Robert T. Kiyosaki, Rich Dad, Poor Dad Review

Click here if this is your business
Robert T. Kiyosaki, Rich Dad, Poor Dad
★★★☆☆
3.1
From 4 reviews
75.0% of users recommend this

moneyseeker3000's review of Robert T. Kiyosaki, Rich Dad, Poor Dad

“CRITICAL REVIEW OF ROBERT KIYOSAKI'S BOOK: RICH DAD...”

☆☆☆☆☆

written by moneyseeker3000 on 23/01/2008

Good Points
Nice front cover

Bad Points
The whole book

General Comments
CRITICAL REVIEW OF ROBERT KIYOSAKI'S BOOK: RICH DAD POOR DAD

Rich Dad Poor Dad is a book written by Robert Kiyosaki which claims to tell you the secret of how to get rich. The book is full of misleading information mixed with half truths copied from elsewhere. Real estate professional John T Reed did a thorough analysis of the book, but here is my review and experience of the book.


REVIEW OF INTRODUCTION:

* Sharon Lechter says the only way out of the rat race of employment is to prove how good you are at accounting and investing. True, but this was said a long time ago in the great book; 'The Richest Man in 'Babylon', (which Kiyosaki openly admits to have read, in later chapters).
* He says education is outdated. That might be true, but that's no reason to spend thousands on Kiyosaki's seminars, games and books.

REVIEW OF CHAPTER ONE:

* He says his poor dad struggled financially. This contradicts the fact that poor dad earned a high salary and had lots of education and was able to afford an expensive house.
* He says Rich Dad taught him to say: 'How can I afford it '. This is one of motivational speaker Anthony Robbins' main principles. Kiyosaki recommends a book by Anthony Robbins at the back of his book; read Anthony Robbins book 'Unlimited Power' and see for yourself. This is further evidence that 'Rich Dad' is a fictional figure, made up of many different people Kiyosaki has encountered over the years.
* He includes the poem 'the road not taken'. Many other books also quote this poem, so it's not a big deal to quote it.

REVIEW OF CHAPTER TWO:

* Kiyosaki's real dad told his son that 'you're only poor if you give up'. Why was Poor Dad giving financial advice when he was not and never did become rich?
* Rich Dad gave Kiyosaki financial advice by letting him work at his store. Yet by this time Rich Dad was not greatly rich so why was his advice worth taking at that time. At that time he would have been just another struggling business owner.

REVIEW OF CHAPTER THREE:

* He says it's not how much money you make, its how much you keep'. That's common sense. You need to have some money in the first place, in order to keep it, so where's the plan for that? Kiyosaki as usual does not say
* He says buy assets and not liabilities. No asset is as trouble free as he implies. You can't just simply buy a money making machine. Any asset has to be maintained and may even turn into a liability over time. The rates of return Kiyosaki suggests are ludicrous.
* He says you can invest $5000 and'"soon turn it into $1 million or more. How do you do that, via lottery tickets? Kiyosaki as usual does not say. How ridiculous.
* He says if you have $2000 monthly expenses and $2000 cash flow then you are wealthy. He neglects to mention that taxes and bills/rates usually rise every year and there are always other unforeseen costs in life. If you do not have any extra income above your cash flow, then how can you afford to pay for extra things, which always crop up?

REVIEW OF CHAPTER FOUR:

* He says to become financially secure all you have to do is take care of your business. In reality the failure rate for businesses is extremely high.
* He says buy assets not liabilities, then in the same paragraph talks about how he bought the liability of a $400 titanium golf club. Clearly he is not practicing what he is preaching.
* He says poor and middle class buy luxuries because they want to look rich, yet Kiyosaki writes in the same book about how he likes to buy Porsches, Rolex watches, titanium golf clubs etc.

REVIEW OF CHAPTER FIVE:

* He says in reality the rich are not taxed. The truth is that in America, everyone who earns a wage is taxed.
* Rich Dad told him to own the corporate ladder. With what funding?
* Kiyosaki said he worked at Xerox and formed his first corporation at the same time. He then says he used profit from the company to buy a Porsche! Why didn't he put the money into more assets instead, as he advises all through the book? A blatant contradiction.
* He says a wealthy person owns nothing and controls everything. In reality if you own nothing, you have no legal entitlement to any money. You need legal ownership of stocks, shares, property, business etc. A look on any rich list clearly shows that rich people own part, or all of their assets. If you own nothing, you have nothing to control, and the legal owners can do whatever they like with the money without your permission.

