The Art of Doing Deals....

Thanks Simon.... Bartering is a form of deal-making too.... I've read what Jay says in his book, "Getting Everything You Can Out of all You've got" about this topic, it's quite interesting....

I've been studying the life of one of my heroes, Kirk Kerkorian.

Kerkorian's life has been an example of how far good deal-making can take you -- that's how he's become one of the top 30 richest Americans (with $7.8 billion in wealth)....

In addition to this, everyone praises Kerkorian, as an honest and honorable person. Kirk Kerkorian shows that you can be on the lookout for good deals, and still be a person of integrity....

The best deals tend to be win/win for everyone.

When Warren Buffett buys a company fully (that is, buying the company completely), he's also doing a deal....

Though Buffett's style of deal-making is very simple, because it's generally always the same. He's looking to buy good companies (with growing profits) at cheap prices, but he leaves the management free and intact....

What the manager-founders get out of it is they get money for themselves, yet they still get to run their company like they did before.... Buffett's purchases are always friendly, which is why there are always people happy to sell to him, even though they know that he always pays less than what he believes it's worth. Everyone's happy, so it's win/win....

And of course, another famous deal-maker is Donald Trump.... A lot of his wealth has come from doing deals. Another lesser-known (but much more wealthy) deal maker is John Kluge (he's the 15th richest American, according to Forbes magazine, worth $13 billion).... Much of his wealth comes from a lifetime of buying and selling media companies....

This knowledge works on the small scale or on the large scale. For example, Kirk Kerkorian was buying and selling cars as a teenager, after that he bought and sold planes, and it was only later on that he bought and sold companies (he's bought and sold MGM about three times).... All these activities require knowledge of the art of negotiation....

The applications of this topic are vast....

And as the above examples show, knowing this could make you rich....

- Dien