Any self made millionaires here? Was it worth it? | Hacker News Reader

Any self made millionaires here? Was it worth it?

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Somebody who really came from a poor or working-class background, who had poor parents. Was all of the work required to build a business (or brand, etc.) worth it, looking back? Was there some other path you could have taken that would have been more fun or fulfilling in some way, but might not have brought the wealth?

Would love to hear from experienced people who have been through it. Why is the entrepreneurial route worth it if you don't come from money, or why isn't it?

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I was pretty poor. The house I lived in still had an outhouse. We had an old-fashion washboard thingy to wash clothes. And, my mom made $7k to take care of 4 kids (in the 90s).

I chased the dream hard. Worked at 4 startups, worked myself to burnout. I went through 4 exits and didn’t get rich (because exits don’t favor non-executives and socially awkward).

I finally got rich just by saving and investing well. I saved pretty much everything I made. It was worth it, because now I get to live the life of The Dude.

> I finally got rich just by saving and investing well. I saved pretty much everything I made. It was worth it, because now I get to live the life of The Dude.

Care to share some details?

Well, rich is relative, of course. But, I take in about 200k in passive income / year. My house is paid for, and while I budget for 120k / year in expenses, it's actually more like 60k. So, the rest just compounds. (Once you have everything, it's hard to find things to spend money on.)

At my first job, I made 30k / year. And, that sort of set my standard of living. I bought my first house in early 2000s for $250k which increased my cost of living. But, I made it back in increased equity. But, everything else went into investments. I maxed out my 401k with index funds. Non-401k investments went into a mix of technology stocks.

As for The Dude lifestyle. Well, I'm mid-40s. I smoke a lot of weed. Hang out with my friends. We make bad music, art, and comedy together. I bike a lot. I chill under the sunset. I still like to make software, and I'm still relatively good at it, but I have no interest in interviewing nor competing with today's hungry all-stars. So, I just abide.

> I have no interest in interviewing nor competing with today's hungry all-stars. So, I just abide.

The Dude abides. I don't know about you but I take comfort in that. It's good knowin' he's out there. The Dude. Takin' 'er easy for all us sinners.

Using this for my blogpost.

Soundtrack: Way down We Go · KALEO

Took a highly focused approach, working a lot at night, but always chose to have a fulfilling family life b/c so many successful people I studied went through multiple wives. I chose to be less rich and stay married. Bought houses for lots of family members. Worked at home so lots of time with kids. Was able to live in safe neighborhoods and afford ongoing large medical expenses for several family members. Was able to experiment with other businesses, failing plenty. Fun though.

In sum: Totally worth it, but I always placed a higher priority on jobs I liked.

Wife actually doesn’t want to be richer, because she grew up an unwilling celebrity. Any more rich than we are, and she would perish under the spotlight.

Unwilling celebrity? Shes famous?

Not the OP, but celebrity takes many forms. Being the mayors daughter or whatever brings unwanted attention.

One of my neighbors was an NFL player. He got hurt, retired and has a normal gig, just with more swag than most people. It was tough for his kids to just enjoy little league or whatever.

I'm nosy and curious.

Prominent parents, as suggested by /u/Spooky23

In what sense did you take a highly focused approach? Did you identify area's where the chance of succeeding was high and worked your way from there?

Yes. I read about people who were successful at business, then when I taught myself how to program I chose difficult specialties (in the 80s, when I chose assembly, embedded systems, and compiler writing) so my lack of a degree wouldn’t be a problem.

On my side it would be to accept that I'm not one of the best game developers in the world and making a career in normal Business Software development.

Making sure to switch companies when you hit a dead road.

Always communicating to your manager what you expect.

Driving the career instead of hoping you get a raise alone makes a huge difference.

Or I also moved to a big city instead of staying in a small city because I knew that my chances for a career are much higher.

I have not studied, and I reached 6 figures by myself and my old friends earn half of what I make (not USA)

And yes I actually enjoy doing a great job slightly independent from what I do.

I grew up poor, in the projects of NY. My father died when I was five and I was raised by my mother alone. I think that constitutes as "poor".