REVIEW OF CHAPTER SIX:

* He says there are a lot of people who have a lot of money but do not get ahead financially. This does not make sense, because if you have a lot of money (and little or no debt); financially you are probably doing quite well.
* He said Rich Dad occasionally reminded them of how close Robert came to the secret of money when the young Kiyosaki made fake money as a young boy, using plaster of paris. So this would mean that Rich Dad is actually praising the illegal forging of money.
* Rich Dad says the mind can create enormous wealth in an instant, yet Kiyosaki spent many years trying to become rich, and ended up bankrupt despite all of the advice Rich Dad had given him over the years.
* Kiyosaki says:'"you may be able to set up your life differently, so the ability to take $25,000 and turn it $1 million in a year is low risk for you ' . With this kind of financial acumen, it makes you wonder why Kiyosaki is not already a billionaire.

REVIEW OF CHAPTER SEVEN:

'He says that he is a best selling author, not a best writing author. This shows that all he cares about is selling books, and is less concerned as to the accurate content of his books.

REVIEW OF CHAPTER EIGHT:

'He says Rich Dad told him to be like the Texans and remember the Alamo. Yet the people actually involved in that battle died a terrible death. Risk, is a sword that cuts both ways, yet Kiyosaki downplays the fact that losing a big risk can be enough to end your financial success permanently (look at Enron).
'He mentions Peter Lynch, yet if you read any book by Peter Lynch, his methods are nothing like Kiyosaki's.
'Kiyosaki talks about his outrageously good deals in the Phoenix real estate market, yet has absolutely no proof to back it up.
'Kiyosaki says most people in the money industry are just spouting off sales pitches like used car salesmen. Yet, in chapter seven he talked about what an expert salesperson he is.

REVIEW OF CHAPTER NINE:

'He starts the chapter by saying'"I wish I could say acquiring wealth was easy for me, but it wasn't'. Remember, this is after having Rich Dad's personal guidance from age nine!
'He says he doesn't subscribe to a get rich quick mentality, yet in chapter six he said he can take $25,000 and turn it into $1 million in a year, with low risk!
'He has the audacity to quote a great book'"The Richest Man in Babylon ' , yet that book is about building money slowly but surely, nothing like Kiyosaki's methods. He also claims'"The Richest Man in Babylon'is a book is about one story, when in reality the book is actually a collection of different stories.

REVIEW OF CHAPTER TEN:

'He starts the chapter by saying'"I wish I could say acquiring wealth was easy for me, but it wasn't'. Remember, this is after having Rich Dad's personal guidance from age nine!
'He says Bill Gates was one of the richest men in the world before age 30. Bill Gates achieved this without a rich dad, so why hasn't Kiyosaki gained a similar or greater level of success? Surely he should be wiping the floor with Bill Gates financially, yet I've never seen a rich list that even puts Kiyosaki and Gates on the same page!

REVIEW OF EPILOGUE:

'He starts the chapter giving an outrageous story about how he helped a friend to retire early. If Kiyosaki was really that good with money (in the example story he provided), he would surely be a billionaire by now because he could invest his own millions to achieve the spectacular results he described.
'Kiyosaki says he turned $5,000 into a $1 million dollar asset producing $5,000 per month ($60,000 per year), cash flow in less than six years! I would be amazed if anyone actually believes that! He says 'It's kind of easy once you get the hang of it!
He ends the book with advertisements for his expensive games, books, and seminars. This gives good weight to the argument that the whole book was just one big sales pitch!

GENERAL REVIEW:

* In my research, I came across a past real-estate guru named Tom Vu on the internet. He preached a similar message to Kiyosaki in the 1990's. Do a search for some of his infomercials on You-tube.com, as it really highlights just how stupid these false gurus think the general public are.
*'"The Secret'by Rhonda Byrne has now been released on DVD and book format. It is a runaway bestseller. Like Kiyosaki's "Rich Dad, Poor Dad", the book was promoted by Oprah and then its sales went ballistic. The actual book/film is yet another vague siren song promising riches, or whatever else you desire, simply by hoping for it. Nothing practical whatsoever, just like Kiyosaki's writings. The author of The Secret was arguably penniless (carrying debt, and not a millionaire or billionaire) when she wrote it, yet now she has become a millionaire due to good selling strategies. Books by false gurus only make the gurus rich, and yet people are buying more copies of this stuff than books by Bill Gates (the richest man in the world)!
* Kiyosaki had 'rich dad' advice from age nine. If the advice was any good, surely he should have become a billionaire due to Rich Dads advice from such a young age. Instead he is a millionaire most probably only due to book sales, and he accomplished this by age 50! In contrast, Bill Gates became a billionaire when he was about 30 years old.
* Billionaires like Trump, Getty and the guy who founded Wal-Mart have autobiographies out, costing about 4 bucks each, brand new. Why is Kiyosaki's stuff (seminars, games, books etc) so expensive in comparison?
* Why isn't Kiyosaki on one of the many Rich Lists? Why isn't he a billionaire by now, since he claims to be so good with money?
*Google.com was sold for billions. Youtube.com sold for billions. If Kiyosakis methods were as good as he says, he would have sold his incredible moneymaking secret system to a buyer for countless billions, so why hasn't he?
* Do a Google search for'"Casey Serin'on the internet, to see someone who became bankrupt using Kiyosaki's methods.
* Do a Google search for "John T Reed", who is one of Kiyosakis biggest critics and see a great argument presented into what a fraud Kiyosaki is.
* Kiyosaki is like the Milli Vanilli (a fake music group) of the financial world. His advice is jam packed with lies. It has a tiny helping of truths copied from elsewhere thrown in, to confuse you.


