110 | A Millionaire Next Door Case Study | Rocky Lalvani

110 | Rocky Lalvani, blogger at Richer Soul, shares his story of growing up as an immigrant’s child, learning how to save money in his early years, and how he’s teaching his own children about finances now.

 

Rocky’s parents came to the U.S. in 1968, when Rocky was 2 years old. Among Rocky’s parents’ friends and their community, money was an open topic, and in pursuit of the “American Dream” his family consistently climbed the financial ladder. When Rocky was 7 his father became a single dad, and Rocky started learning how to be more independent, personally and financially.   Paying attention to what customers and supervisors actually wanted helped Rocky advance at work. How much was Rocky saving when he was working in his youth? Rocky worked through college by delivering pizza and working at the university, finishing without any student debt. When he got his first post-college job, his dad helped him set up all the available automated savings accounts – 401k, company stock, etc. After realizing he needed to get out of consumer debt, what was Rocky’s strategy? Rocky’s plan was always to be a millionaire – he had been calculating and trying strategies since early on. Seeing people lose their life savings in an economic downturn motivated Rocky to get himself into a steady financial position. What steps did Rocky take to get himself to FI? Started saving early. Always spent less than he made. Rocky paid off his mortgage as early as possible. How is Rocky teaching his children about money? At this point, Rocky’s children are young adults – they don’t need things to be confident. Rocky wishes that in addition to teaching how to save money, he had also taught his children to earn money. Rocky’s strategy to help his daughter do well on the SAT, and hopefully earn a good scholarship, was to download an app on her phone and answer one SAT question a day for three years, prior to taking the exam. Earning a scholarship to college is a sliding scale – a student might earn scholarship at a lower tier school, when they would not earn anything at a “better” school. Rocky and his son went a step further and did their best to figure out how to pay for college with the lowest price tag.

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