About

Hi.  It’s me. The Millionaire Moron.

I am the definition of insanity.

Insanity:  Doing the same thing over and over and expecting different results.

Yup, that’s me.  In other words, a moron.  Primarily when it comes to personal finance. 

Luckily, I am also a millionaire.  Let me clarify that, my wife is a millionaire since “what’s hers is hers, and what’s mine is hers.” 

Millionaire definition:  Where my net worth is greater than $1,000,000 and is calculated by subtracting my liabilities from my assets.  I am not including the value of our home in this calculation

How did this moron become a millionaire?  By the grace of God really and a huge help from compound interest over time.

“Compound interest is the 8th wonder of the world.  He who understands it, earns it…he who doesn’t…pays it.” – Albert Einstein

I followed the simple suggestion to start contributing to a 401K at the start of my career.  It’s true that if you “set it and forget it”, even if it is a small percentage to start, you simply live on the rest and let compounding do the rest.  Trust me, it was hard at first as I needed every penny of that first paycheck making $18,000 a year to live in NYC in 1997.   

I want to highlight that although I did not join the workforce until my late twenties, I still became a millionaire despite missing out on some crucial early compounding years. 

Why did I join the workforce so late? 

I wish I could say it was because I was traveling the world helping those in need.  The cold truth is that I was earning a PHD in exploring the bottom of a bottle and various “dry goods”.  I have the disease of more.  If one is good, a thousand is better so I believed.  So, I crashed and burned, hitting bottom during my first attempt at college.  With the help of others, I dusted myself off, sobered up (been clean ever since) and went back to a new university as the first one said, “Uh, no thank you.”  This put me on the seven-year graduation plan but I graduated and then got to work.

As Billy in Love Actually says, “Kids, don’t do drugs!”  Please just ignore his second piece of advice tied to that. [GIF?}

The reality is that I should have a net worth in the eight figures.  Hence, I was a moron along the way.  For many years, I lived well above my means.  Racking up debt.  Paying it off.  Racking it up.  I bought stuff to impress others who could care less. I took out a loan from our 401K to buy a house not once, but twice. One with the perfect timing of purchasing a home in July 2008 right before the housing crash.  Yeah, that was a fun hole to dig out of. 

When I really think about what was the root cause of my moronicity, it was fear. Plain and simple fear.  My fear of not getting what I wanted led to stupid and risky decisions.  My fear of losing what I had prevented me from taking the risks when the right opportunities presented themselves.  My fear of disappointing my wife and children poured gas on the fire to live well above my means. 

I cannot go back and change the past.  My goal is to share all of my hard-earned lessons with you, both good and bad, to hopefully help you not make the same mistakes I have made and take the right actions. 

Best way to not be a moron?  Don’t do what the moron did!

Thank you for allowing me to be of service. 

The Millionaire Moron