Drawing upon four decades of experience developing, owning, and managing properties and on almost thirty years of teaching at the Harvard Business School, William J. Poorvu offers an insider's perspective on how to make smart decisions about real estate.The real estate “game” is played by people, and it’s the stories of real people that make Poorvu’s introduction to the industry colorful and interesting. You will meet players ranging from real estate moguls to small-scale developers to individual investors in exotic investment instruments. Their stories evolve throughout the book and illustrate how these people—with all their complicated needs, talents, and motives—fit into the larger process and context. In clear and nontechnical language, Poorvu explains how variables—players, properties, capital markets, and the external environment—come together to influence the shape and outcome of a real estate deal. He explains the time frame for different kinds of real estate investments and walks the reader through the key “periods of play” in the real estate game: concept, commitment, development, operation, reward, and reinvestment. The Real Estate Game introduces a simple but powerful “back-of-the-envelope” technique for analyzing the financial implications of a potential deal. Using this tool and others, Poorvu shows readers how to use direct investments, syndicates, and REITs to get into the real estate game across a broad range of property types: residential, office, hotel, industrial, and retail. Offering unique insight into the ways that developers and investors can create value, The Real Estate Game is both a perfect introduction for the novice and an invaluable overview for the experienced professional.

    Wealthy, powerful, and potentially dangerous, hedge fund moguls have become the It Boys of twenty-first ­century capitalism. Ken Griffin of Citadel started out trading convertible bonds from his dorm room at Harvard. Julian Robertson staffed his hedge fund with college athletes half his age, then he flew them to various retreats in the Rockies and raced them up the mountains. Paul Tudor Jones posed for a magazine photograph next to a killer shark and happily declared that a 1929-style crash would be "total rock-and-roll" for him. Michael Steinhardt was capable of reducing underlings to sobs. "All I want to do is kill myself," one said. "Can I watch?" Steinhardt responded. Finance professors have long argued that beating the market is impossible, and yet drawing on insights from physics, economics, and psychology, these titans have cracked the market's mysteries and gone on to earn fortunes. Their innovation has transformed the world, spawning new markets in exotic financial instruments and rewriting the rules of capitalism. More than just a history, More Money Than God is a window on tomorrow's financial system. Hedge funds have been left for dead after past financial panics: After the stock market rout of the early 1970s, after the bond market bloodbath of 1994, after the collapse of Long Term Capital Management in 1998, and yet again after the dot-com crash in 2000. Each time, hedge funds have proved to be survivors, and it would be wrong to bet against them now. Banks such as CitiGroup, brokers such as Bear Stearns and Lehman Brothers, home lenders such as Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac, insurers such as AIG, and money market funds run by giants such as Fidelity-all have failed or been bailed out. But the hedge fund industry has survived the test of 2008 far better than its rivals. The future of finance lies in the history of hedge funds.

    Now, Ric reveals the deceptive and manipulative business practices occurring in your retail mutual funds—practices that are causing you to suffer higher fees, greater risks, and lower returns than you realize. In The Lies About Money, he offers you a detailed yet easy-to-follow plan that lets you take back control of your investments—and your financial future. Here, Ric shares his most valuable lessons gained through two decades of working directly with individuals and families. He reveals the lies that have infiltrated your retail mutual funds and retirement accounts and teaches you how to invest your money in your employer retirement plan; how to save for college; and for those who are retired, how to generate more income without sacrificing security. He shows you that proper money management has nothing to do with “hot tips” and everything to do with scientific analysis, bolstered by solid academic research and historical data. Along the way, Ric shows you the secrets to investment success—a long-term focus, the importance of diversification, and the crucial need for (and methods of) portfolio rebalancing. With insight and strategies that will change people's lives, The Lies About Money offers the truth that everyone is looking for.

    As it developed, the author realized that personal money management skills were rarely taught in high schools, colleges and even in MBA programs. Unfortunately, books on the subject tend to be complicated, lengthy reads. The book includes eight important lessons focusing on 99 principles that will quickly and memorably enhance any individual's money management acumen. Unlike many of the personal money management books out there, this book is a quick, easily digested read that focuses more on the qualitative side than the quantitative side of personal money management. The principles are not from a text book. Rather, they are practical principles learned by the author as he navigated through his financial life. Many are unorthodox in order to be memorable and provoke deeper thought by the reader. Not only an excellent graduation gift for high school and college students but also a great read for any adult!

