Blake Konrardy - Millennial Millionaire: Optimize Your Financial Life and Get Rich

I never imagined Id be skiing in the Swiss Alps in August while the balance in my brokerage account surpassed $600,000. For starters, I didnt know it was possible to ski in the summer. Yet here I was wrapping up my glacial skiing adventure, riding in a gondola down to Zermatt, a village nestled under the mighty Matterhorn mountain. As I was taking off a few layers of clothes to prepare for the 70-and-sunny weather at the mountain base, I thought I might as well take this chance to check my investment account balances, since I hadnt looked in a couple of weeks. I couldnt help but smile as I saw the account at $603,327 up over $300,000 from where it had been just two years prior.

My wife, Rachel, must have noticed me grinning like an idiot, because she asked what was so funny. When I shared the good news with her, she muttered Oh, thats cool, before returning her gaze to the incredible mountain peaks. Her reaction reminded me that money is just the tool that enables the kind of experience we were having, so I slipped my phone back into my pocket and joined her.

You may think experiences like this are reserved for the ultra-wealthy: people with family money or Fortune 500 CEOs. However, I dont fit into that mold, and, odds are, neither do you. Fortunately, its possible to quickly become a millionaire starting from nothing. Less than two years after that ski trip, my net worth surpassed $1,000,000.

I didnt win the lottery; I didnt inherit an estate. Rather, I was able to hit that milestone by identifying small life changes that can make a big financial impact. And this knowledge allows me to share some good news: you dont have to work at Google and live in a van to become a millionaire. Nothing I did was that remarkable or extreme, and that is why I am writing this book. It combines the advice of dozens of experts with my own personal lessons learned to provide the average Joes guide to become a millionaire. I will teach you the changes you can make today to rapidly accumulate wealth and live the life you desire, without luck or gimmicks.

I realize this may sound like I am touting exactly that: a get rich quick scheme. Thats because society ingrains a skepticism of financial success in us. We learn that youre not supposed to be a young millionaire. Youre not supposed to do whatever you want in life.

Youre supposed to rack up debt to go to college and grad school, get a decent-paying job, and buy a fancy car and a big house. Youre supposed to pay off your student loans in 10 years, pay off your mortgage in 30 years, and retire after 40 years of working with whatever little money youve saved on the side, hoping youre healthy enough at age 70 to actually enjoy retirement.

However, I dont like doing what youre supposed to do. I dont like following the prescribed path in life. Thats why, when I was 25 years old, I set a goal to be a 30-year old millionaire and live the rest of my life without having to worry about money.

I began my financial journey with a whopping $232 in my bank account at age 21 and became a millionaire less than a decade later. This book will show you exactly how I did it.

With virtually no savings and no debt, my starting position of $232 was actually a luxury compared to most college graduates. It took a rare combination of factors to make this happen: I went to a state school, received substantial scholarships, graduated a semester early, and worked part-time. I recognize this is an uncommonly fortunate starting point, so dont fret if youre starting off well in the red. Most people do, and Ill show you examples of how they quickly went from a negative net worth to seven figures.

After college, I landed my first full-time job as a statistician at an insurance company. The pay was solid: a $55,000 salary in a low cost-of-living city in Central Illinois. Many of my peers took their newfound big-kid paychecks and bought new cars or rented fancy apartments. Instead, I rented a 3-bedroom house with two roommates, where we each paid $400 a month. It wasnt luxury living, but as a 22-year-old, I didnt need much luxury to enjoy playing beer pong in our unfinished basement.

At work, I strove to quickly increase my income by doing what was guaranteed to make me money: passing industry exams and submitting patents, which provided automatic salary increases and bonuses. I also made it clear to my leadership that I wanted to move up in the company and was motivated to do whatever it took. This helped me land an internal promotion into a new department, giving me a $15,000 pay bump and setting me up for higher-paying jobs in the future.

During this time, I was also experimenting with a few side gigs to earn extra income. My first was a hip-hop blog that paid some of my college apartment rent and generated an extra $5,000 when I sold it. Unfortunately, that little success inflated my ego enough that I began to believe I was an entrepreneurial prodigy, and I quickly lost that $5,000 trying to start a company making protein-fortified beer (who could have guessed that idea would flop!?). After this and a few more business duds, I had some real success in a side gig using my background as a statistician to develop a predictive model for sports betting. It turns out my most valuable skills at work were also useful at making money on the side.

At age 25, I moved to San Francisco so I could save more money. Yes, you read that right; I moved to the most expensive city in the country to increase my saving rate. Theres a common misconception that high cost-of-living areas are a nightmare for accumulating wealth. While thats true if youre working a minimum wage job, if the right opportunity (and salary) can bring you there, it can actually accelerate your income growth. While my rent was nearly 10 times what it was in Illinois, I doubled my salary and got a significant relocation check that I pocketed and invested. Another significant event happened during this time: I married my wife, Rachel, who is financially savvy in her own right.

After growing my net worth to $500,000 in San Francisco, I recognized my solid financial footing and made a non-financial life decision. Rachel and I returned to our true home of Chicago to be closer to our family and friends. During this move, we leveraged our high San Francisco salaries to negotiate pay at our new jobs, ending up with about the same income and significantly lower expenses.