MY OWN REAL LIFE EXPERIENCE WITH'"RICH DAD POOR DAD ' :

I got Rich Dad Poor Dad in 2001, and I earnestly tried to put Kiyosaki's ideas into practice. I have yet to make a penny directly out of it. I re-read the book quite a few times over the years, just in case I had misunderstood any of it, but I still have been completely unable to make his principles work. Rich Dad Poor Dad is just like a comic book. When I tried the ideas out, like so many other people, I got absolutely nowhere.

Kiyosaki's writing does stir up strong emotional responses, yet I have never been able to make any of his money making schemes work in real life. His principles fail because, in reality, vast amounts of start up capital and the ability to predict the future would be required for his methods to produce the consistently high yields he claims. He says 'don't work for money, make money work for you', but I have found that I have always had to put in some effort somewhere along the line, to get my money. Maybe there's just something wrong with me, but I have so far been unable to get something for nothing.

If not for the fact that I also read other books and pursued other plans over the years, I'm sure Kiyosaki's advice alone would have bankrupted me, as it has done to at least one person I know. Once people get past the joy of being told by Kiyosaki that they no longer need to work for money, they can then go on to test out his juvenile ideas in the real world and see what happens. One of my friends got well into Kiyosaki a few years ago. He got all the books, spent $300 on both board games, quit his job, and annoyed everyone by constantly boasting about how rich he was going to become, and how amazing Robert Kiyosaki is. Now, he's bankrupt and disgraced, as he found out that it's nowhere near as easy as Kiyosaki makes out. Now he's got no money, and he looks like a fool. Meanwhile the Kiyosaki circus rolls on.

The inaccuracies in the book outweigh any good points the book may have. For example, most people now know that Martha Stewart went to prison for insider trading, and for the author to blatantly recommend a form of it, is absurd. Anyone who has read that part of it, and then goes on to positively recommend the book to other people ought to be ashamed of themselves. The sales of this book only point to how desperate people are, to become rich.

I have met many Kiyosaki devotees in my own life, who have a positive outlook, but they have a tendency to hide, or lie about their current financial status in order to keep their mis-guided dreams going and to make themselves look like some kind of big-shot. Some of these people later went on to have their house re-possessed, as they had left their job to start a business which they thought would be easy to do without much effort . 'I don't work for money, money works for me, they would say, parrot fashion. Kiyosaki might say these are all learning experiences, but these devotees have families with children, and real responsibilities toward them.

Why is it that the people who positively recommend this book have simply read it, then instantly raved that Kiyosaki is the messiah who will lead them to financial freedom? Aren't they supposed to also road-test the book in real-life as well, to prove that it works? The commonsense method is obviously to read the book and put the suggestions into practice. THEN when\if you become a millionaire using his (fantasy) methods, you can tell people how good the book is. For people to sing the book's praises before they have even made one ounce of substantial profit out of it makes no sense whatsoever. This whole Rich Dad Poor Dad'"phenomenon'is nothing more than a cult. Most people do want to get rich, but this book is not the path to financial freedom, no matter how desperate you are.

I have friends who read this book around the year 2001, and purchased additional Kiyosaki materials. Nobody is a millionaire or financially free yet. In fact, every single one is either working in their exact same 'crummy' job, or bankrupted. So anybody who thinks this book is good, please also reveal how much money the book has made you.

This book's high sales volume means nothing; billions of people used to believe the world was flat years ago, and that wasn't true either. Borrow this book from the library or from a friend, and attempt to try the ideas in real-life, and you will see how impossible they are in reality. If you are unable to put the principles in the book to good effect in real-life, don't worry its not you, it is Kiyosaki who is at fault.

I find it amazing that millions of people have purchased this book, yet only one person (John T Reed) has even bothered to do a proper investigation into the author's background. Why are't all the millions of people who purchased this book, going out there, and doing their own research into Kiyosaki's business history? Kiyosaki is now one of the best selling self-help authors of all time, and considering that he is dispensing financial advice, he surely deserves far more scrutiny from the investigative media than he has so far been getting. For all those people who are positively recommending this book, please go out and do an investigation into Kiyosaki, then tell us all about it.