I'll give a 10,000 foot view of my younger years. I learned how to program on my own in the 90s because my school had no books or anything. I got my first computer when I was in college. I didn't study computer science or anything technical.

I kept programming/hacking after school/work. I did eventually get a programming job and I kept hacking after working. I eventually got a brilliant idea to charge money for something I made (after having made hundreds of open source projects).

People started paying for my tool. I was making $500,000+ USD per-year from my tool alone. I quit my "full time" job and kept doing what I always did, hacking on stuff.

Do I regret anything? No. Would I do anything different? Probably not.

I guess the only advice I have is "charge for it".

what was the tool and business model?

I grew up poor, mom claimed $19k annual income the year before my first year of college. I couldn’t believe it when I saw it on my FAFSA. I literally couldn’t figure out a budget that could have worked (I tried) and yet we always had food, we never once lacked for a necessity, never once discussed not being able to pay utilities. She just handled it.

Of course it was worth it. It would have been worth it even if I hadn’t succeeded. Work hard, do good work, plan well, build wealth, cultivate relationships. Eliminate unnecessary expenses and waste. All these things are worth doing in themselves.

Also I wasn’t self made. I had white privilege (I distinctly recall two times I was cut slack for youthful hi-jinx where a black person would have gone to jail). I had people who mentored me and supported me. I had people who cut me slack when I needed it and believed in me. If anything my success is due to the strength of my family and friends. So remember to cultivate long-term relationships. Above all demonstrate trustworthiness.

The entrepreneurial route is the best way to build and hold wealth. Because it allows you to become part of the owner class. It’s unfair but if you’re going to live in an unfair system you owe it to yourself to join the class most favored.

Some people choose not to pursue wealth. I know people who consciously chose to teach or otherwise nurture children, knowing they forego wealth by doing so. Some people choose to become artists, or another creative pursuits. Some people choose journalism knowing there’s not a lot of money in it. Keep that in mind if you join the owners class. You’re not special, you’re not better. They simply choose not to do what you did. Many times as a deliberate rejection.

My father grew up on a Minnesota farm, homesteaded by European immigrants. He got drafted into the army and married my German mom in Nuremberg after WWII. They provided for me enough to get educated, learn to program, and become a college dropout, software entrepreneur, and multimillionaire.

To answer your questions: yes, the work was worth it, because it led to having no financial concerns, which is very relaxing, and financial success let me help and support family members and let my wife support charities. I doubt there would have been a "more fun" path for me because I enjoyed programming so much.

Current Nuremberg resident here nice to see Nuremberg on HN :)

Could you share a bit more about your businesses? Would love to learn more

My path was easier - get a good job and put 20% of salary into savings for 20 years. It meant driving cars into the ground and being frugal during tight times, but worth it.

By “millionaire,” do you actually mean “independently wealthy”? Single-digit millionaire is a pretty low bar in some places, at least on paper.

+1 I think most of the folks who are on HN, e.g. software engineers, should be able to get to a million in net worth through savings over 10-20 years. At least in the US given USD salaries and possibly Canada as well.

Single digit millionaire is like straight A student. It's not particularly rare, but it involves a lot of sacrifice and perseverance. I do think the question stands.

The sad part is that people pretty much need to save $1M+ to retire at 65 these days, yet many vastly underfund their accounts.

A lot of people purchased a house.. does that count?

Yes.

Here in Southern Ontario, just being a millionaire means you still cannot afford to buy even a cheap shack.

Yet for the most part minimum wage and entry level jobs have not had an increase in pay for almost thirty years.

The result is that we have lost our middle class.

It's hard for them to afford a weekend camping. Ontario is very expensive.

Canada is very expensive but minimum wage has literally doubled in the last 15 years from $7 to $15.

And inflation?

It’s a pay decrease.

Net inflation in the past 15 years has been more like 40% than 114%.

If you look at any decently sized local shops or services like family owned restaurants, landscaping, etc. they are probably millionaires and will likely tell you its worth it. You don't have to be a tech founder to be an entrepreneur or get millions, if you want a billion maybe. Pros are not working for the man and financial freedom.

