Like Simon Sinek in his “Golden Circle” theory, we’ll start with the why. Why write this book? What drove us to do it?

We were born into a middle-class family in Spain. We had a happy childhood and never wanted for anything. However, as in any family like ours, our dinnertime conversations never touched upon businesses or investments, and we never got any training on personal finances at school or college. Quite the contrary. Like most people, the one message continually pushed on us was: “All you have to do is study hard, get good grades, go to college and get a good job.” They drilled this into us, so it’s exactly what we did.

Richard achieved an Extraordinary Award for his Engineering degree, and began work at one of the top five strategy consulting companies in the world. At just twenty-three, he was already traveling the world, advising large corporations in Latin America and Europe. Diego, on the other hand, had always been a big saver and investor, and at twenty-one he was comparing mortgages to buy his own house. We had dived into the rat race at the deep end!

But it didn’t take us long to realize that all the information and knowledge we had picked up would be useless when it came to managing our personal finances. We didn’t know what we had to do to manage our money properly; we had not the slightest idea how to assess an investment, and we didn’t know the tricks and secrets that already-wealthy people use to generate more wealth. What we could see, though, was that just by working and earning a salary all our lives, we would never be rich – not even close.

That’s why, thirsty for insight and eager to grow personally, we embarked on a quest for knowledge. We invested thousands of euros in financial training, got masters in stock-market investments, and read every book on the personal finance bestsellers lists.

With all of that under our belts, little by little, barely noticing, we began to learn. We founded companies, and even when they failed, we learned. We invested in stocks – sometimes we won and sometimes we lost, but we learned. We invested in real estate; we made a few mistakes, but we learned.

Thanks to this learning, we gradually began to buy and generate assets that were increasingly lucrative. It wasn’t easy, but thanks to our tenacity, our mentors, and our investments in financial training, we finally achieved our sought-after financial freedom[1].

The knowledge was out there; we just had to look for it. But it wasn’t within just anyone’s reach – probably because it’s not in the interests of the rich and powerful, or governments or banks, for the average joe to have access to this knowledge. That’s exactly why we decided to do something about it. We were lucky enough to be born into a family who could support us and give us access to a good education, as well as teaching us values like hard work and perseverance. But not everyone is so fortunate.

So, we decided to write a book that compiled all that knowledge and experience we had picked up during years of searching, and made it accessible to everyone. We have created the only guide you need to improve your personal finances and get on the certain path toward financial freedom.

This book doesn’t promise to make you rich within a month – anyone who does that is lying to you. But if you apply our method, within a reasonable space of time you will be able to achieve financial freedom. From there, you can live without working if you want, or continue to grow your assets until you’re a millionaire. It’s up to you. All we want to do is show you the way – you’re the one who has to walk it!

[1] Financial freedom: an individual’s ability to cover their economic needs without having to undertake any kind of activity.

PAUSE FOR THOUGHT…

One day, when he was little, Thomas Edison came home from school and gave his mother a piece of paper, telling her: “My teacher gave this paper to me and told me to only give it to my mother. What does it say?”.

His mother’s eyes filled with tears as she started to read. “Your son is a genius. This school is too small for him and doesn’t have enough good teachers for training him. Please teach him yourself.”

And that’s exactly what his mother did, until she fell gravely ill and died.

Many years later, he was searching through his mother’s things when he found the letter from his old teacher. He read it to himself. It said: “Your son is addled [mentally deficient]. We won’t let him come to school any more.”

He was overcome with emotion, and wrote in his diary: Thomas A. Edison was an addled child that, by a hero mother, became the genius of the century.