Becoming a millionaire is something a lot of us dream of but don’t really think we can achieve. Well, why not? Reaching the millionaire status isn’t an unachievable goal. There are more millionaires in the world that you may think; specifically, around 42 million millionaires as of 2019, which had gone up from 42 million the year before and 36 million the year before that, according to Credit Suisse’s annual Global Wealth Report.
So, you see that as more and more people become millionaires, the odds of you joining them keep getting better. But first, you have to have the right mindset to get started on your journey to wealth. Based on some of your personal traits, you might already be well on your way!
Here are 15 signs that you’re meant to be a millionaire:
1. The Entrepreneurial Bug Bit You Early
Many millionaires started making money at a very young age. We can see this with so many well-known billionaires of the world, from a 12-year old Mark Cuban who sold trash bags door-to-door, to 6-year old Warren Buffett selling packets of gum in his neighborhood. Richard Branson was just 11-years old when he began selling parakeets as pets!
If you had a similar tenacity for entrepreneurship in your childhood, that’s a good indicator that you’re meant to be a millionaire.
2. You’re an Overachiever
Were you that annoying student in class who reminded the teacher that they hadn’t given you homework before the weekend? Did you wallow in disappointment anytime you got a grade below an A- in class? Many millionaires are the “go big or go home” kind; they aren’t satisfied with making $1 million – they want $10 million!
3. You’re Good-Looking
We know it’s not fair, but we didn’t make it that way! It’s not just a myth that attractive people have more opportunities available to them. Being attractive gives them the advantage of self-confidence; they are able to charm their way through interviews and even make more sales.
They even have an advantage when it comes to salaries.
According to Daniel Hamermesh, an economics professor at the University of Texas in Austin “Attractive people are likely to earn an average of 3 percent to 4 percent more than a person with below-average looks.” This may not sound like much, but it can amount to up to “$230,000 more over a lifetime for the typical good-looking person.”
4. You’re a Go-Getter
“Are you the kind of person who sees an opportunity and then takes action to take advantage of it? If so, congratulations, because it’s that kind of action-oriented mindset that can propel you to financial freedom,” says Todd Campbell, author of Your Guide to Better Stock Picks, in a piece for The Motley Fool. That’s all that needs to be said about that!
5. You Act Quickly
Millionaires don’t sit on their hands and twiddle their thumbs waiting for the “right” time to invest/start a business. They are known to “seize the day”. Waiting leads you nowhere, so start taking the first step towards your dream right now. By the time you’re thinking it through, the opportunity could have passed.
6. You Focus on Earning Rather than Saving
Saving is a crucial aspect of excelling at money management, and we all know that the uber-rich are the ones who are most frugal. But just as good as they are at saving, they are better at spending wisely. This means they know that you have to spend money to make money, but also that they make sure to spend it in a manner that will yield them the best results.
7. You Were a Popular Kid
According to studies done by researchers Gabriela Conti (University of Chicago), Gerrit Mueller (Institute of Employment Research), Andrea Gaeotti (University of Essex) and Stephen Pudney (University of Essex), “Moving from the 20th to 80th percentile of the high-school popularity distribution yields a 10 percent wage premium nearly 40 years later.”
In layman’s terms, it just means that if you had a lot of friends in high school, you have a better chance of earning more money as an adult.
8. You Can Defer Gratification
According to writes Jason Hall, a writer, and editor for The Motley Fool, “Deferring gratification is one of the most important steps to becoming a millionaire.”
“The reality is building wealth generally takes a lot of time,” he continues, “Even Warren Buffett, one of the richest people alive and arguably the best investor ever, created more than 80 percent of his vast wealth after he turned 50.”
9. You Can Live Below Your Means
We’ve mentioned that rich people are actually quite frugal. And remember the number of millionaires in the world we talked about? This is how most of them, not regarding the Mark Zuckerbergs and Jeff Bezos of the world, got there. In fact, some of your neighbors may be millionaires and you might not even know about it! These people lived in modest homes, drove modest cars, and saved money instead of splurging on luxuries to get here.
10. You Leave the Past Behind
People who keep focusing on their pasts rarely have time to think about their future, or they may project their disappointment about what happened before into pessimism about what is to come. Those with the millionaire mindset do the opposite. Millionaires didn’t earn their wealth by cruising through life. These people have gotten over fear, failure, and rejection – they’ve overcome adversities and picked themselves up to get to where they are today – and they could only have done all of this is if they brushed off the past and looked to the future with an open mind.
11. You Like to Set Goals
Wealthy people spend a lot of their time setting long-term goals and plans on how to achieve them. According to Peter Voogd, founder of The Game Changers Academy, “You don’t make a million by accident. If it’s not a goal, you sure as hell won’t hit it.” Peter made his first million before turning 26, so he knows a thing or two about the millionaire mindset!
12. You’re Married and Have Never Been Divorced
Personal relationships may seem unrelated to finances, but marriage is more than just emotions. Think about it, when a person gets divorced, the wealthier of them usually give up some percentage of their wealth to the other party, thus reducing their net worth.
According to a 2006 study from Ohio State University, divorce can reduce a person’s wealth by about 77% compared to a single person. On the other hand, getting married increases the comparative wealth to about doubles (93%)!
“Divorce causes a decrease in wealth that is larger than just splitting a couple’s assets in half,” said Jay Zagorsky, author of the study and a research scientist at Ohio State University’s Center for Human Resource Research. “If you really want to increase your wealth, get married, and stay married.”
13. You Know Your Strengths
A jack of all trades is a master of none. This means that if you try to spread yourself too thin, you’ll never excel at what you’re actually good at. A millionaire knows his/her strengths and how to capitalize on them.
Gary Vaynerchuk once said, “I suck at 99 percent of the stuff, but I go all out on that 1 percent I’m good at.”
14. You Take Responsibility
Millionaires don’t whine, complain, or dump the blame on someone else when it comes to their failures. They accept responsibility and set out to look for ways to better themselves.
“Rich people believe, ‘I create my life,'” writes T. Harv Eker in his book, Secrets of the Millionaire Mindset. “Poor people believe, ‘Life happens to me.'”
15. You’re Always Focused on Self-Betterment
A millionaire doesn’t just get to a point of “good enough” and give up. They are constantly looking for ways to better themselves (and those around them) because the only way to keep up in today’s ever-changing world is to keep changing yourself by learning new skills, keeping up with current news trends, etc.