True, though I know a few families that were ruined by this path. Things like your house can often end up becoming leverage because you are afraid to lose the lifestyle you are used to, and it's easy to take your eyes of the road when it has started to seem monotonous.

family owned businesses usually are asset rich, "rarely" cashflow/cash rich (when they are they tend to increase a lot good/bad capital expenditure and lifestyle , as decisions are shared). Two different things. Culture in a co-owned business is often more rewarding /enjoyable/ flexible (not often a good choice) than being an employee or a funded entrepreneur. Passing the torch is also a big factor of personal pride. Economically is probably not often that smart as skills are not usually transferable. Better to build a career base outside and join later or biuld a trade inside (management skills also if medium enterprise). At least this is my experience as 3rd generation "small" business heir in europe.

For more context on the reason "small" is put in quotes in the parent comment, "small business" or "small and medium-sized enterprises" definitions vary from country to country. A "Mittelstand" is defined as annual revenues up to 50 MM Euro and a maximum of 500 employees.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mittelstand

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Small_and_medium-sized_enterpr...

[French for SME]: https://fr.wikipedia.org/wiki/Petite_ou_moyenne_entreprise

My parents were not poor but middle class (80k combined income in nyc). I didn't know anybody who worked in business as a kid, especially corporate business.

My early attempts at entrepreneurship at age 17-20 were fun but honestly I didn't have the context needed to succeed. It was working my way up the career ladder and working at VC backed companies that gave me the knowledge to be succesful.

I now own a company worth high 7 figures, and building that was totally worth it, but it was necessary to do real jobs to learn.

Can you tell me about some of the challenges you faced in the initial stage of setting up your company? Have you ever thought about quitting?

advice you'd give looking back on things you'd wished you'd have known while you were 17?

You don’t have to do the entrepreneurial route to become a millionaire. Any tech job will make you a millionaire in your lifetime. If you make 100k/yr and save 30% a year from age 21 to 67 you’ll have $2.2MM in savings.

> and save [...] a year from age 21 to 67 you’ll have [...] in savings

Assumption of savings vehicle being available for 46 years sometimes doesn't hold.

You mean having a bank account?

I mean having a concept of private property.

Not sure if there's much overlap between someone who earn 100k/year and someone who doesn't have concept of private property.

First third of my life I was living in a state that officially refused to recognize private property (USSR). Modern Russia, for example, while officially recognizing private property rights, does not uphold them.

(assuming income growth matches inflation, and 2% real return on investments)

https://www.bankrate.com/retirement/retirement-plan-calculat...

Hell of a lot of "ifs" and assertions here. IF you can get a 100k job at age 21 and IF you can save 30% per year (which us a lot) and IF nothing goes wrong with your health, company failing, being laid off, etc etc.

It's highly, highly unrealistic to assume 21 year olds earning 100K AND saving 30% of it, have you met many 21 year olds?

I don't get it – the ask is "how to do X?". The answering being, "if you are or you do Q, then you will get X" is perfectly well-formed.

The conditions you mention are hazardous but also true for having a career or being materially free in general, rather than just for how to become a millionaire.

And IF you work in the US. In certain European country, like mine, teach workers[1] earn less than the average salary while working more hours than the average population. No golden handcuffs or millionaires here.

[1]In general every non-medical degree will get you the same pay as a specialized skilled worker but skilled jobs and manifacturing are even less and often with horrible conditions so everyone goes to the degree route and hope to find somwthing or emigrate. I wish I had done Medicine as my mother said.

No it’s not unrealistic. Any decently bright and hard working college student studying computer science can get that 100k+ even as an intern. So technically this saving can start before age of 21. By age 25 they can already make 300k+. But yes, this is assuming you are in North America.

They can, but most don't.

It’s an oversimplification of my income for clarity. In this scenario you make 100k and never more or less (no raises, no other income sources). If you live outside of California or NYC saving 30% is very doable if you’re fiscally responsible, which if your goal is to be a millionaire is a good prerequisite.

