The Millionaire Fastlane by M. J. DeMarco: Summary and Notes
“Real money and momentum is created when an idea (potential speed) is matched with execution (accelerator pressure).”
Rating: 8/10
Related: The 10x Rule, Wealth Exposed, The Richest Man in Babylon
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Table of Contents
The Millionaire Fastlane Short Summary
The Millionaire Fastlane by M. J. Demarco is a book that will teach you how to build insane wealth. Demarco shares the secret to becoming a millionaire at any age. And it is not the kind of advice you receive from financial gurus, parents, or friends. Becoming a Fastlane millionaire has its own recipe: grow a money tree, reclaim your time, and exploit the law of effection. An excellent book on how to create insane wealth and live a great life.
What Is Fastlane?
The Fastlane is a state of wealth that is characterized by abundance. In the Fastlane, you don’t trade your time for money and are in complete control of all the wealth-generating factors.
The Fastlane lifestyle is for the people who want to retire young and don’t want to follow the conventional get rich roadmap that involves maxing the 401k, being frugal, and retiring at 65.
Being on the Fastlane requires that you turn your back on what society says about wealth. Otherwise, you will never get rich.
“The Millionaire Fastlane isn’t about being retired old with millions, but about redefining wealth to include youth, fun, freedom, and prosperity”
The get rich slow strategy that is championed by society is a losing game. It is anchored on your time, assumes that everything will go according to plan, and doesn’t involve getting rich at a young age.
If you want to get rich, take the Fastlane road.
True wealth is authored by three fundamental F’s:
- Family (relationships). Wealth is strong spirited familial relationships with people
- Fitness (health). Fitness includes health, vibrancy, passion, and boundless energy
- Freedom (choice). Freedom is the ability to pursue your dreams and do what you love
The Roadtrip To Wealth
Wealth is forged by a carefully crafted process. Wealth is not an event, but a journey.
The roadmap to wealth is made up of four key ingredients:
- Your roadmap. The roadmap is the guiding force behind the decisions you make
- Your vehicle. Your vehicle is you. No one can drive you to your financial destination
- Your roads. Roads are the financial pathways that lead to wealth. You can be an engineer, a plumber, a truck driver, etc. The roadmap guides your actions and the consequences of those actions create your financial life
- Your speed. Speed refers to execution or your ability to go from idea to implementation
There are three road maps to wealth:
- The Sidewalk to poorness
- Slowline to mediocrity and
- Fastlane to wealth
The Sidewalk to Poorness
The Sidewalk is the road most traveled and it is the one that is championed by society.
The sidewalker is always one something from being homeless, bankrupt, or back to living in their parents’ basement.
Sidewalkers are trapped in a lifestyle servitude that is characterized by an urgent and insatiable need for self-gratification.
Sidewalker mindset:
- Debt perception: Credit allows you to buy things now. What I want, I get!
- Time perception: There is enough time and you could be dead in two weeks anyway
- Education perception. You finished school when you graduated and so, there is no need to learn
- Money perception. If you have money, flaunt it
- Primary income source. Whatever pays the most, you will chase it
- Primary wealth accelerator. Luck
- Wealth perception. The one with the most toys wins
- Destination. “I live for today and I’m not bothered about tomorrow”
- Responsibility and control. Indulges in the victim mentality
- Life perception. Life is too short to plan ahead
“The Sidewalk is money blind. It doesn’t care about how much money you make. You can’t medicate poor money management with more money. Yes, you can look filthy rich and still be riding the sidewalk dirty.”
Mediocrity- The Slowlane Roadmap
The Slowlane involves sacrificing today for a better tomorrow. If you are on the slowlane, you’ve been deluged with a series of doctrines that ask you to make a trade-off. Such trade-offs include getting a job, working for retirement, and saving 10% of the paycheck.
The Slowlane is a convenient exit for the sidewalk and soon evolves into maturity and increased adult responsibilities.
The Slowlane offers the promise for riches at the age of retirement when it’s not even possible to enjoy the fruits of labor.
Slowlane mindset and missives include:
- Debt perception: Debt is evil.
- Time perception: Time is abundant and can be gladly traded off for more dollars
- Education perception. Educations is important as it helps earn more dollars
- Money perception. Each and every dollar must be accounted for because money is scarce
- Primary income source. A job is the primary source of income
- Primary wealth accelerator. Compound interest
- Wealth perception. Savings, investments, and 401K
- Destination. Comfortable retirement in the twilight years
- Responsibility and control. Works to provide for the family by relying on the employer, government, and the state of the economy
- Life perception. Settle for less, and give up on any dreams
The Slowlane roadmap relies on the following equation:
Wealth = (Primary Income Source: Job) + (Wealth Accelerator: Market Investments)
When in the Slowlane, you mindlessly trade your life for a paycheck.