    Time is not. Become financially independent as fast as possible.In 2010, 24-year old Grant Sabatier woke up to find he had $2.26 in his bank account. Five years later, he had a net worth of over $1.25 million, and CNBC began calling him "the Millennial Millionaire." By age 30, he had reached financial independence. Along the way he uncovered that most of the accepted wisdom about money, work, and retirement is either incorrect, incomplete, or so old-school it's obsolete.Financial Freedom is a step-by-step path to make more money in less time, so you have more time for the things you love. It challenges the accepted narrative of spending decades working a traditional 9 to 5 job, pinching pennies, and finally earning the right to retirement at age 65, and instead offers readers an alternative: forget everything you've ever learned about money so that you can actually live the life you want.Sabatier offers surprising, counter-intuitive advice on topics such as how to:*  Create profitable side hustles that you can turn into passive income streams or full-time businesses*  Save money without giving up what makes you happy*  Negotiate more out of your employer than you thought possible*  Travel the world for less*  Live for free--or better yet, make money on your living situation*  Create a simple, money-making portfolio that only needs minor adjustments*  Think creatively--there are so many ways to make money, but we don't see them.But most importantly, Sabatier highlights that, while one's ability to make money is limitless, one's time is not. There's also a limit to how much you can save, but not to how much money you can make. No one should spend precious years working at a job they dislike or worrying about how to make ends meet. Perhaps the biggest surprise: You need less money to "retire" at age 30 than you do at age 65.Financial Freedom is not merely a laundry list of advice to follow to get rich quick--it's a practical roadmap to living life on one's own terms, as soon as possible.

    one of the best real estate investment books I have ever read. On my scale of 1 to 10, this unique book rates an off-the-charts 12." ---Robert BrussConfessions of a Real Estate Entrepreneur is for the individual who is ready to get serious about investing. Not a rah-rah or get-rich-quick book, this book is for someone who is prepared to think about what he or she wants to accomplish. James Randel provides the how and why.James Randel has been a successful investor and educator for 25 years. He teaches investing through stories and anecdotes - bringing to the limelight not just his successes (and there are some amazing stories of these) but also his mistakes. His candor is instructive and entertaining.It is said that "those who can, do, and those who can't, teach." James Randel is a rare exception as he is both a highly successful investor as well as an excellent teacher. As said by Jeff Dunne, Vice Chairman of the largest real estate company in the world, CB Richard Ellis:"I've tracked Jimmy's incredible run of successful real estate investments for 20 years and more recently invested very profitably with him. His new book is a must read for anyone interested in real estate investing."If you are tired of the "same old, same old" and prepared to play in the big leagues, this book is calling your name.

    In this life-changing little book, entrepreneur and inspirational speaker Keith Cameron Smith shows you how to think like a millionaire and reap the benefits of a millionaire mindset. The key to moving beyond the middle class and up the economic ladder is mastering ten vital principles, including• Millionaires think long-term. The middle class thinks short-term. Create a clear vision of the life you desire, and focus on it.• Millionaires talk about ideas. The middle class talks about things and other people. Ask some positive “what if” questions every day, and bounce ideas off successful people who will be honest with you.• Millionaires work for profits. The middle class works for wages. Take calculated risks and learn to take advantage of good opportunities.We all want to improve our financial position. In this inspirational and practical guide filled with savvy and sensible advice, Smith upgrades you from coach to first class. So follow these principles, transform your life, and realize your dreams!

    Drawing on confidential internal memos and interviews with dozens of key players, Lowenstein explains not just how the fund made and lost its money but also how the personalities of Long-Term’s partners, the arrogance of their mathematical certainties, and the culture of Wall Street itself contributed to both their rise and their fall.When it was founded in 1993, Long-Term was hailed as the most impressive hedge fund in history. But after four years in which the firm dazzled Wall Street as a $100 billion moneymaking juggernaut, it suddenly suffered catastrophic losses that jeopardized not only the biggest banks on Wall Street but the stability of the financial system itself. The dramatic story of Long-Term’s fall is now a chilling harbinger of the crisis that would strike all of Wall Street, from Lehman Brothers to AIG, a decade later. In his new Afterword, Lowenstein shows that LTCM’s implosion should be seen not as a one-off drama but as a template for market meltdowns in an age of instability—and as a wake-up call that Wall Street and government alike tragically ignored.