I made 36k out of college but now make 135k. I saved 0% at the start and save over 30% now. Assuming I’ll keep getting raises I’ll be a millionaire. My goal was to show OP that you don’t need to start a business to become a millionaire, working in tech for a long career with financial literacy will also get you there.

With that attitude, you're going nowhere...

The problem is, - is the time/life/worth balance worth it?

I would agree, yes, stick in tech 40 years, you'd be a millionaire, even 5-10, but at that point, I feel you should exit - and live your life and do your "thing."

It's one thing to try and succeed, another to try and fail, and ironically, when most people have assets/liquidity, they're in the part of the life that failing and restarting is hard, if not impractical all together. I've seen this many a time, growing up in Florida - and it does make the route of being a "office drone" for 40 years, appeasing, or even getting a 100k+ salary via a public sector job, and a pension to retire on and the ease/slowness of the work.

But, then again, this can work for almost "anyone" - meaning the term, millionaire, doesn't mean much what it used too - nor the purchasing power.

It comes down really to what you want in life, and even me, in my early 30's makes me wonder what amount of money/security is necessary to have a life I want.

Millionaire because you worked 40 years in a company, and took it safe.

Millionaire cause you worked in a company, pivioted, and created your own thing and succeeded.

While not related to money, I feel a just comparision is this Star Trek scene, where, there is a bit of missing context if you don't know the series but the tone/message should get across: the easier path doesn't always mean the one that's most rewarding:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LHoPLhpw2g4

The whole episode is exciting, and considered one of the best - Star Trek, The Next Generation - Tapestry.

In this thread there are a lot of people overlooking that even someone who is financially disciplined can lose it all very quickly. Their own health or the health of someone close to them can drain those dollars quickly. A marriage goes sideways and you'll be lucky if the lawyers don't take it all. A few bad stock bets... point is, sure compound interest might make you a "millionaire" but it's a long way from those first millions to actual financial security, and LUCK plays a huge role.

There are no self-made millionaires.

I'm from a poor family and got pretty wealthy. Yet I'm under no illusion that this was "self-made". No one of us is "self-made". We all depend on a society around us that gives us a language, concepts, knowledge and stability to accumulate wealth. We depend on foundations that have been built by others, on resources extracted by others, on work done by others. "Self-made" is just a comfortable blanket to pretend that it was our hard work alone that made us rich. In reality it's only very, very much luck that allows to to prosper while others are destitute.

The "self-made millionaire" is a capitalistic myth that glorifies exploitation of others. Don't fall for it.

It's a poor lens through which view the world.

In the same way there are no criminals or good or bad people.

Sure, I don't believe in free will either, but from a practical point of view, you should probably give some credit to millionaires who made it without getting money from anyone. And you should give even more credit to millionaires who made it starting with a poor family. Similarly I won't trust criminals as much as non criminals, even if I'm sure they could have been different if their lives had different circumstances.

Of course we're lucky to live in the richest society ever created in history which gives us opportunities our ancestors didn't have. You can thank capitalism for that.

I feel good about my economic success (almost 1M with just contracting and a failed startup behind). Sure, I'm thankful that my family could afford a computer when I was a kid but nobody really encouraged me to follow this route or gave me any money. My teenage years were all fighting with my parents to stay more on the computer and work while they wanted me to study. And everyone kept telling me there was no money in software development.

I like to remind myself that had I been born just about anywhere else in the world, I wouldn’t be as fortunate as I am. At least not financially.

I’m not a millionaire, but I earn more than almost everyone I know. It’s a matter of where I was born, when, hobbies I fell into, etc. I mean, I grew up poor as hell, undiagnosed ADHD, the whole deal. I was dealt a pretty bad hand, but placed somewhere with so much opportunity that it worked out despite that.

You can frame it a lot of ways. Yes I worked hard, I tried to do my best (and still do!), I just don’t feel self made.

Having said that, I wouldn’t argue that you aren’t self made. You certainly didn’t have everything handed to you, and I’m sure you’re a hard and smart worker.

