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Old 25-04-2020, 10:51 PM
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Originally Posted by Unregistered View Post
Passive income is a misnomer. All Passive income still require some upfront work and risk taking (eg. if investing in stocks, property and business). I have a few friends who wrote books and earn a little royalty from their book sales. But these royalty income are pittance unless you can write great novels or books that are required texts used in schools. And it takes quite a bit of effort to write those books.

So first all, perish the thought about receiving income without effort. Even to interest from Fixed Deposits (FDs), you first need that deposit - money which comes from somewhere which is very likely to be from work and savings.

For myself I do have the following sources of "passive" incomes:

1. Interest from FDs and Bonds - around $20,000 a year
2. Dividends from shares - around $60,000 a year (before the Covid crisis)
3. Rental income - $36,000 a year (gross, ie still need to deduct the condo fees, property tax, income tax etc...)
4. Interest earned in CPF OA & SA - $29,000 last year (I am above 55 yo, so I could withdraw this interest if I choose to)

To reach the above stage, there was a full 30 years of working, saving and investing. It is all active and hard work. And there is quite a bit of risk taking except for FDs and CPF which are secure.

So if you were to look at my situation now, you would only see the above income as "passive". And you are not entirely wrong but it would be wrong to ignore the hard work and risk taking that it took to build this up.

Having said that, it does feel very good and satisfying to be receiving these other incomes over and above your salary income. At this quite mature and established stage, you will also notice that your wealth growth rate increases. Your networth grows faster.

So you need to have right mindset (mental model) about "passive" income. You need to be prepared to do a lot of "heavy lifting" upfront. Once that this is in place, you can then sit back, "chillax" and enjoy the 'fruits". Good luck.
Didn't know boomers visit these forums too, good write up tho

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