“The ultimate insanity is to sell your soul Monday through Friday for the paycheck of Saturday and Sunday. Yes, give me $5 today and in return I’ll give you $2 back tomorrow. 5-for-2. No? How about five loaves of bread today and in return, I’ll give you two back tomorrow. No again? Why? This is a smoking Deal!”
The Fastlane Roadmap
The Fastlane: A business lifestyle that is characterized by controllable unlimited leverage (CUL). It creates the optimal environment for rapid wealth creation and an extraordinary lifestyle.
The Fastlane mindset:
- Debt perception: Debt is useful as it allows one to grow their system
- Time perception: Time is far more important than money
- Education perception. Learning is important for growth
- Money perception. Money is everywhere. It reflects the value you create
- Primary income source. Business systems and investments
- Primary wealth accelerator. Making something out of nothing
- Wealth perception. Build business systems for cash flow and asset valuation
- Destination. A lifetime of passive income. Life is what you make of it. Only you can choose how you react to circumstances
- Life perception. Dreams are worth pursuing no matter how outlandish
The Fastlane is a business system while the Slowlane is a job. In the Slowlane, you trade your time for your employer’s cash while in the Fastlane, wealth is driven by a business system.
The Fastlane wealth equation looks like this:
Wealth = Net Profit + Asset Value
Asset Value = (Net Profit) X (Industry Multiplier)
“The Fastlane Roadmap is engineered for two purposes. It’s engineered to create a passive income stream to the excess of your expenses and lifestyle desires, and to make financial freedom a reality, exclusive of age.”
The Five Faslane Business Seedlings
- Rental systems. Real estate is an example of a rental system that produces a recurring monthly income
- Computer/software systems. The internet and software programs have created more millionaires than any other system in history
- Content systems. Content systems are systems of information. They include books, blogs, and social networks
- Distribution systems. These are systems that move products to the masses. An example is Amazon
- Human resource systems. Systems that are run by people. Sometimes they can work in conjunction with other systems
The Real Law of Wealth
The law of effection: The more lives you affect in an entity you control, in scale or in magnitude, the richer you become.
“To exploit the Law of Effection, your business needs to make an impact of either scale or magnitude, or both. Within our Fastlane wealth equation, “scale” and “magnitude” are implicit to our “net profit” variable. NET PROFIT = Units Sold (Scale) X Unit Profit (Magnitude)”
Your Vehicle To Wealth
To get to the Fastlane, you need a well-oiled and ready vehicle and that vehicle is you. You are the one responsible for making the journey.
You can’t pay yourself first if you don’t own yourself. To own yourself, create a corporation that divorces you from the act of business.
The recommended Fastlane business entity is either a C corp or an S corp.
Success is not made up of a single choice but hundreds of them.
“People don’t choose to be poor. They make poor decisions that slowly assemble into a poorness puzzle. Retrace the footprints to poverty and it happens slowly, systematically, and methodically, under a steady diet of poor choices.”
The choice of perception leads us to particular actions. If you believe and perceive certain ideas, you will act in accordance with that belief.
The easiest way to start making better decisions is to start changing your perception.
For example:
If you lose your job, you can either decide to see the event positively or negatively.
Tips for making better decisions:
1. Worse Case Consequence Analysis (WCCA). Analyse potential consequences before making a decision
2. Weighted Average Decision Matrix (WADM). Weigh the various decisions and see which one is better
The Five Fastlane Commandments (NECST)
- The commandment of need. Businesses satisfy the needs of people. Don’t chase money. Rather, look at how your business will help other people
- The commandment of entry. As entry barriers to a business fall, or lessen, the effectiveness of that road declines while competition in that field subsequently strengthens. To overcome weak entry, you need exceptionalism
- The commandment of control. Play in an organization that you control or you will be at the mercy of someone else
- The commandment of scale. Increase scale and magnitude in your business
- The commandment of time. Your business should detach you from your time
Speed
Ideas are nothing without execution.
“The Fastlane is a conglomeration of information that creates potential speed. You understand the Fastlane roadmap and its wealth equation. You’ve dumped the Sidewalk and the Slowlane.”
Execution divides winners from losers. Execution is a process. Ideas are events.
