About Me 22

Welcome to my blog BeSmartRich or BSR.

I know it is a dorky name for a personal finance blog and probably many people don’t take it seriously but my intention was good at least so stop making fun of it people!

Anyway, that dorky name makes me work harder to put good contents here so look around and let me know whether it meets your standards.

Welcome to my blog and hope you enjoy your time! -BSR

Quick Summary of Me

• Early 30’s male
• Born in South Korea and live in Toronto, Canada
• Came to study English and work for 6 months in Vancouver, Canada in 2006 but that became more than 8 years so far and keeps counting
• Newly married in 2013 with my love of my life. No kids yet but a greyhound that eats like a horse.

• 

  My wife and the pet horse I am talking about

• Became a Canadian in January 2015
• A chartered accountant
• Addicted to
  • Glass of red wine, all kinds of beers, scotch, whiskey, gin and kahlua. Whatever make me drunk.
  • Typically drink after work and fall asleep on the couch around 9pm until my wife wakes me up at 11pm to help me move to the bed.
    

    This is my guilty pleasure

  • Drinking with friends solving all kinds of world’s problems
  • Authentic and Genuine people who are true to themselves
  • Animals especially dogs and cats
  • Numbers
  • Playing piano and guitar. Used to be in a fusion jazz band in Korea
  • Listening to all kinds of music. Jazz, Blues, Pop, Hiphop, Rock, Hardcore, Metal, Reggae, Classical piano…
  • Swimming, skating, snowboarding, walking
  • Korean movies- Peppermint Candy, Secret Sunshine, Oasis, Pieta, Green Fish, ‘Spring, Summer, Fall, Winter… and Spring’, The wailing, The good, the bad the weird, I saw the devil, Old boy, Stoker, Symphathy for Mr. Vengeance, Handmaiden, Lady vengeance, Thirst, Memories of murder, The host, Mother, The age of shadows etc…
  • Other favorite movies- No country for old men, Zodiac, Children of Men, Gravity,  Biutiful, Pan’s Labyrinth, The shape of water, Mulholland Drive, In the mood for love, Son of Saul
  • Movie directors- Alfonso Cuaron, Alejandro Gonzalez Inarritu, Nolan, Cohen brothers, David Fincher, David Lynch, Guillermo Deltoro, Hong Sang Su, Park Chan Wook, Bong Jun Ho, Kim Kiduk, Na Hong Jin, Lee Chang Dong, Zhang Lu,
  • Reading books about anything interesting that I have never done before
  • Traveling
  • Food
  • Buying super high quality companies
  • Be inspired by hard working people regardless what they do for a living

Investing Goals

1. Beat the markets at 80% of time
2. Annualized return of 15% to double my investment every 5 years.
3. Try to have fun while at it?

My monster dog. She consumes more food than my wife

Land of Opportunities

I was born and raised in Seoul, Korea and currently resides in Toronto, Canada, my land of opportunity.

I had so many different jobs while I was growing up in Korea. I used to be a newspaper delivery man, gas station assistant, convenient store cashier, dish washer, bakery assistant, flyer handout man, buffet and various restaurants server, computer store assistant, sergeant of Korean military etc…

I worked hard but my life wasn’t going anywhere until I realized that in order to be financially independent in this harsh world, learning to live Smart is the key. So I decide to come to Canada. I arrived in Canada, Vancouver, back in July 2006 right after completing my military service.

Lesson Learned from Military

From the military, I learned to push my mental and physical barrier. My team often worked under unfavorable conditions such as running low on food or sleep. I had to make quick decisions. I learned to live consistently out of my comfort zone and operate effectively and efficiently despite all the stressors. I learned to tune out the distractions and focus at the task at hand.

I used to live in that APC (Armoured Personnel Carrier) for 2 years.

Minimum Wage?- No Problems

I endured 2 years golden time of my life in one of toughest military in the world so I had full of confidence and was extremely happy to be out of the military and be a civilian. Living in a totally different country was tough but exciting and very rewarding as I learned something new every day. I had no English skills, was very shy and quiet and knew no one but myself.

I studied in a language school and worked as dish washer and pawn shop assistant at first making less than minimum wage. If I think about it now, I was taken an advantage by the employers due to the fact that I spoke poor English and was a fresh foreign worker without a university degree although I was happy to make some money to pay for rent and bills and not touching my savings.

$7/ hour wasn’t really great.

