My Top 5 Investing Non-Negotiables

I recall when I was about 12 years old an old friend of my mom’s told me about a relative of his who purchased a whole bunch of stock at one price, sold it for a profit, and got rich overnight. I clearly remember thinking “man, if someone could just teach me how to do that!” This was my first introduction to “investing”: the idea that you can just pick the right stock, get lucky and end up rich. As I got older, I learned about mutual funds, annuities, life insurance, and other retail financial products. From there, I began to dive deep into the world of alternative investing. Things like real estate, private lending, note investing, bullion, and a few others. I learned there are good and bad in that world and began to focus on assets that I have a high level of control over.

After almost 15 years of investing experience, I want to share with you what I’ve deemed are the most important components that an investment must provide me with.

Here they are:

1. A real asset that I control. By a real asset, I mean something that is more than just a digit on a screen or a piece of paper. I prefer tangible assets because a tangible asset can’t just disappear. Paper and digits can. Control means that I can direct the outcomes of the asset and I am the final decision maker on it. I don’t personally like the idea that I can buy a stock, or a token and it can just be cut in half or disappear overnight. I don’t like the idea that someone else can post a tweet or a blog feed on reddit can impact the outcomes of my investment. Hence why I want real assets that I can control.

2. Passive income. At this stage of my life, I am focused on generating passive income. I’ve already achieved financial independence, which means I have passive income from my businesses and investments, but I personally have a passive income target from my investments specifically that I’ve not hit yet and I intend to. Passive means “not active or operating” and income means “a gain or recurrent benefit”. So passive income literally is a monetary gain or recurrent benefit that doesn’t require me to be active or to operate anything to get it. Aka, it pays me every regardless of whether I work or not. Passive income, also known as cash flow, is the holy grail of the investment world and that is why it’s the 2nd most important thing to me only next to having a real asset that I control.

3. Appreciation. After passive income, I want appreciation. Appreciation is different than income. Income means that the asset produces something on a regular basis that others want and that others pay for and I receive the income from that production stream on a regular basis. Appreciation means the market price or value of the asset can increase and I can grow my net worth as a result of that. Between the two, I prioritize the passive income first because it buys me freedom of my time, but if I can get both, then appreciation is a great additional benefit.

4. Leverage. Leverage means debt and I don’t mean it how most people do. Most people think of leverage as going to a bank and borrowing their money or going to investors and borrowing their money to buy assets that the person can’t afford with their own money. They tout it as OPM, or “other people’s money”. I think this is dumb and increases your risk and lowers your profit margins. When I say leverage, I refer to me owning the asset outright first. This means I use my own money to buy an asset because it will store my value and pay me passive income and could appreciate. Then, I can borrow against the asset as it grows, use the funds I’ve borrowed in invest in more assets and now I have two assets instead of one and my money grows in two locations at the same time. With life insurance, this is referred to as the Infinite Banking Concept, but the reality is that I can do this with life insurance, precious metals, and real estate.

5. Tax benefits. I don’t like paying taxes and I don’t believe it’s Constitutional. Now, with that being said, I understand that I would rather make more dollars than save on existing dollars. The action of making more dollars is an action of expansion. The action of reducing taxes is an action of economizing. Tax benefits are the last thing I look for when I invest because I have seen too many investments where there are great tax benefits, but the trade off is you miss out on the first 4 points I mentioned. You can lower your taxes without using investments to do it and I prefer to do it that way if possible so that I can focus on the main things that are important to me when it comes to investing and handle, the taxes separately. But, if an opportunity happens to have all 4 of the main points I mentioned, plus tax benefits, then I’m not opposed at all to investing.

There are assets that have all 4 or in some cases all 5 of these points included. Never let a financial advisor or someone otherwise convince you that you need to invest in things that aren’t real, that you don’t control, that don’t pay you passive income, and that don’t appreciate and don’t lower your taxes. At a minimum, you should always strive for the first 3 and if #4 and #5 make sense, then add those in too.

I’m sharing this article with you because my goal vision is that the majority of wealth is controlled by good people who use it to make the world a better place.

If you’re also good person who wants to help make the world a better place and you’d like more information on the Fraud Free World initiative or you’d like to support it with me, send an email to my team with “Fraud Free World” in the subject line to Contact@WealthDynamX.com.

If you’re a follower and have not read my book The Blueprint to Financial Freedom yet, that is the place to start. This book covers the specifics for each level in the various chapters and you can grab the book for free as my gift.

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The Blueprint to Financial Freedom by Jerry Fetta

To Purpose, Wealth & Freedom,

Jerry Fetta

Jerry Fetta is the CEO and Founder of Wealth DynamX. He is a nationally recognized financial expert featured in Forbes, Yahoo Finance, Fox, Chicago Weekly News, New York Finance, interviewed on 100+ podcasts with world renowned experts, earning endorsements and affiliations throughout his career with names like Kevin O’Leary, Grant Cardone, Dave Ramsey, and Pamela Yellen.

Jerry’s mission in life is to help create millions of financially educated and solvent families achieving greater financial freedom and sharing the truth about money with those around them.

Learn more at www.WealthDynamX.com

(DISCLAIMER: The information in this content should not be considered tax, financial, investment, or any kind of professional advice. Only a professional diagnosis of your specific situation can determine which strategies are appropriate for your needs. Wealth DynamX can and does not provide advice unless/until engaged by you.)