    But what if you could escape the traditional path and get on one that doesn't require working full-time until age 65? What if you could wake up every day without an alarm clock and do the things you love most? Tanja Hester and her husband Mark left their crazed careerist lifestyle to live their dream life in Lake Tahoe, retiring early from high-stress careers. Now Tanja will help you map out a customized plan for freedom and make it easy to succeed, whether you're good at math and budgeting -- or not! Work Optional is more than just a financial plan: it's a plan for your whole life -- designed by you, not by an employer or clients. Tanja walks you through envisioning your dream life, accounting for variables such as health care and children, protecting yourself from recessions and future unknowns, and achieving a purpose-filled early retirement, semi-retirement, or career intermission with completely doable, non-penny-pinching steps. You can live a happier, more meaningful life, free from the daily grind. Regardless of where you are in your career, Work Optional will get you there.

    The legendary Omaha investor has never written a memoir, but now he has allowed one writer, Alice Schroeder, unprecedented access to explore directly with him and with those closest to him his work, opinions, struggles, triumphs, follies, and wisdom. The result is the personally revealing and complete biography of the man known everywhere as “The Oracle of Omaha.”Although the media track him constantly, Buffett himself has never told his full life story. His reality is private, especially by celebrity standards. Indeed, while the homespun persona that the public sees is true as far as it goes, it goes only so far. Warren Buffett is an array of paradoxes. He set out to prove that nice guys can finish first. Over the years he treated his investors as partners, acted as their steward, and championed honesty as an investor, CEO, board member, essayist, and speaker. At the same time he became the world’s richest man, all from the modest Omaha headquarters of his company Berkshire Hathaway. None of this fits the term “simple.”When Alice Schroeder met Warren Buffett she was an insurance industry analyst and a gifted writer known for her keen perception and business acumen. Her writings on finance impressed him, and as she came to know him she realized that while much had been written on the subject of his investing style, no one had moved beyond that to explore his larger philosophy, which is bound up in a complex personality and the details of his life. Out of this came his decision to cooperate with her on the book about himself that he would never write.Never before has Buffett spent countless hours responding to a writer’s questions, talking, giving complete access to his wife, children, friends, and business associates—opening his files, recalling his childhood. It was an act of courage, as The Snowball makes immensely clear. Being human, his own life, like most lives, has been a mix of strengths and frailties. Yet notable though his wealth may be, Buffett’s legacy will not be his ranking on the scorecard of wealth; it will be his principles and ideas that have enriched people’s lives. This book tells you why Warren Buffett is the most fascinating American success story of our time.

    It’s not even that they are smarter than you or make more money than you do each year. So what do they have that you don’t . . . at least not yet? What’s The Difference?Trusted financial coach Jean Chatzky shares the secrets her groundbreaking research of the self-made wealthy has uncovered so that anyone can break through the barriers that stand between them and true financial freedom. Find out why it’s important to:• Get happy, but not too happy• Do what you love, but don’t quit your day job• Read every day • Remember that failure is not an option–it’s a necessity• Harness your intuition to take risks that make sense • Practice the Kevin Bacon Principle–make connections• Say thank you–and mean it• Make your money work as hard as you doThrough candid interviews and a study of more than five thousand people, Jean reveals the traits and habits of those who have moved from the lowest economic strata to the highest. The Difference helps you take a look at where you are now and offers simple strategies for going where you want to go. The Difference, you’ll see, is within you: You have the power to determine your financial future and achieve the next level of wealth.

