poker takes less hours to get good at. but it still takes hard work. take a look at the best players in the NLHE and see where there lives are going. off the top of my head brian has a terrific work/study ethic, taylor started his own company, strassa is a trader, foxwoodsfiend is goign to yale to be a lawyer.

to respond to the OP. i don't think 50k can change a life style. as everyone has said 50k will be blown through quite fast. however if we can save and invest that money while holding onto a job... then we can learn some sort of skill, a language, take classes, invest in real estate. for instance if someone wanted to become a profsesional musician, having 50k saved up to help along the way i think could be decisive.

Apparently you didn't read the thread and are under the assumption I think someone can retire on $50k even though I was arguing the counter. The title of the thread was someone elses view that I was in disagreement with. If you did read the thread then I really have no clue what you're talking about and am certain you don't either.

Disagree. My thought process is very uncommon not just for 20 somethings but for people in general since as others have acknowledged throughout the thread this is something a lot of people don't realize until it's too late, if ever at all. Your pompous tone (I guess something you're known for judging from other posts) also seems to imply you disagree with my views even though as far as I can tell you haven't disagreed with anything other than what adds more to someones quality of life, extra money or more genuine enjoyment of what they do for a living.

Yep. It's either this or somehow getting out of working at a job you hate by means of generating passive income or saving up a big enough amount to retire early. Otherwise just having an additional $50k in the bank or even an extra $200K in the bank isn't changing ones lifestyle.

You are presenting yourself as dumb and immature, but that's not the main problem. The main problem, is that people are giving various kinds of good advice and presenting interesting ideas, but you just have a massive blind spot and are just sticking to your original thoughts. Instead you should be reading what people write and be saying, "hey that's good advice, that's an interesting idea, I've learnt something". But you don't. No-one can talk any sense into you. So why bother trying.

A lump some is more beneficial to someone it debt but only in the short term. Depending or their debt and the amount of money they receive they will maintain for a while and then slip back into the pattern of debt they had in the past.

For people who already are well-to-do, a cash windfall will have little effect on their lives. They will continuing doing what they have been doing in the past to become successful. Outside of couple minor upgrades or splurges their lives will remain relatively the same regardless of the windfall.

Unless you win millions in the lottery your earning and spending habits are going to determine how successful you are in the long run.

Poker players often don't realise how lucky they are to have their brains perfectly calibrated towards playing well. You have to not be a degenerate who loses his mind every time money is lost and won, but at the same time, you need to have a will to gamble and get a nice endorphin hit every time you score big and a feeling of emptiness when you don't. On the surface these are contradictions but some of us (notably the successful players) have both and some have a very sick balance.

Without this balance I think its impossible to be successful at poker regardless of time/effort/skill level. Some very smart people never 'get' poker, while some average people do, making up for lack of skill with hardwork. But the brain wiring seems to be a one constant with all successful poker players.

Of course, there's poker players who go on to other things. I'd argue that we haven't had a hyper successful poker player who's been hyper successful elsewhere... yet. But we're all pretty young and probability says that one of us will go on to be big time.

50k would go in the mattress and make me feel better about unexpected expenses. I probably wouldn't even take a day off work. I may buy a new camera+lens (~4-5k), and my wife would want me to buy her something ~1-2k.

i disagree with your post. the easiest to respond to is your last point and greenplastic is someone who is hyper succseful in business now. although true, that is just one person out of many.

Yes, $50k changed my lifestyle.

I knew I was different from most of the people here, but didn't realize how far out of the majority.

I've held a job since I was 14 and am now in my mid twenties. Since I worked through college I had no debt. 3 years out of college I have a bit more than $50k in savings.

Right around the time I had $50k saved up, I asked my job if I could move to just working Tues-Thurs. They agreed and I now only work 3 days a week.

Some key factors are probably that I am not married, don't have kids, and don't own a car (I have owned cars in the past though just to point that out). I live exactly where I want to live though and I wouldn't want to live anywhere else. I'm quite frugal, but still have pretty much everything I desire, but my expectations are lower. I'm not a hermit either, although I'm definitely not a social butterfly, but I was just out a club the other night with some friends.

There was another factor that influenced me though, which was the death of my 3 year old god-daughter earlier this year. That event was what made me take stock and think hey you know what, $50k is enough to get me (just me, you others probably are not frugal enough) through quite a few years even if I lost my job, so I am going to try actually enjoying life some more.

When I look at others, I know a lot of people living paycheck to paycheck. I'd like to think $50k would change their lives too, and it may, but realistically I have seen how even when they get a nice lump sum from something like accident insurance or some such, they usually blow through it within a small timeframe and go back to hand-to-mouth.

So, yes $50k literally changed my lifestyle.

Oh, and after re-reading my last post, I'd like to point out I live in a rented apartment in the middle of the city, just to prevent confusion on that point.

I'd be shocked if anyone was actually reading this thread anymore. But I'm going to toss in my .02 anyway. If find it somewhat odd that this thread has been so focused on how you need $X to maintain some standard of quality of life. IMO, quality of life is tied to PASSIVITY OF INCOME, not necessarily to amount of cash in the bank.

When I first started out in investing (first in small business, then in real estate) I had it in my mind that I wanted to retire at age X with $X. I was obsessed with this number and age. Right now I can't remember why those two numbers spoke so strongly to me.

