They Asked a Finance Professor: “How Can I Get Rich?”

There is a question my students ask from time to time—and one that, in truth, intrigues not only the young but almost everyone: “Professor, how can I get rich?”

The worst answer I could give as a finance professor would be to name a few stocks, say “buy a flat here”, “buy gold”, “buy crypto”, or “do this business”. Because wealth is not a one-off stroke of luck; it is the accumulated result of hundreds of sound financial decisions (a sequence of behaviours consistent with principles) made over many years.

Moreover, being young in Turkey today is not easy. Housing prices are high, rents are heavy, buying a car is difficult, and the purchasing power of incomes is constantly under discussion. In such an environment, saying “save and invest” can sometimes seem too easy. Yet precisely for that reason, young people need to learn some of the basic truths of finance as early as possible.

Invest in yourself first. A twenty-year-old’s greatest capital is not the money in the bank. It is the forty to fifty years of working life ahead. So in the early years the real question is not “Which investment should I put my money into?” but “How do I raise my own market value?” Learn good English. Specialise in your profession. Learn to use artificial intelligence. Keep up with technology. Learn to communicate, to sell, to read financial statements, to analyse data, and to solve problems. Raising the annual return on 100,000 lira by a few percentage points matters; yet expertise that can lift your annual earning capacity from 500,000 lira to 1 million lira matters far more.

As your income rises, do not raise your spending at the same pace. In finance we may call this “lifestyle inflation”. The phone you use with your first salary begins to feel inadequate a few years later. Then the car changes. More expensive restaurants, more expensive holidays, more expensive brands enter your life. Your income rises, but your wealth does not. Here there is an important distinction young people need to understand: looking rich and being rich are not the same thing. Wearing a 100,000-lira watch is not a sign of wealth. True wealth is the freedom to choose not to buy that watch even when you have the money to do so.

Pay yourself first with a portion of every sum you earn. If you take your salary, spend first, and try to save what is left at the end of the month, usually nothing remains. Reverse the order. When income arrives, set aside a definite share for saving and investment; live on what is left. If you can start with 5 percent, start with 5 percent. If you can set aside 10 percent, set aside 10 percent. The first aim here is not to accumulate a large sum, but to build financial discipline.

Start early. Young people’s greatest financial advantage is not high income but time. Compound return is one of the most powerful mechanisms in finance. When the return you earn is reinvested, it is no longer only your principal that works for you; the returns you earned in the past also begin to earn money on your behalf.

That is why one of the costliest sentences in an investing life is this: “Let me earn a bit more money first, then I’ll start investing.” Most of the time that “then” never comes.

Do not underestimate inflation. For a young person living in Turkey, merely accumulating money is not enough. What matters is being able to protect purchasing power. Holding all your savings in cash for a long time looks risk-free. Yet if inflation is high, your money may stay nominally in place while shrinking in real terms. So develop your financial literacy. Learn about deposits, bonds, investment funds, equities, gold, real estate, and other investment instruments. But do not invest before you understand.

Do not try to get rich quickly. This may be the most valuable piece of financial advice I can give young people. “A stock that will return 50 percent in a month.” “Crypto that is certain to rise.” “If you miss this opportunity you’ll never find another.” In the history of finance, a substantial share of people’s large wealth losses has come not from the desire to make money, but from the desire to make money very fast (from greed / avarice). The urge to get rich quickly can destroy your chance of getting rich slowly but permanently. (If you have time, I recommend reading this piece: Fraudsters Draw Their Energy from Greed.)

Use debt not for consumption but, where possible, for production. Debt is not bad. What is bad is using debt for the wrong purpose. Debt used for education that will raise your income, for a productive investment, or for a reasonable business investment is not the same as constant consumption on a credit card. Consumer debt spends your future income today. Productive debt, used correctly, can raise your future earning capacity.

Try not to depend on a single source of income. In the first years of your working life, give all your attention to becoming good at your profession. Over time, however, try to turn your knowledge into different sources of income. You can consult. You can develop a venture. You can create digital products. You can write a book. You can teach. You can build long-term investments in the capital markets. The aim here is not to do ten jobs at once. It is first to build a valuable skill, then to diversify the economic return on that skill.

Avoid large losses. Success in finance is not only about how much you earn; how much you can keep also matters. If an investment loses 50 percent of its value, you need not 50 percent but 100 percent to return to the starting level. That is why putting all your money into a single investment, trading with uncontrolled leverage, or taking large risks in instruments you do not understand is not a wealth-building strategy. One of the most important rules while becoming wealthy is to stay in the game.

Be patient. In the age of social media, patience has become harder. Someone is selling a company at twenty-five. Someone is driving a luxury car. Someone is posting holiday photos from the other side of the world. Looking at all this, you may think you have fallen behind. But remember: what you see on social media is often people’s shop window, not their balance sheet. You see the car someone drives; you do not see their bank debt. You see their home; you do not see the mortgage instalment. You see their holiday; you do not see their savings. So do not compare your own wealth with other people’s consumption.

As a finance professor, my answer to young people who ask “Professor, how can I get rich?” is this: Make yourself valuable. Before working hard for its own sake, learn to do work that creates value. Spend less than you earn. Invest the difference regularly in productive assets. Control debt. Avoid large losses. Learn to use time and compound return. Do these things with discipline for twenty to thirty years. Wealth is usually not the result of great financial genius. It is the result of small but correct decisions, repeated over a long period.

Perhaps the most valuable financial truth that can be learned at a young age is this: the first step toward getting rich is not earning more money; it is establishing the right relationship with money.