According to recent studies, the rate of income inequality between the poor and rich in the United States hasn’t been this stark since the Great Depression.
It’s all relative, of course.
According to the elite private bankers you’re not really, really rich unless you have at least $25 million in the bank.
Private bankers and finance experts now consider that number to be a threshold amount for self-sustainable and investable wealth.
With $25 million, one could suffer losses in a diversified investment portfolio, see rebounds in a few years, all while still maintaining your status as wealthy, rather than just plain old rich.
Only a couple of decades ago just having a few million made you truly rich.
Peter Charrington, the global head for Citi Private Bank, says that in 1994 “$3 million was largely considered ultra-high net worth across the industry.”
Times have changed.
“Fast-forward almost 25 years, and $25 million is how we define ultra-high net worth,” he says.
How to join the wealthy few
Inflation is a part of it. A million in 2000 would be worth about $1.5 million today.
In a world of volatile financial markets and creeping inflation, a million dollars just doesn’t go as far as it used to.
Unless you are born rich it takes time and the implementation of strategic financial strategies to become wealthy.
Saving money is not enough to become rich. It also takes having multiple streams of income and prudent investment planning as well.
The wealthy “do not rely on one singular source of income,” explains author Thomas C. Corley, who studies the successes of self-made millionaires.
“Sixty-five percent had at least three streams of income that they created prior to making their first million dollars.”