If anything I’m just cognizant of the person I easily could have been, or the life I could have had, were a few variables to change very slightly.

Being born before/away from computers would have been a disaster for my career potential, I think.

I'm in a very similar situation.

> Being born before/away from computers would have been a disaster for my career potential, I think.

Oh, yes.

> In the same way there are no criminals or good or bad people.

I'm not arguing that no one bears the moral responsibility for their actions or that there are no laws to determine who's a criminal.

> Sure, I don't believe in free will either,

I didn't make any statements about determinism.

> Of course we're lucky to live in the richest society ever created in history which gives us opportunities our ancestors didn't have. You can thank capitalism for that.

> Sure, I'm thankful that my family could afford a computer when I was a kid but nobody really encouraged me to follow this route or gave me any money.

It's been pretty much the same for me.

I think the main point I'm trying to convey is; hard work is not enough. Many people work hard all their live and don't get anything other than a body broken by destitution.

Hard work is not the point of the "self-made" millionaire; luck is.

Yes, I’m fairly sure a lot of people in this world earn a fraction of what I do but work harder, are smarter, etc. They just happened to not be born in Western Canada, in my case.

I’ve blown so many opportunities and still managed to succeed. Life is on easy mode over here.

That's some real deep philosophical insight there ...

It does not matter how much you work, in the end you don't deserve the fruits of your labor, because of course, there is no such thing as fruits of you labor. It's the fruits of the society around us.

> It's the fruits of the society around us.

That's a given. Still, Society needs a way to incentivize people. Some way of encouraging people to be entrepreneurial, curious, industrious and active, to reach beyond what is immediately possible, work on their strengths and on supporting each other to grow in their own.

If no one is self-made then why do most wealthy people (who didn’t inherit) seem to work so hard?

Because they are insistent on making sure you know they worked hard: it's part if the role.

> If no one is self-made then why do most wealthy people (who didn’t inherit) seem to work so hard?

You should go see how the other half live. There are many people out there working way harder than any of the billionaires on the hardest working billionaire list who can barely put a meal on the table.

There are also many people out there working just as hard and making a paltry 60k a year.

That’s like saying “living a health lifestyle doesn’t stop cancer because my friend lived very health and died of cancer at 40”

It's like saying "living a healthy lifestyle doesn't stop cancer because my friend lived very healthily and died of cancer at 40" when less than 1% of people survive past 40, many of those that do inherited immunity to cancer and most of the rest had some sort of identifiable genetic advantage

Huh? "Self-made" can be middle class entirely. Not 1% of the population.

You were replying to someone talking about the relative work ethic of billionaires in a topic about self made millionaires...

(But again, if you want to lower the threshold, whilst it is indeed more feasible to become "self made" "middle class" for most valid definitions of those two terms, most people's middle class status has a lot more to do with their background and skillset than their work ethic relative to "working class" people)

Using the litteral 'millionaire' net worth marker that is the top ~8% of adults in the US. If class is measured purely on net worth, as much as it might feel like it - it is not middle class to have a net worth of 1 million USD.

Its like saying "I think lots of rich successful people do drugs so if i do more cocaine and some more heroin than them then I will be even richer and more successful than they are" - all while failing to notice the strung out drug addict you walk past in the street.

I disagree. "Self made" doesn't mean that you had no society around you and you did everything in silo. Self Made means that you didn't have a lot to start with but with your hard work, persistence and determination (little bit of luck), you made it for yourself. Of course, you will have people and support structures around you. Let me give you an example. Lot of people have support structure and what not but they still don't make it to "self made" because they lack the other qualities such as grit, determination, hard work etc.

So yea, people can totally be self made and don't get too hung up literally on the word "self".

To me, you break down very neatly why "self-made" is a strange moniker. A lot of people are hard-working, persistent, full of ideas and determination. But they are not being called "self-made", except if they have that little tad of luck that changes everything and actually makes them successful (as in; earn tons of money). So, that leaves the only distinguished feature that of luck. Wouldn't it be better to call them "luck-made"?

