Book Reviews on Making Money and Real Estate

(click on the pic to buy the book cheap)

It’s been a while since I read this one, but I’ll go through it again, I just couldn’t NOT have this classic on the blog in its early days.

It is again, a great story about Robert’s lessons in money management with the two men in his life with very different philosophies that illustrate the difference in thinking between the rich and the employees.

It really illustrates the points and was written before Robert was in the business of being a serial author, when, in my opinion, he did his best work.

(Click on the picture here to buy the book cheap)

This review wasn’t written by me, but I liked the book and I lied the nice wording of the review so I added this one in. – Glenn

Beloved by millions, this timeless classic holds the key to all you desire and everything you wish to accomplish. This is the book that reveals the secret to personal wealth.

This is the book that holds the secret to acquiring money, keeping money and making money earn more money.

(Click on the picture here to buy the book cheap)

This is one of the original Self Help books that I read and it certainly starts you on the road to learning how to manage people in all areas of your life. There’s a VERY successful real estate company near me that won’t even look at your resume unless you have attached to it, a two page book report on what you learned from this book, and how you will apply it.

12 things it boasts it will help you achieve (and it meets many of these points successfully)

1. Get out of a mental rut, think new thoughts, acquire new visions, new ambitions
2. Make friends quickly and easily
3. Increase your popularity
4. Win people to your way of thinking
5. Influence your influence, your prestige, your ability to get things done
6. Win new clients, new customers
7. Increase your earning power
8. Make you a better salesman, a better executive
9. Handle complaints, avoid arguments, keep your human contacts smooth and pleasant
10. Become a better speaker, a more entertaining conversationalist
11. Make the principles of psychology easy for you to apply in your daily contacts
12. Arouse enthusiasm among your associates

This book has done all these things for countless thousands of readers in 28 different languages

In my 1964 edition of this book (that was written in 1936) it has on the fron cover

‘NOW OVER 9,944,500 COPIES SOLD’

Wikipedia now quotes that it has sold over 15 million copies. So it’s obviously got something to offer. Well, it has lots to offer.

Some of the principles are a little dated, like smiling a lot will help, and say people’s names all the time. It sounds so basic, but it’s true and works. Some of the examples are a little dated as well, but there is a revised edition available that helps in that area.

All in all worth your attention and the time it takes to read, if just to re-enforce some of the things you already know, and to analyse this piece of ‘self help’ history.

Glenn Twiddle

It’s an interesting story about the author of ‘Think and Grow Rich’, Napoleon Hill. Now this book is on more millionaires’ recommended reading list than any other with the exception of the bible, so really it is the bible of the money making industry. And the interesting thing is, according to acclaimed trainer Dan Kennedy, that he was almost broke if W. Clement Stone, who was a student of Hill’s, hadn’t bailed him out and gave him a job as his sales trainer towards the end of his career. I’ll discuss the one flaw with this book in a moment.

This book was compiled by Napoleon Hill after studying the most successful people in America in the early 20th Century and analysing what traits and patterns of thinking were common to all, or most, of them. And the results of decades of this study are contained in this book. And here we, the public, can get decades worth of research for less than $20. Man, you got to love books huh?

So why did the man who pretty much ‘got it’ didn’t ‘have it.’ Well this book really should be titled, ‘How to Think to Grow Rich.’ I think the problem was in the implication that all you have to do is ‘think’ in a certain way and you’ll magically grow rich. It’s the unspoken ‘just’ before the title that is implied that is the problem. Without the action, in an environment where you’re likely to make money, you can think all you like and nothing will change. Unless the thinking leads to doing, there will be no getting rich. Don’t get me wrong, Hill had a great income at various times in his life with all the extravagance that goes with it, but he made some mistakes as well.

I think that’s also the problem with ‘The Secret,’ which by the way, is based on the principals in this book. Some of the people on the Secret imply that just the thoughts will make the reality, but James Ray and Joe Vitale are the two that promote the ‘MASSIVE ACTION’ as an integral part of the deal.

That being said, all in all, an absolute MUST for anyone who has a desire for making money. The one downside is that the examples are a little dated, but if you get the updated version that is a moot point.

I stole my copy from my Dad. It was printed in 1960 and it has ‘Newly Revised’ on the old ratty cover. Quite simply – REQUIRED READING. (Oh yeah, and don’t let the chapter on ‘Sexual Transmutation’ scare you off. Interesting premise though.)

Glenn Twiddle