The Millionaire Next Door Summary – Thomas J. Stanley

The Millionaire Next Door (1995)

The Surprising Secrets of America's Wealthy

by Thomas J. Stanley

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The Millionaire Next Door Summary

This The Millionaire Next Door publisher’s blurb comes from the Taylor Trade paperback edition of the book…

“‘Why aren’t I as wealthy as I should be?’ Many people ask this question of themselves. Often they are hard-working, well-educated, middle- to high-income people. Why, then, are so few affluent? For nearly two decades the answer has been found in the best-selling The Millionaire Next Door: The Surprising Secrets of America’s Wealthy, reissued with a new preface for the twenty-first century by Dr. Thomas J. Stanley.

According to the authors, most people have it all wrong about how you become wealthy in America. Wealth in America is more often the result of hard work, diligent savings, and living below your means than it is about inheritance, advanced degrees, or even intelligence. The Millionaire Next Door identifies seven common traits that show up again and again among those who have accumulated wealth. You will learn, for example, that millionaires bargain shop for used cars, pay a tiny fraction of their wealth in income tax, raise children who are often unaware of their family’s wealth until they are adults, and, above all, reject the big-spending lifestyles most of us associate with rich people. Most of the truly wealthy in this country don’t live in Beverly Hills or on Park Avenue — they live next door.”

The Millionaire Next Door Contents

The Millionaire Next Door has 8 main chapters…

Introduction

1. Meet the Millionaire Next Door
2. Frugal Frugal Frugal
3. Time, Energy, and Money
4. You Aren’t What You Drive
5. Economic Outpatient Care
6. Affirmative Action, Family Style
7. Find Your Niche
8. Jobs: Millionaires versus Heirs

The Millionaire Next Door is data heavy. It contains 31 tables as indexed below…

• 1-1: The Top Ten Ancestry Groups of American Millionaires
• 1-2: The Top Fifteen Economically Productive Small Population Ancestry Groups
• 2-1: Prices Paid by Millionaires for Clothing and Accessories
• 2-2: Credit Cards of Millionaire Household Members
• 2-3: Contrasts among American Taxpayers
• 3-1: Concerns, Fears, and Worries: Dr. North vs. Dr. South
• 3-2: Consumption Habits: The Norths vs. the Souths
• 3-3: Income and Wealth Contrasts: The Norths vs. the Souths
• 3-4: Concerns, Fears, and Worries: PAWs vs. UAWs
• 3-5: Investment Planning and Demographic Contrasts: Middle-Income PAWs vs. UAWs
• 3-6: Hours Allocated: Dr. North vs. Dr. South
• 4-1: Motor Vehicles of Millionaires: Model-Year
• 4-2: Motor Vehicles of Millionaires: Purchase Price
• 4-3: Motor Vehicle Acquisition Orientations of Millionaires
• 4-4: Economic Lifestyles of Motor Vehicle Acquisition Types
• 5-1: Economic Outpatient Care Given by Affluent Parents
• 5-2: Receivers vs. Nonreceivers of Cash Gifts
• 6-1: The Likelihood of Receiving a Substantial Inheritance: Occupational Contrasts
• 6-2: The Likelihood of Receiving Substantial Financial Gifts: Occupational Contrasts
• 6-3: Mean Annual Earnings: Men vs. Women
• 6-4: Corporate Executive—Gifts and Inheritance
• 6-5: Entrepreneur—Gifts and Inheritance
• 6-6: Physicians—Gifts and Inheritance
• 7-1: Estimated Allocations of Estates Valued at $1 Million or More
• 7-2: Estimated Fees for Estate Services
• 7-3: Predicted Number and Value of Estates of $1 Million or More
• 7-4: Predicted Number of Estates Valued at $1 Million or More Rank Ordered by Number of Estates by State for the Year 2000
• 7-5: Estimated Number of Millionaire Households in the Year 2005
• 8-1: Rankings of Selected Categories of Sole Proprietorships
• 8-2: The Top Ten Most Profitable Sole-Proprietorship Businesses
• 8-3: Selected Businesses/Occupations of Self-Employed Millionaires

Best The Millionaire Next Door Quotes

These The Millionaire Next Door quotes come from The Art of Living's ever-growing central library of thoughts, anecdotes, notes, and inspirational quotes.

"Many people who live in expensive homes and drive luxury cars do not actually have much wealth... Many people who have a great deal of wealth do not even live in upscale neighborhoods."

- Thomas J. Stanley, The Millionaire Next Door

"Wealth is not the same as income. If you make a good income each year and spend it all, you are not getting wealthier. You are just living high. Wealth is what you accumulate, not what you spend."

- Thomas J. Stanley, The Millionaire Next Door

"Wealth is more often the result of a lifestyle of hard work, perseverance, planning, and, most of all, self-discipline."

- Thomas J. Stanley, The Millionaire Next Door

"[The] seven common denominators among those who successfully build wealth: 1. They live well below their means; 2. They allocate their time, energy, and money efficiently, in ways conducive to building wealth; 3. They believe that financial independence is more important than displaying high social status; 4. Their parents did not provide economic outpatient care; 5. Their adult children are economically self-sufficient; 6. They are proficient in targeting market opportunities; 7. They chose the right occupation."

- Thomas J. Stanley, The Millionaire Next Door

"People whom we define as being wealthy get much more pleasure from owning substantial amounts of appreciable assets than from displaying a high-consumption lifestyle."

- Thomas J. Stanley, The Millionaire Next Door

"Multiply your age times your realized pretax annual household income from all sources except inheritances. Divide by ten. This, less any inherited wealth, is what your net worth should be."

- Thomas J. Stanley, The Millionaire Next Door

"If you are in the top quartile for wealth accumulation, you are a PAW, or prodigious accumulator of wealth. If you are in the bottom quartile, you are a UAW, or under accumulator of wealth. Are you a PAW, a UAW, or just an AAW (average accumulator of wealth)?"

- Thomas J. Stanley, The Millionaire Next Door

"The foundation stone of wealth accumulation is defense, and this defense should be anchored by budgeting and planning."

- Thomas J. Stanley, The Millionaire Next Door

"[Millionaires] became millionaires by budgeting and controlling expenses, and they maintain their affluent status the same way."

- Thomas J. Stanley, The Millionaire Next Door

"Financially independent people are happier than those in their same income/age cohort who are not financially secure."

- Thomas J. Stanley, The Millionaire Next Door

"To build wealth, minimize your realized (taxable) income and maximize your unrealized income (wealth/capital appreciation without a cash flow)."

- Thomas J. Stanley, The Millionaire Next Door

"If you’re not yet wealthy but want to be someday, never purchase a home that requires a mortgage that is more than twice your household’s total annual realized income."

- Thomas J. Stanley, The Millionaire Next Door

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Arthur Worsley
I founded TAoL to discover and share the best wisdom on how to live long and prosper. Before that I studied Psychology, Philosophy & Physiology at Oxford and consulted at McKinsey. Still curious? Learn more or take my FREE productivity quiz.