Good Education is a Must-have

During the stay, I became more and more fond of staying in Canada. I really like Canadians for their well mannered and warm hearted personality and its diversity. I love its beautiful well cared pollution free nature and its great culture. I realized that this is my land of opportunity and dream. So I decided to stay and study. I wanted to study in all the great university in Canada such as UBC, Simon Fraser, UT, Mcgill,  etc… but I couldn’t afford them. I would have declared personal bankruptcy within 2 years if I studied one of those schools. Haha… So I researched every single universities in Canada from Saskatchewan, Regina, to Memorial university in Newfoundland then I found an excellent business school in Halifax, Nova Scotia that was affordable.

So I moved from West Coast, Vancouver, BC to all the way to East Coast, Halifax, Nova Scotia. People in Halifax is wonderful, very caring and warm. I made amazing friends, partied a lot but when other people partied harder, I knew I had to work at least twice harder than others to be even so I came home and studied and worked very hard.

All the hard work materialized as I graduated with Summa Cum Laude and received a job offer from a big 4 accounting firm a year before I graduated. Lucky? Absolutely! But you get luckier if you try harder!

Became a Canadian Citizen

Most recently, I achieved my greatest goal of my life. I became a Canadian. Words can’t describe enough how proud I am to be a Canadian. It took me 8 years to achieve this goal of my life. I want to thank everyone for warm friendships along the journey and I decided to work hard days and nights to pay back for all the help and support I received. The best way is to work for them and never ever forget all the support that I received.

The Purpose of the Blog

That’s one of the main reasons why I created this blog not because my friends and family get annoyed and cranky when I talk about world’s problems, stock markets and my random rants. Haha… I want to encourage hard working people just like you to study, work smartly, save, being frugal and invest wisely for better future. Think about it. I was poor, had no family member living nearby, my language skills were terrible and was a high school graduate making less than minimum wage.
I worked very hard with smart plans and I am quite different now as compared to who I was 8 years ago. Currently, I work with a TSX company and have a managerial position in the accounting department. I am nobody compared to all the successful people but I want to share all the tips that I know with you regarding how a regular person just like you has a dream to be a millionaire and getting closer every day.

Welcome to a Random Korean Immigrant’s Million Dollar Journey

Whether you are a hard working immigrant like me or a native speaker (wherever you were born) feeling stuck in life with no way out, what you are probably missing is learning to live Smart. If a random Korean immigrant who used to speak terrible English without university degree in Canada can do it then you can do it too.

Set your goals up and Fulfill your dream. I want to be as honest as possible in my blog and of course will be accountable for decisions that I make. I won’t try to make stupid mistakes but it may happen and you are more than welcome to laugh with me so be prepared.

I don’t consider myself a financial guru but I keep my eyes open to learn something useful everyday. My net worth as of May 2011 was $25,000 and I am planning to grow my current net worth of $90,000 (Sep 1 2014) to $1,000,000 before I hit 45 years old. Yes. I said it. Is the goal too unrealistic? Well, let’s see how it goes.  If this sounds interesting, Subscribe your email and come along for the voyage.

If you will excuse me, I will have to water my money tree.

All the contents in my blog are provided to you at free of charge. If you insist that my blog was helpful to you, impacted your life positively and you want to buy me a beer then you can just do that through Paypal. Thank you for the beer buddy!

Here is my most popular post that was written in June 2016. Check out!

How to save $200,000 in 6 years and retire before 45

The following lists the most popular posts

5 Key Tips to Boost Your Investment Returns Today!

11 most important Warren Buffett’s stock picking tips, especially 7th one.

How to save $200,000 in 6 years and retire before 45

50 most insightful Warren Buffett quotes that you need to read to be rich.

Legendary investor Peter Lynch’s Top 13 best stock picking tips from ‘One Up on Wall Street’

Why Quality Matters the Most- Linamar, MTY, Enghouse, CGI Group and Google

Investing is Art, Science and Your Own Homework.

Why is Cash the King when investing?

One question you must ask yourself before buying any stocks

My one of the most stupid investing mistakes- BUY IT WHEN YOU CAN!

Insider ownership is almost everything when it comes to stock performance2017/02/05

Can you save $10 a day? If so you will be a millionaire in about 30 years.

Do you know how much your CEO make?

Why I strongly dislike all time high stock markets and Buffett seems to agree with me?

Why is a liberal arts degree useless?

Canada’s Warren Buffett, Mark Leonard’s Constellation Software

Constellation Software’s another blowout earnings under Mark Leonard, the best capital allocator in Canada or possibly in the World!

Constellation Software and MTY Food Group’s blowout quarter

Canada’s Warren Buffett, Mark Leonard’s Constellation Software growth story continues with Q4 earnings results

Top 30 performing TSX stocks for last 3 years. Can you guess what the top performing stock is?