How To Become A Millionaire In 10 Steps Flat

Want to know how to become a millionaire? This story of the world’s first virtual millionaire may be able to tell us something!

There’s this woman who made a million dollars by creating a female avatar (or online character) in a video game called Second Life. By building a business empire within the video game’s alternative universe through real estate and arbitrage of virtual land, items and currencies, she amassed a fortune in the game’s currency which could be converted into real life dollars.

This female entrepreneur leveraged a premium membership of $9.95 in the video game and turned it into a million dollars. How sweet is that! Here are some images depicting her avatar as well as her true identity (her real name is Ailin Graef):





Image Sources: Idea City

It goes to show you, anybody can become a millionaire by doing something well.

Even mastering a video game.

That is one unusual way to make it big. How about the more conventional avenues? Well there’s some great advice out there on how to become a millionaire, mostly telling you that you need to save, invest your money wisely and let it cook for a while. At the end of a few decades, you’ll be rich with a million bucks.



That’s all absolutely true, but I thought to provide some additional thoughts on this subject with the following commandments.

How To Become A Millionaire: 10 Mandates To Get To A Million

#1 Start saving and investing early.

The younger you are, the greater your chance of making a million if you start saving and investing early! The power of compounding is on your side. To start, you can open an online brokerage account — some good ones are Zecco and TradeKing.

Tip: If you’re ready to invest, here’s a full list of the If you’re ready to invest, here’s a full list of the best online stock brokers that I would highly recommend.

#2 Know that any type of work or business can make you rich if it has a market.

Any line of work can potentially make you a millionaire if you’re successful at it, and especially if you’re really good at it. Your skills, if they answer a strong demand, could be your ticket to big things. Many of the wealthy are people who excel at what they do — whether it be in sports, entertainment, sales, real estate, business, art, engineering, writing.

#3 Make some money by doing something you like to do.

If you enjoy what you do, the chances of you becoming great at your chosen area of work will increase. It bears repeating that if you are in a marketable line of work or calling, you have the opportunity to rise to the top and conceivably make very good money. As an example, check out these people who make money blogging. Many folks start out with a hobby that they eventually turn into a business.

#4 Enter the field you want to be in and find out what’s marketable about it.

Strategically work towards the goal of breaking into a marketable career. For example, you can start out in food preparation. But then build your experience and learn the business as best as you can so that one day you may start something on your own.

#5 Help yourself succeed with the following traits: positive mindset, can-do attitude, willingness to learn, knowledgeability, persistence, determination, passion and being action-oriented.

#6 Be willing to make sacrifices and to reset priorities.

Stop spending, watch your budget and set aside some money. Try to find some inspiration to help you through the financial challenges. Look into other people’s success stories and take encouragement from their own experiences.

#7 Don’t buy into the belief that you can get rich overnight. The only way you can do so is by being lucky. You can have a windfall fall on your lap tomorrow, but that would be lady fortune smiling upon you — a chance event. Lotteries and casinos are obvious crap shoots. If someone offers you the formula to get rich tomorrow with very little work all for a “small” fee, run away. It’s a scam.

#8 Learn all you can about finance.

Don’t invest blindly. Read up on it, learn how other successful people have made it and do the research via books, the web, workshops, classes or seminars.

#9 Learn all you can about business, if you want to become an entrepreneur.

Don’t get into business blindly. Learn how to run, operate and manage a business before you take on that risk. There are many people with specific talents who entered into business and failed. That’s because it’s not enough to be able to cultivate an idea or a skill, you’ll also need to know something about business before starting one. Either you have the head for business, or get a partner who does.

#10 Know the rest of the wealth formula, realizing that making money is just the first step to success.

Make money: this is obvious. You have to start somewhere, after all.

Grow your money: Your money has to work for you as well. So learn how to make it grow.

Preserve it, keep it, protect it: this is one element often overlooked in conventional financial advice because it’s not as exciting as the “making” and “growing” steps. But this is a whole realm of finance you’ll want to keep abreast of to be able to grasp the big picture. Some topics on this cover trusts, estate planning, asset protection, insurance and other wealth preservation strategies.

A Couple of Last Points

You don’t have to do everything yourself. You can always hire others — reputable experts(!) — to implement your plan. But I’d advice that you don’t hire a professional without knowing about these subjects yourself. You don’t want someone else, no matter how much you trust them, to be in control of your finances. In the end, you are the one who cares the most about your money and who wants to be that millionaire; hence, you’ll need to be your own financial boss.

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