> So yea, people can totally be self made and don't get too hung up literally on the word "self".

That's good advise!

> Self Made means that you didn't have a lot to start with but with your hard work, persistence and determination (little bit of luck), you made it for yourself.

I think this view downplays how important luck is. How many dot com millionaires wouldn't be millionaires today if they'd been born +20 years from their actual birth year? Would the market have waited for them?

Luck determines your opportunities - hard work is implied.

most oppurtunty are "handed" by the society, few created their own chances from very different backgrounds, but those who do for sure deserve to be called "selfmade". Still nothing bad in not being a "pioneer"

When people say that no one is "self-made" they usually mean that it is good to remind ourselves that all successful people have more than just themselves to thank for their prosperity. That the framework necessary for success is built and maintained by all of us, and you should respect the people who pave the roads so you can have a smooth drive to work, make the coffee that keeps you alert, and so on. But it's always strange to me when people say the same thing to mean the opposite, that prosperity is just luck, and not the result of anyone's work at all.

> That the framework necessary for success is built and maintained by all of us, and you should respect the people who pave the roads so you can have a smooth drive to work, make the coffee that keeps you alert, and so on.

This very much, indeed.

> But it's always strange to me when people say the same thing to mean the opposite, that prosperity is just luck, and not the result of anyone's work at all.

It's easier to achieve success, when you're born in rich family, rich country. It's easier, when you have good health, high intelligence and great people skills. In modern world these factors make difference between success and failure. That's why being "self-made" in most case is over hyped. We can compensate our flaws, but some start without them. In almost every case, you won't reach the top from bottom, because gap in wealth is too huge. "Self-made" is survivor bias.

> "Self-made" is survivor bias.

That's a neat way of putting it. I might steal that.

> Was there some other path you could have taken that would have been more fun or fulfilling in some way, but might not have brought the wealth?

It's impossible for anyone to know whether taking another path would have been better or worse. We only know the path we've taken.

My father was arguably a self-made millionaire, even though he wouldn't have described himself that way. (He wasn't hugely wealthy, but he did live a couple of decades with FU money.)

He was literally born in a log cabin, with an outhouse, and rode horses to school. He was a migrant farm worker as a kid and young adult.

Yes, it was worth it. He got to spend money on his kids and grandkids. He got to do pretty much what he wanted to do with his time. He had a much better life than his parents.

The rest of your questions make assumptions that simply aren't relevant. You have a very limited view of how one can build wealth.

I made mine after selling my startup a few years ago. The only thing that changed was my mental state. From constantly worrying about money to only worrying about returning to my previous state.

I had to make a few sacrifices to get where I am now, though. I compromised my mental health quite a bit but I'm slowly returning back to my baseline now. That specific sacrifice became obvious only in hindsight since at that time I wasn't aware how things were really affecting me.

I have some things I wish I had done differently, but they don't chase so much as to call them regrets.

yup

Then again, all I did was buy a thousand shares of Microsoft the day they went public.

Nice. Should be worth around 70 million now after all the splits if you never sold any of the shares. And you would also be making over half a mil every year just on dividends.

Was it a case of betting everything on black so-to-speak? Otherwise having an extra 25+k to put in MSFT back in 1986 probably meant you weren't too bad off to begin with. Still, excellent move regardless!

Not myself, but check out Reddit’s FatFIRE subreddit for many anecdotes and discussions.

I was actually uninspired by the stories I saw of lifestyles of those who “made it”, but YMMV and they generally seem to feel it was worth it.

Back then getting off the farm meant college. All my siblings took that route. We have an Intel VP, an IT professional, a state Environmental Impact statement researcher, a bonemarrow transplant nurse, a serial entrepreneur in Silicon Valley and fortune-500 industrial VP (several companies)

Not the same landscape any more; different routes are available now.

It can take a lot of work just being a self-made thousandaire.

Significant earnings from your own technology and even your own two hands would have to start somewhere.

Then maybe you can get a better idea about bumping it up 1000x or so.

Nothing is ever worth it at the end, but it's better than being as poor as I was

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