perks (lopside is the right side) (× lopsided perks (Never Split the Difference)). “Let’s talk about total compensation”
  - Smile. Like the Beach Boys.
  - Incantations
    - “Let’s find a way to arrive at a fair number that works for both of us.”
    - “How can we get to 55k?”
    - “I’m not comfortable revealing my salary, so let’s move on. What else can I answer for you?”
- Negotiate lower fees.
  - No yes/no questions. Request, don’t ask. (Don’t ask, don’t tell.) Make statements, be assertive. (× principles of assertiveness (Improvise)) (× Never Split the Difference)
  - Incantations
    - “I’d like X, please.” (my account to have free transactions and no minimum balance, please.)
    - “What can you do to X?” (remove the late fee?)
    - “I’d like to X.” (have this removed.)
    - “I’d like to X. What else can you do to help me?”
    - “I’d like to X. Do I need to do do anything besides ask right here on the phone?”
  - Track phone calls to institutions & outcomes — so you can refer back to previous calls contents (with precision) when calling. This scares people.
  - Threaten to leave, or to go to the competitor (mention attracting fees). The longer you’ve been at a bank, the higher value you are to them. Leverage this; use it as argument. “I’ve been a customer at yours for over 5 years.” Banks don’t want to lose you.
  - Negotiate in person or on the phone, not by mail or over ICQ.
- Small jobs on the side. You have many skills you don’t realize you can get paid for (e.g. dance lessons). Have a look at Craigslist. Passive income.

investingmentness

(running out of ink so being a bit more sparing with bolding in this section)

Invest in yourself, invest in your career. There is often no better investment.
Invest every month, for a long time.
- The longer you save, the less you have to save each month. Save long and prosper.
- Send money to your investment account each month, proportionally into your different funds.
- When getting started: save towards one investment fund at a time (minimum deposit). Asset allocation (assal for short) doesn’t have to be perfect from the get-go — it can take a few years until you reach your balanced portfolio. Create sub-savings goals.

Asset allocation (stock vs bonds) vs diversification (within an asset class)
- Asset allocation and diversification model: eg Swensen (or e.g. p241, example with Vanguard).
Actively managed mutual funds (overpriced, avoid); index funds (passively managed, good, low fees); target date funds (hands-off but not very accessible in the NL). If going the index funds route, typically invest in several to diversify. Rebalance every 12 months or so. (× enjoy your roots, have some funds (kids on holiday, animal collective))

To evaluate a fund, look at its track record over the last 10 years or more.
Frequent trading typically costs tax.

Look for low fees. A 1% fee can reduce your return by 30%, a 2% fee can half your investment return. A 1% fee is massive. Anything above 0.75% is expensive. For index funds, look for management fees around 0.2%.
- When picking a fund, know all the fees.

FIRE and LeanFIRE(!)
- FIRE/LeanFIRE is a decision. And if you want to reach it, you can choose how to achieve it. Decide in how many years you want to reach your crossover point and make a plan to reach it by then – how it would translate to how much to invest each month and how much to earn each month. (But don’t forget to live.)

Rule of 72: divide 72 by the interest rate to get the years it will take to double your investment. If you invest every month, it compounds even more.

Cautious with buying real estate: make sure your portfolio is still diversified, that you’re not investing it all into the house. A house should just be one item in your portfolio.
- Buying a house only makes sense if you’re staying there 10+ years.
- Having a house has a lot of hidden costs + the cost of not having the money in the stock market.
“Heart investing”: 10% of your portfolio for projects you want to support (a.k.a. small-scale angel investing) – only after you have your portfolio completely set-up and diversified.

misc

Baltimore Stockbroker Scam (prediction scam): have a large pool of people; tell half that Option A is going to win, the other half that Option B is going to win. Ditch whichever group you gave the wrong prediction. Repeat within the smaller group. Some people will have you seen making the right prediction e.g. 10x in a row.
- Forecasting needs to be public (and irreversible) for it to have value.
Automate monthly transfers to charity.
Offer a meeting time and location directly upon reaching out (“Are you available for a short talk? If so, would Monday at 2pm work for you?”)
“It’s important to me.” (x CM)