Kiyosaki's cash cow continues to milk the innocent public dry. He has a board game costing many hundreds of bucks. I personally know of 3 people who have spent money on the game, and now regret the purchase. The game has a huge price mark up, yet is nothing special, just paper and cardboard. I have sat down to play it a few times with different groups, and it is more boring and time consuming than monopoly.

'Rich Dad, Poor Dad' is a book which preys on people's financial fears and weaknesses; a trick which has worked since time immemorial. Ask yourself why anybody who wants you to be financially free would tell you to pay $300 for his pathetic board games (he does this at the end of the book!). Kiyosaki also charges thousands of dollars for seminars; how can a poor person trying to become rich, afford it? Kiyosaki is not a man who cares if you are unable to feed your children or pay your bills. Kiyosaki hit the jackpot with this book; I bet he still can't quite believe how many people bought it. He probably laughs himself to sleep every night.

This book, and its advice, is over-priced, over-simplified, unintelligible, and completely impractical in the real world. Kiyosaki is not living his current rich lifestyle due to the advice in this book. His lifestyle comes from sales of the book, as he has obviously made millions of dollars out of it.

Robert Kiyosaki has around 20 books out now, and shockingly, even his wife Kim Kiyosaki has gotten in on the act with a book called'"Rich Woman ' , presumably to emulate the success of female gurus like Suze Orman. As near as I can tell, Kim Kiyosaki has failed to match the sales or profile of her husband and I will be another person not buying her book.

Kiyosaki wrote that following Rich Dads advice left him bankrupt, penniless and living in a car. I also watched some TV show Kiyosaki was on in 2006, and he talked about how he was broke and penniless when he met his wife. This was after 30 years of using the plans he is telling us all to use in this book! The sad reality is, that if you become bankrupt: employers are less likely to hire you for a job, it becomes EXTREMELY harder to get bank loans (especially at acceptable rates), and you may become homeless (like Kiyosaki) and never recover. If you want to end up on the streets and feeling like a fool, then follow this books advice.

In summary, this book is all about a man who allegedly used his'"Rich Dads'methods for years and only ended up bankrupt. He then wrote a book which became a bestseller, and the rest is history. Kiyosaki is rich now, but what he has written in this book, and stated on TV, proves that the methods in his book are not the path he took, as Rich Dads methods left him destitute.

If you want to be rich and happy, do not buy this book. Start by getting a job, and then save and invest your money like real rich people have done for centuries. If you buy this book, you will only be contributing to Kiyosaki's'"ignorance tax ' /

I have now read hundreds of books about getting rich, attended a few seminars, and I continue to seek out new information. I am continually amazed by the tactics people (like Kiyosaki) use, to trick you out of your money. Remember the old saying,'"A fool and his money are soon parted' There are a lot of callous people in this world who will take your money shamelessly until you are broke. If something sounds too good to be true, it usually is.

The best book I have ever read on making money is'"The Richest Man in Babylon'which has made me many thousands, simply by saving money working at my normal, boring job, and quietly amassing a small fortune. Other books I found useful with principles that actually work in real life, are 'The Millionaire Next door' and 'The Millionaire Mind. I consider myself financially comfortable right now, but I currently think that to reach my own financial goals will take me about ten years. I have yet to find a get rich quick scheme, and I consider Rich Dad poor Dad a bad investment, as I lost money by buying it. Having said that, I'm glad I tested it in real life, as I had to know the truth for myself. I do not recommend that anyone buys Rich Dad Poor Dad, as it really is just a nice fantasy tale, and nothing more. Trust me on this; I have now owned the book for over 5 years, as have many other people I know. Nobody has made any money from using it, after all this time!!


GOOD BOOKS TO READ ABOUT HOW TO MAKE MONEY:

The following are a list of books written by, or about, real rich people who have an actual track record. What is notable, is the contrast in price with these books, and the price of information from gurus such as Kiyosaki who have no traceable track record but charge thousands for seminars. The total price of all the books I've spotlighted below is less than 150 dollar/euros. Try Amazon.com to buy these books:

Foundation:

1. The richest man in Babylon
2. The millionaire next door
3. The millionaire mind

Autobiographies:

1. The Art of the deal, Donald Trump
2. Anyone can do it, Duncan Bannatyne
3. How to be rich, J Paul Getty
4. Made in America - Sam Walton
5. Losing My Virginity - Richard Branson
6. How to get rich, Felix Dennis

Investing:

1. The Intelligent Investor, Benjamin Graham
2. One up on Wall Street, Peter Lynch
3. The essays of Warren Buffett, Warren Buffett

Other:

1. The 7 habits of highly effective people, Stephen Covey



  • Paperback

    Format

If you are commenting on behalf of the company that has been reviewed, please consider upgrading to Official Business Response for higher impact replies.
Was this review helpful? 0 0