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You Are What You Accumulate

You Are What You Accumulate

What do investors need to know about the Law of Accumulation, asks Michael Yardney

By: Michael Yardney

1 April 2015

What would you think if I told you your choice of lunch today was somehow linked to your success as a property investor? It’s a strange correlation I know, but trust me when I say they are surprisingly connected.

The truth is, every decision you make, be it big or small, influences your ability to reach your goals, thanks to the Law of Accumulation, which is a key principle of how people become wealthy through property.

This law states that everything great and worthwhile in life comes about as an accumulation of hundreds, if not thousands, of tiny efforts or sacrifices. This means that everything that you do, or that you fail to do, impacts on the final result you achieve.

It’s an unusual concept to wrap your head around, but once you understand it, you can start to fully appreciate how it can impact your accomplishments as a property investor.

Genuine Success

I’ve found that success rarely happens overnight nor comes about as the result of one single experience or breakthrough. Instead, lasting, genuine success gathers and accumulates over time. You have to put in countless seemingly insignificant efforts before you achieve anything worthwhile.

But that’s the power of the Law of Accumulation: It allows you to appreciate that once set yourself a goal, everything you do either helps or hurts you on your path towards reaching that goal.

This means everything you do either pushes you closer towards your goal, or drags you in the opposite direction.

Let me explain. Are you having difficulty saving that deposit for your first home or your next property investment?

Let’s go back to my lunch example. What did you have for lunch today? Did you make something yourself – a simple sandwich, or perhaps some reheated leftovers from last night? Or did you buy a salad and a muffin for $15?

If you’ve set yourself a goal to grow your wealth through property investing, then it stands to reason that every dollar you save in your day-to-day life could be put towards achieving your real estate goals.

If you bring your lunch to work every day for a year, you might spend $10 per week on raw ingredients. If you buy your lunch instead, you’ll spend closer to $75 per week. The money that you save by bringing your lunch accumulates over time and after 12 months, saving you close to $4,000.

Influencing Outcomes

So as you can see, the simple act of bringing versus buying your lunch becomes a situation of accumulation – one that could influence your outcomes as a property investor.

But it’s really much more powerful than that…

While creating wealth through property investing will rarely happen overnight, the Law of Accumulation means that your financial success will happen with the accumulation of factors that generally fall into three areas:

Knowledge: Let’s face it – knowledge is power. It’s a key factor that gives you leverage to recognise and act upon potentially fruitful opportunities. Your body of real estate knowledge accrues as the result of thousands of small pieces of information you accumulate over time. It doesn’t happen out of thin air – you have to invest thousands of hours into building your mental library one idea at a time. As a cumulative result of those years of study and growth you will become an expert that sets you apart from the average investor.

Experience: Successful people in any field are invariably more experienced than those who are not successful. In essence, the more experienced you are in any area, the quicker you can connect the dots the next time you’re making decisions, because you have a greater depth of information to draw from.

The only way to truly acquire experience is to be willing to take risks where there is no guarantee of success. The greatest enemy of mastery and experience is living within your comfort zone and allowing the anxiety that comes with the thought of trying something new and different to hold you back.

This means that unless you move out of your comfort zone and take chances you will not accumulate the new experiences you’ll need to stretch and grow. I’ve heard it said you learn to succeed only by failing!

Money: In almost every circumstance, large fortunes come about as an accumulation of many smaller amounts of money. They grow like a snowball, starting very small and growing as it rolls forward and accumulates millions of tiny snowflakes to its mass. This is particularly true for property investors who use the magic of time, leverage and compounding to grow their assets.

You’ve probably heard it said that it takes money to make money, so if you’re just starting your journey, the trick is to spend less than you earn, save the difference and then invest it. As your savings accumulate, you develop a momentum that moves you more rapidly toward your financial goals. Sure, it can be hard to get started on a programme of financial accumulation, so begin by saving say 5% of your income. These small amounts will slowly add up and before long, you’ll be able to set aside 8%, then 10% or even more. When you successfully save money in this way, you set up a force field of energy around that money, which serves to attract even more money into your life.

Isn’t it time you used the power of the Law of Accumulation to help you develop financial freedom through property investment?

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