Rags to Riches: Motivating Stories of How Ordinary People Achieved Extraordinary Wealth [Paperback]

Gail Liberman (Author), Alan Lavine (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: April 2000

From magician to manufacturing magnate, financial columnist to real estate investor, poet to college drop-out, here are the profiles of 17 ordinary people who started with nothing. Husband-wife financial journalist team Gail Liberman and Alan Lavine collaborate on an engaging and insightful journey into the lives, histories and backgrounds of people who have themselves traveled from rags to riches and are willing to share their insights. The authors add their professional perspectives employed by these people to amass and retain their fortunes, and tips to avoid the downside of wealth.

Each story illustrates a different wealth accumulation and retention strategy. Readers will meet the likes of:

* Bootstrap Entrepreneur Lisa Renshaw, who lived in a 10 x 12 foot room for three and a half years while she built her parking garage into a respectable business, now employing 300 people, with 68 garages and parking lots, and generating $28 million in annual revenues.
* Pro golfer Juan "Chi Chi" Rodriguez, a Puerto Rican sugar laborer turned golf caddy who developed fame and wealth by living his passion.
* Poet and university instructor Maya Angelou, who was asked to deliver an original poem at Bill Clinton's inauguration. Since then she has written 11 best sellers.
* Record mogul David Geffen, a ne'er do well high school drop-out who co-founded DreamWorks film studio and is now worth 2.3 billion.

Editorial Reviews

From the Publisher

Who Wants to Be a Millionaire?

Who doesnt? From magician to manufacturing magnate, financial columnist to real estate investor, poet to college dropout, here are the profiles of 17 ordinary people who started with nothingand became millionaires! These are the stories of people who overcame poverty or in some cases middle-class lifestyles to single-handedly beat overwhelming odds and achieve financial success. They may not all be household names, but their stories can serve as an inspiration to us all.

Praise for Rags to Riches:

There are as many paths to financial success as there are people who want to achieve it. This book shows that wealth is within the reach of just about anyone.

Tom Siedell, Managing Editor, Your Money

The most extraordinary thing about Rags to Riches is that it affirms how ordinary people have this tremendous, innate ability to achieve success and generate wealth if they put their minds to it.

John F. Wasik, Author, Retire Early and Live the Life You Want Now

Rags to Riches: Motivating Stories of How Ordinary People Achieved Extraordinary Wealth goes well beyond the quick-fix guru guidebooks to explore effective, long-term strategies that systematically build wealth. Its a fascinating, candid look at how every day, people reach their goals by turning challenge into opportunity.

Marla Brill, Publisher, Brills Mutual Funds Interactive

A fascinating and instructive collection of biographies.

Evan Simonoff, Associated Publisher/Editor-in-Chief, Financial Planning

Now readers everywhere can discover what Palm Beach Daily News readers have learned: Gail Liberman and Alan Lavine know everything there is to know about personal wealthhow to get it and how to grow it. Gails weekly column in our paper tells affluent readers how to manage their fortunes. This book takes a step back and tells readers, in the words of millionaires who been there and done it, how to acquire a vast personal fortune.

Linda Rawls, Editor, Palm Beach Daily News

About the Author

Husband and wife Alan Lavine and Gail Liberman know money. They are syndicated finance columnists and authors based in North Palm Beach, Florida. Their joint columns run weekly in the Boston Herald, on America Online, and in numerous newspapers. They are frequent guests on radio and television as well as columnists for Fundsinteractive.com and Quicken.com. Alan and Gail are the authors of Love, Marriage & Money, as well as the bestseller, The Complete Idiots Guide to Making Money with Mutual Funds.

Product Details

• Paperback: 227 pages
• Publisher: Dearborn Trade; 1St Edition edition (April 2000)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0793133920
• ISBN-13: 978-0793133925
• Product Dimensions: 8.9 x 6 x 0.3 inches
• Shipping Weight: 4 ounces
• Average Customer Review: 3.6 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (17 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #1,101,003 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

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Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

27 of 29 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Inspiration for everyone, June 21, 2000

By 

Joe Thoma (Orlando) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Rags to Riches: Motivating Stories of How Ordinary People Achieved Extraordinary Wealth (Paperback)

This is one of the best personal-finance books that you could read. "Rags to Riches" takes you beyond the usual advice, while including useful wisdom of wealth accumulation. The authors provide something much more compelling than the standard retelling of how to save, grow and protect your money. The best thing about "Rags" is that it brings the reader face-to-face with real success stories, told with a true feeling for the people behind the pocketbooks. For those of us who hope to succeed, the stories in this book are inspirational. And what's even better, these successful people are just like you and me. There's an affinity there that can't be matched by headlines about Donald Trump or George Soros. This book makes a perfect gift for college or B-school grads, mid-career folks and even someone nearing retirement age. These strategies could even work for those second- or third-career folks.

24 of 27 people found the following review helpful:

2.0 out of 5 stars Great idea hampered by poor structure and sloppy writing, August 3, 2000

By 

A. North "Alix North" (Northern California) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

This review is from: Rags to Riches: Motivating Stories of How Ordinary People Achieved Extraordinary Wealth (Paperback)

As a lover of success stories and biographies, I was looking forward to reading Rags to Riches. The idea seems perfect--profile regular folks who have established wealth, and tell how they did it. But what I found was disappointment.

Each profile is rather long and, most annoyingly, poorly structured. The stories are not linear--making it hard to follow the story--and also repeat themselves. Many stories share a wealth of details unrelated to the subject's financial success. I suspected that the profiles to follow the exact course of the verbal interview, with no editing and restructuring to benefit the reader. While I enjoy rich stories (no pun intended) I found myself bored and frustrated with the lack of focus.

In some cases, the authors chose to profile individuals who they could not interview. I believe these profiles damaged the book, as the authors can only suppose how the individual achieved their wealth. In particular, the profile of Maya Angelou told me very little about how she grew and managed her wealth--how much was deliberate, what kind of advice did she receive, how does she retain it? It seemd the authors were enchanted with Ms. Angelou for reasons other than her financial success, and that was why they chose to include her. I received little benefit from reading the profile, as interesting as Ms. Angelou is in other regards.

With only 16 profiles and many of them flawed, I'd recommend looking elsewhere for this kind of insight. It's too bad--I had high hopes for the book.

21 of 24 people found the following review helpful:

2.0 out of 5 stars How to cheat and get ahead, July 31, 2000

By 

John Cordy - See all my reviews

This review is from: Rags to Riches: Motivating Stories of How Ordinary People Achieved Extraordinary Wealth (Paperback)

In the Introduction the authors state "their stories can serve as an inspiration to all of us."Then later they talk about how David Geffen lied to his employer about being a college grad and then arrived early each day to go through the mail to find letter from college. When it arrive he steamed it open, obtained a new letterhead and wrote his own letter verifying he was a graduate. Great lesson on how to get ahead. Just what I want my children to learn.