8 Redditors tells us how they amass more than 1 million in Networth

You probably be wondering how easy is it to be a millionaire in the United States. If you have been on Reddit long enough, you would have been overwhelmed by new threads started on folks seeking help getting out of debt.

Its refreshing to find one that shares how folks build their net worth to more than a million dollars. You can read the thread and full comments here.

With a lax monetary policy, 1 mil is not a hard target.  However, what  you will notice is that many of them are very young.

They do have some commonality:

1. They make less mistakes than most. You don’t have to be an exceptional player. Some of them don’t even invest. They just do less stupid things with their money
2. They have a propensity to save

The frugal salesman

You don’t have to be a great investor to build crazy wealth. Sometimes you just have to be good at your job.

Diverting 100% of paycheck into stocks

This looks risky. Diverting an entire paycheck to his brokerage account. I doubt he can do it from the onset but he did achieve the million networth at age 35.

The clear record keeper

Here is a person who keeps such clear records (and spends some effort presenting it in this table, which I felt is hard to come up with)

A person who admits he is not a good active manager, but have successfully hedge his incompetence with index investing.

The young property man

This guy is just good that he bought the property at the best time in US. However, he got started with some help from an inheritance.

The welder with a worthy land

This kid (22 years old) works as a pipeline welder. That pays damn well! Even discounting the farmland, its still a lot of money for a 22 year old!

Oldest in the group

This is probably the guy with the longest running record (30 years). So what did he invest in?

Currently? I’m at Fidelity now. But I’ve used E*Trade and Vanguard directly, and had 401ks at various providers via work. Also used A.G. Edwards, but they are long gone. In 2010 there was a lump sump pension payout.

**Stocks**

DAL – Delta Airlines

DTE – Detroit Edison

**ETFs**

IVV – iShares Core S&P 500

IJJ – iShares S&P Mid Cap 400 Value

IJR – iShares S&P Small Cap

VGK -Vanguard FTSE Europe

XLV – Health Care Select Sector

**Mutual Funds**

FBALX – Fidelity Balanced

FTRNX – Fidelity Trend (large growth)

HRSVX – Heartland Select Value Fund Investor Class Shs (mid value)

JATTX – Janus Triton Fund T Shares (small growth)

NHFIX- Northern High Yield Fixed Income Fund (junk bonds)

OAKIX – Oakmark International Fund Cl I

PONDX – PIMCO Income Fund Class D

I’ve held probably 100+ stocks/funds over the years. 3-4 don’t even exist any more and 2 went bankrupt while I held positions. The kick start probably was Dell. I bought about 18 months after they went public and sold just before the dot.com bubble burst (adjusted cost was $6/shr, sold at $50+). That got my seed money going.

But I started saving in IRA the 2nd year they were available, and 401ks the very first year. Every time I got a raise 1/2 went to savings. For many years we were saving 50% of our pre-tax income.

I’ve not had a mortgage or car payments since 2006.

The engineer with much stock options

This is what being paid with options can get you. A lot of lottery chances, some failures some turned out really good.

The one whose wealth is much tied up in a business