At Millionaire Foundry, we believe Lowering Your Burn Rate – the amount of cash you ‘burn’ to cover living expenses – is so critical that it is the first of the four mandatory drivers to building wealth.
When you cut the spending that covers your living expenses, your first Big Win is that you save more, growing wealth faster because you’re able to put more cash into Your Wealth Generating Machine.
Your Wealth Generating Machine, also a mandatory wealth driver, in turn has more fuel to generate even more cash output, moving you with greater speed towards your financial goals.
It now becomes easier to reach retirement and other financial achievements.
But if you can’t bring your spending consistently below your income, you’ll never accumulate meaningful wealth. Therefore it’s mandatory you succeed in setting a budget and sticking to it.
The second and even Bigger Win of Lowering Your Burn Rate is that by learning to live on less, you won’t need as much total cash to reach your Financial Independence Day.
Financial freedom is that point where you no longer have to work to earn income because your assets do all the hard work of generating cash for you.
Reaching that milestone means that you can live life on your terms, no longer tethered to a 6:00am alarm, followed by an ugly rush hour, and a boss you dislike.
Your life can truly become your own.
Targets to reach financial independence (which some call retirement) are usually based on your projected living expenses once you’re 100% dependent on the income your assets generate to cover your Burn Rate.
The lower your long-term annual living expenses, the less cash you need to become financially independent.
It’s that simple.
Permanently lower your living expenses and you’ll reach financial freedom more quickly.
Some experts suggest saving enough to replace 80% or more of your current annual income in retirement.
Throughout their working years, savvy wealth accumulators rarely use that much of their income just to cover their living expenses.
Depending on your circumstances, setting the target at 80% or above may cause you to unnecessarily delay your Financial Independence Day in order to save more than you may actually need.
Of course we support saving as much as possible because few regret having too much money.
But wealth is freedom, and reaching your Financial Independence Day more quickly will entirely transform your life.
When people set a budget and commit to reducing their spending, they often look only to the immediate positive impact of a dollar saved, which is important because it does boost savings.
But if every aspiring wealth accumulator also considered that they Win Double when they control their spending, there would be even more focus on the critical step of cutting living expenses to save more.
The sooner you take action to Lower Your Burn Rate, the more you will benefit from the Double Win.
Time is critical because every dollar you save has the potential to fuel your wealth accumulation for the rest of your life.
Spend a dollar now and it forever loses its power to serve you in reaching your wealth goals.
Even if your finances are not where you’d like them to be today, taking the first step by lowering your Burn Rate will give you the peace of mind that you’re heading in the right direction.
And each dollar you save immediately goes to expand your wealth foundation. No risk, only reward.
If you find yourself close to retirement but the financial models show you don’t have enough saved, permanently reducing your Burn Rate can get you partially back on track, and may even help you close the gap altogether.
Wherever you’re at in your wealth journey, don’t miss out on the incredible power of the Double Win you get when you cut spending.
Commit today to reach your Financial Independence Day more quickly.
Accelerate your wealth journey by starting at Lower Your Burn Rate.
Wealth is Freedom!
A First Generation Millionaire