    A lively, original, and challenging history of stock market speculation from the 17th century to present day.Is your investment in that new Internet stock a sign of stock market savvy or an act of peculiarly American speculative folly? How has the psychology of investing changed--and not changed--over the last five hundred years? In Devil Take the Hindmost, Edward Chancellor traces the origins of the speculative spirit back to ancient Rome and chronicles its revival in the modern world: from the tulip scandal of 1630s Holland, to "stockjobbing" in London's Exchange Alley, to the infamous South Sea Bubble of 1720, which prompted Sir Isaac Newton to comment, "I can calculate the motion of heavenly bodies, but not the madness of people."Here are brokers underwriting risks that included highway robbery and the "assurance of female chastity"; credit notes and lottery tickets circulating as money; wise and unwise investors from Alexander Pope and Benjamin Disraeli to Ivan Boesky and Hillary Rodham Clinton.From the Gilded Age to the Roaring Twenties, from the nineteenth century railway mania to the crash of 1929, from junk bonds and the Japanese bubble economy to the day-traders of the Information Era, Devil Take the Hindmost tells a fascinating story of human dreams and folly through the ages.

    Swensen offers incontrovertible evidence that the for-profit mutual fund industry consistently fails the average investor. From excessive management fees to the frequent "churning" of portfolios, the relentless pursuit of profits by mutual fund management companies harms individual clients. Perhaps most destructive of all are the hidden schemes that limit investor choice and reduce returns, including "pay-to-play" product-placement fees, stale-price trading scams, soft-dollar kickbacks, and 12b-1 distribution charges. Even if investors manage to emerge unscathed from an encounter with the profit-seeking mutual fund industry, individuals face the likelihood of self-inflicted pain. The common practice of selling losers and buying winners (and doing both too often) damages portfolio returns and increases tax liabilities, delivering a one-two punch to investor aspirations. In short: Nearly insurmountable hurdles confront ordinary investors. Swensen's solution? A contrarian investment alternative that promotes well-diversified, equity-oriented, "market-mimicking" portfolios that reward investors who exhibit the courage to stay the course. Swensen suggests implementing his nonconformist proposal with investor-friendly, not-for-profit investment companies such as Vanguard and TIAA-CREF. By avoiding actively managed funds and employing client-oriented mutual fund managers, investors create the preconditions for investment success. Bottom line? Unconventional Success provides the guidance and financial know-how for improving the personal investor's financial future.

     The Motley Fool's Rule Breakers, Rule Makers presents the sophisticated, yet easy-to-understand stock-picking methods that have kept the Motley Fool portfolio beating the Standard & Poor's averages by more than 30 percent. The key is investing in small start-up companies that have historically offered the greatest investment returns (the "rule breakers") as well as huge companies that maintain legal monopolies in their fields (the "rule makers"). The Gardner brothers explain * How to identify the best investments in today's public markets: the rule breakers and the rule makers * The definition of a "tweener" -- a maturing rule breaker -- and how to detect the Tweener Death Rattle * When to buy and when to sell, and how to manage your portfolio on a regular basis In their first two books, the Fools got you started in investing and freed you from the fees and worries that Wall Street's Wise Men have been imposing on investors for decades. Now, by sharing their methods for picking rule breakers and rule makers, they guide you through a stock market that has seen company valuations soar to unprecedented heights and that promises to continue providing roller-coaster thrills. The Motley Fools are the ultimate companions to bring along for a safe, fun, and profitable ride.

    Over the course of that time—a period in which he experienced an unprecedented record of success—Buffett wrote semiannual letters to his small but growing group of partners, sharing his thoughts, approaches, and reflections.Compiled for the first time and with Buffett’s permission, the letters spotlight his contrarian diversification strategy, his almost religious celebration of compounding interest, his preference for conservative rather than conventional decision making, and his goal and tactics for bettering market results by at least 10% annually. Demonstrating Buffett’s intellectual rigor, they provide a framework to the craft of investing that had not existed before: Buffett built upon the quantitative contributions made by his famous teacher, Benjamin Graham, demonstrating how they could be applied and improved.Jeremy Miller reveals how these letters offer us a rare look into Buffett’s mind and offer accessible lessons in control and discipline—effective in bull and bear markets alike, and in all types of investing climates—that are the bedrock of his success. Warren Buffett’s Ground Rules paints a portrait of the sage as a young investor during a time when he developed the long-term value-oriented strategy that helped him build the foundation of his wealth—rules for success every investor needs today.