How Phil is achieving the life of his dreams....

I have a friend, let's call him Phil. He also has a background in physics (like me) -- he's currently finishing off his Ph.D. Phil is 31 years old, and his true PASSION is research -- that's what he'd like to do for his life. BUT he wants to do the research HE wants to do -- not what someone else wants him to do. That poses a problem.

Phil knows that to live the life he wants to, he'll need money to support himself and his research work. If he works a regular full time job all his life, he realizes that most likely he won't have the time to do what he really wants to do.

However, he can't look to the scientific community to help find the key to solving his money problems. Many working scientists have money problems themselves! Money isn't their specialty -- while some do okay, some seem to have a positive loathing of money.

If Phil can't solve his problem, he won't be able to live the life of his dreams. Then he discovered a solution.

While he's doing his Ph.D., he's also working a full-time job. He's able to do this because he works answering the phones for technical support company. Much of his time is spent waiting by the phone; if nobody calls, he's allowed to spend his time doing his own work. Also, he often works night-shift, leaving some of his days free. This led to the following realization.

Phil discovered that with the income from his job, he was qualified to get a bank loan to buy a house. He had already saved enough for a down-payment.

With his money and a loan from the bank for the rest, he purchased a house. He doesn't live there (he still lives in cheaper rented shared accommodation). His house is purely for investment.

He made sure that the rental income from the house MORE than pays the bank loan, interest, and other expenses of his house. He purchased a house in a fast growing area, just on the outskirts of the city area. It took a while to find a house with the kind of financial characteristics he needed, so that the rental income was high enough to pay all the expenses.... But he eventually found one and bought it. (He estimated the rental income by talking to the real estate agent, and the bank told him how much his regular payments would be to pay back his loan.)

The house he bought was pretty ugly looking, but Phil recognized that for this house, it was just superficial. After he bought it, he spent a couple weeks painting it and its appearance really improved. He was able to raise the rent he could charge substantially. He achieved quite a bit! Let me explain.

Phil now had one house, and because of the way he had organized things, it was bringing IN money, even after his regular payments to the bank! It was a small amount of money -- maybe $50 per week extra -- but it was an extra $50 per week in his pocket he wouldn't have had otherwise. Some of this was from the fact that his interest payments to the bank were tax deductible. In addition to this, his tenants were effectively buying the house for him since their rental income was paying off his bank loan. But that was just the beginning!

He had one house, but Phil kept saving more money. About a year later, he found he could buy another house, partly using his first house as collateral for the loan. He told me that after your first loan, the next loan is easier, if the bank sees you've managed to make a steady profit from it. So he took the next step.

He got another bank loan, and found another house, again with the characteristics he wanted -- the rental income had to MORE than pay off the payments for the bank loan. So he purchased another house!

Again, he found -- because of how he's structured it -- that his second house was putting another $50 or so extra per week in his pocket. In addition to this, his tenants were now effectively paying off his second house for him! But there's more to his story.

It's now about 2 1/2 years since he bought his first house.... And last time I spoke with him about a week ago, Phil was shopping around for his third house....

Right now, he's putting the finishing touches on his Ph.D. thesis and preparing to take a three-week holiday in Italy when it's done. However, if Phil keeps going as he has been, his future is secured.

After he gets another few more houses, Phil won't need to work -- the extra money from his houses will become a living wage. A steady stream of income which he doesn't have to work for. That will free him to LIVE a life of his true PASSIONS!

What are your dreams, and how do you want to achieve them? Learn from the example of Phil and others -- there are many paths to success, what it takes is a vision based on solid knowledge, and then the action to implement it. If you do this, then you could be living the life of your dreams too!

- Dien Rice