Stanley Riiks Interview Part 1
Your latest book is Think Rich, Get Rich: 5 Steps to Financial Independence, is out now. Tell us about the book.
Think Rich, Get Richis a simple, step by step guide to money: saving it, investing it, and building your wealth so that you can live your best life. It’s concise and easy to follow. There are only 5 steps, which are broken down into easy bite-sized chunks. This is basically a financial bible.
You usually write horror, fantasy and SF. Why write a book about finance?
I’ve always been interested in finance, since about the age of 8 when I had to sell my Star Wars figures to buy Transformers (big mistake!). That’s when I realised I needed to save money, so I could buy the toys I wanted to. I started selling toys at school. I got my first job, a paper round, at 13. I bought my first shares when I was 15, too young to own them so they were in my mum’s name. I got a job as a cleaner at age 25, started my first business as 17. I feel like I’ve been preparing to write this book most of my life. During the last recession, after the housing market crashed in 2008, I wrote a series of blogs about finance. Now I know a lot more, so I decided to write a book.
What’s the one financial regret you have?
I’m only allowed one? Not buying enough shares during the 2008 recession. I did buy some Disney, but I wish I’ve bought Amazon, Nike, and Apple too. I also probably should have bought my first property sooner. Regrets aren’t helpful though, learn from your mistakes and move forward. I did get Apple shares a few years later, and I bought Nike shares during lockdown this year. If I had more money I’d buy Amazon too, but I’ve bought four property in the last year instead.
Biggest financial success?
My flat in Charlton, south east London. I bought it in 2013 and rented it for two years. It’s now worth nearly double what I paid for it. I think that’s pretty good!
Biggest financial mistakes?
Actually, it was one I narrowly escaped. We had been searching for properties for a few months and we found this perfect 3-bedroom house in Canterbury, ideal for a student let. We put in an offer and it was accepted, everything was going through fine, and then we get the survey back. The house had previously been bought at auctioned and had basically been bodged together to look good, but the ceiling was barely held up (the wrong nails had been used), the windows were dodgy and the roof was in serious danger of collapsing. There was nearly £30,000 of work that needed doing before it was even safe. We tried to negotiate the price down sufficiently to cover the costs, but the seller wouldn’t budge so we pulled out. That’s why I’ll never buy a house without a survey.
5 Steps doesn’t sound like much. Is wealth really achievable in just 5 steps?
The 5 steps in the book are not particularly difficult, but it does take discipline, it does take sacrifice. And it’s not going to happen overnight. If it was that easy, everyone would do it. Having said that, this is not rocket science, you don’t need to be super intelligent, you don’t need anything other than determination. And is it achievable? Yes, it most definitely is. I’ll be retiring next year at the age of 45, so it is perfectly achievable.
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