Business, Economics & Law
Financial Freedom
How to Create Wealth and Hold onto it
by Rainer Zitelmann
There is no shortage of books on how to get rich. But this book, which has already enjoyed major success in Germany and China, is different. It is not another “self-help book” full of simple prescriptions for building wealth. Unlike a majority of books on how to get rich, most of which merely reflect the personal opinions of their authors, this book is based on hard facts and the scientific findings of wealth research. The author wrote his doctoral dissertation on the psychology of the super-rich and it was subsequently published in English as The Wealth Elite. While his dissertation is a scientific book (and therefore not appealing to every reader), Financial Freedom is a much easier read and is far more accessible to general audiences. For example, the book opens by telling the stories of people who became rich (e.g. as pop stars, athletes, lottery winners) before losing everything. The book’s USP is that it is written for “novices” (i.e. readers without even a basic understanding of the world of finance) and more “advanced readers” (i.e. those with a greater understanding of the topic). There are three key reasons why the author is the right person to write on this topic: He became very wealthy himself in just a few years as an entrepreneur and real estate investor. He knows many rich and super-rich individuals, including multibillionaires, and has talked to them about their path to wealth. He is a scientific “wealth researcher.” The first part of the book is all about getting rich, while the second part focuses on staying rich. The author reveals that very few people get rich on the stock market. Stocks are great when it comes to staying rich, but not for becoming rich. To get rich, you need to become an entrepreneur and invest in real estate. The author advises readers to find out if they have what it takes to become an entrepreneur by first launching their own business as a sideline. He also shows how swimming against the current and doing things differently are the keys to becoming rich.