I slaved for several years, mostly working 16 hour days. Work, then to my businesses and renovating rental houses. I thought I was being smart. Then one day I got together with some of my college buddies. We spent a week together camping and hiking. I noticed some things 1) I had no idea how stressed out I was, and 2) I realized i was not happy. I didn't ever want to leave the goddam woods and face my life. It was a SHOCKING realization for me. I thought I was being smart.

From that day on I made a decision. I no longer cared at all about retirement. I don't really plan to retire ever. I decided that I was going to get rid of all my businesses and other crap and focus on rental properties that show significant cash flow. I wanted semi-passive investments that generate cash I can live on.

I built a decent portfolio and it all runs itself pretty neatly. I work about 20 hours per week now, but if I were being honest I could probably work much less.

Is $50k enough to change your life? Absolutely. With $50k you can buy several cash flowing rentals in MANY parts of the country. Right now, I bet I could pretty easily make $2k per month in income from a $50k investment. Then I could use that $2k per month to buy more rentals. I think that if you are smart about HOW you invest the money, and HOW you build you business (focus on PASSIVITY, which I'll admit I haven't bee the best at), you can get to a place where you have a solid upper-middle class income within 5 years and spend very little time actually operating your business.

Thats a little unfair spex. You spent years developing the skillset necessary...and while it seems to have come easy to you, for the vast majority it would not.

The point is, that the vast majority of people (assuming they aren't fools with their money) can become noticeably more secure with a windfall of $50k.

In the 3rd world, lives are being changed with $50 microloans.

PLEASE never stop posting. Great post.

Nah I've agreed with various posts in the thread and disagreed with others. The specific topic you're referring to was the whole issue of:

Which I agreed with what Henry wrote here. Just because I don't agree with everything you say you resort to forming quick generalizations about me and slinging insults? I don't believe I'm the one hat's immature. A view was stated, I disagreed with it. Someone insulted me, I responded back in the same manner.


I haven't even disagreed with most of the advice in the thread (care to quote something?) considering I agree with most of the things posted. I disagreed with the topic above and with Henry on what adds more value to ones life. Not sure what your problem is

Agree entirely.

I'm guessing you didn't read the whole thread but this was what I agree with and why I disagree that $50k or some lump sum changes much of anything (unless the person already had this knowledge of what to do with it like you mention). When I mentioned this earlier in the thread it was when Henry said he found it "weird" that I felt being able to stop working would be closely tied in with quality of life even though thats what passive income is... income without working.

My entire view was just that lump sums of money do nothing for lifestyle unless it was a HUGE amount that would be able to sustain a lifestyle without working. If you don't get that then the best bet to change lifestyle was find a job where you absolutely enjoy it and the lifestyle it brings, or being able to generate enough passive income to not have to work either. This appears to be what you're saying as well but feel free to point out something I'm missing since you are respected for knowing what you're talking about on these boards.

Very nice post. So in this sense it would seem that $50k "can" change your lifestyle but it would require first knowing what to do with it. But if you already know what to do with $50k to have this type of impact, wouldn't it be easy to get the money? I was thinking that if someone already has the knoweldge/resources/contacts then the problem wouldn't be finding the $50k to invest with. Or in other words, I was thinking that people would be better off just focusing on attaining that knowledge and the contacts rather than the money because it would serve them much better. And if they did know what to do with it then it wouldn't be the $50k changing their lifestyle it would be that skill and ability they have to invest it. If you give a random person $50k that doesn't know what to do with it then it would just be wasted, but give it to someone else and they would be able to do a lot, so it wouldn't be the $50k having that impact it would be the knowledge they have. I agree with everything you wrote and it sounds like it basically falls into the category of generating passive income through investing, which obviously would change ones lifestyle.

Okay you can get your $50k worth of implants.

But most people can use $50k to take a significant step towards financial security, thus noticeably improving their quality of life.

Ok, that is true. At this point I have a skill set. But what I do is very easy. Anyone might not be able to hold their own against the smart guys on Wall Street. But in REI its a different ball game. Everything you need to know about REI to be successful it readily available in about 20 books and courses. You can spend less $1,000 and about 3 months to gain just about all the expertise you need to get started right.

You wouldn't start out in REI flipping apartment buildings like I do. But that isn't what I meant when I said I could make $2k/mo on a $50k investment. You can find regular houses, rooming houses, mobile home deals, etc. That stuff doesn't take any special expertise to do.

Stop trolling with insults (it's pretty immature) and elaborate on your stance on what someone who comes into $50k is supposed to do with it to make a "significant" step towards financial security. The main things needed to get financial freedom is knowledge and contacts... if most people had that they would get financial freedom but if most people had $50k then they can't do anything with it. Keep in mind that this discussion was about changing ones lifestyle as we have been discussing and others have mentioned as well:

Your worldview is narrow, naive and very bizarre. What other people can do with $50k is not dictated by what goes on inside your head. If you can't get this then you have serious problems and you should seek counseling.

Fwiw, my views are not naieve and bizarre which you would know if you bothered reading the thread at all, in which many others feel the same way.

But I can see that when it comes to actual constructive discussion of the topic that involves thinking and intellect you have nothing to offer and revert back to pointless trolling. Carry on.

You need help. Get counseling.

I agree with boobies4me by the way. Anyway everyone is going off topic.

What? You agree that money can only be used for instant gratification, and that noone plans for the future?